Double-post callout double-post

May 15, 2002 8:35 AM

When double-post callouts are ignored: a second post about game console price cuts (here's the first one), posting a link that that had been posted in the comments of the original thread. I pointed this out, but discussion continued anyway. Discussion is still going on in the first thread, and the general thrust of the discussion in each thread is absolutely identical (price cuts, comparisons of consoles, buying advice). What, was I too polite?
posted by mcwetboy to Etiquette/Policy at 8:35 AM (44 comments total)

No, you just need to settle down. It's not the end of the world, a double post.
It's not even against the law.

The conversation has continued because people are already inside the context of that thread. Lighten up.
posted by rocketman at 8:49 AM on May 15, 2002

And, the first thread is about the Sony price cut. The second one is about Microsoft's price cut.

So they are a bit different. I would also posit that many users do not want to wade through a thread that has gone to 40 comments.
posted by rocketman at 8:51 AM on May 15, 2002

The FrontPagePost from yesterday was posted at 3:40 pm eastern and was probably missed by many east coasters while today's was posted at 9:18 am eastern, the beginning of the workday. The more recent one was at hand, and so, it got comments. That's what happens given the MeFi story-submit system and differences in time zones. Them's the breaks.
posted by mischief at 8:52 AM on May 15, 2002

Maybe no one cares? I know people like to be pendantic about the rules here, but the only rule here is basicly majority rule outside of the what matt feels like dealing with.

I'm personally not a fan of what seems to be a race to point out double posts and all the unwritten rules that seem to go with them. Until someone develops a weblogging format that addresses recurring topics then we're going to be stuck with this little "problem".

I mean how many new opinions are we getting on the middle east, racism, corporations doing bad things, etc? I'd say atleast 90% of the posts on each of those topics are identical to posts in another thread about the same thing. Does that stop people from posting these topics?

Since I'm on a rant here I'm going to just veer off in another direction now. To be honest I don't read metafilter for the links. Yeah, there's some good stuff here, but it's mostly recycled stuff from other weblogs and a good chunk just comes off news sites. However, I do read it for the comments because that's the real strength of this site. Any post that encourages people to make intresting comments is good by me. Even if that subject has been discussed in a recent thread. Two threads on the same topic have the potential to go different ways. They give different people the chance to express their opinions. The best part is that it takes very little of my time to notice I've read something before, and if it's not something I'm intrested enough to read twice then I can just pass it by.

So, to sum it all up, while you should try to avoid double posts it's not the end of the world if they show up, and if people are having a good thread off one, don't try to rain on their parade.
posted by betaray at 8:55 AM on May 15, 2002

I know people like to be pendantic

That's "pedantic."

;)
posted by rodii at 8:57 AM on May 15, 2002

awesome
posted by betaray at 8:58 AM on May 15, 2002

I suspected that my needing to lighten up about it — or, to put it another way, that it isn't worth worrying about, really — was one possible answer. (And I mentioned it in early drafts of this post — yes, I do multiple drafts of posts, howzat for anal? — but eliminated it to keep it briefer.) Fair enough!

But let me toss around some of the points made here, because my original point (which I may not have made explicit) was to generate some discussion about this. We've got a bunch of new members arriving and we're in a bit of a Usenet September situation here, so discussing the "rules", and how strict to be about them, isn't a bad thing.

mischief: The more recent one was at hand, and so, it got comments — But my issue here, valid or not, is not that it was a double post (yes, they happen), but that I pointed out, in the first comment, the ongoing discussion in the earlier thread, and that few people apparently took the bait. Which I found a little perplexing, maybe even annoying.

rocketman: I would also posit that many users do not want to wade through a thread that has gone to 40 comments. — A difficult precedent which gives the green-light to a much more cluttered front page: start a new thread on the same or nearly similar topic because 40 comments are too many? I know many Mefi users are allergic to the page-down key (hence the double posts), but jeez, is 40 comments really that much to wade through? (Been on Slashdot lately?)

rocketman: And, the first thread is about the Sony price cut. The second one is about Microsoft's price cut. — I think that's splitting hairs, actually, but that's a legitimate point of disagreement: I think they were close enough to warrant continuing discussion in the original thread. Maybe I take a somewhat broader view of what constitutes a double post than some, but I don't think I'm necessarily wrong. Should there have been two threads about Apple's server announcement yesterday? One on XServe, one on the upcoming 3U XServe RAID array? I mean, there's a risk, if you take a narrow view of double posting, of splitting hairs so finely that you have lots of different posts on very closely related subjects.

betaray: Aren't two threads on the same topic more difficult to keep track of, though?
posted by mcwetboy at 9:12 AM on May 15, 2002

I know people like to be pendantic

That's "pedantic."

;)

Actually, I think betaray is correct. Pendantic I take to mean something you wear round your neck, that swings, pendulum-like, both ways. So that sometimes one berates double posts and other times one forgives them. This seems to describe the MeFi mindset at the moment quite well.

Plus mon coeur balance... ;)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 9:18 AM on May 15, 2002

To be honest I don't read metafilter for the links

Neither do I. I get better news links at sites like ALdaily.com.

My rant: There's something "in the air" right now in the science community. I've had several discussions with scientist friends about it. It would make a great front-page post and a good scoop except that there are no good primary-sources for this that I can link to on the Web. I feel that I am sitting on my hands now, waiting for someone in the Time-Warner-Viacom megacomplex to write an article on it first so that I can then 'link' to it.

I suppose I can also start my own weblog, write a post about this and then hope that someone else links to that. *sigh*
posted by vacapinta at 9:33 AM on May 15, 2002

"but that I pointed out, in the first comment, the ongoing discussion in the earlier thread, and that few people apparently took the bait. Which I found a little perplexing, maybe even annoying."

Why should anyone respect anything you say? Who are you? What is your authority?

They probably perceived you as a "busy-body teachers' pet" type of guy ("Oh, look, someone's playing traffic cop. How cute. Asshole.") and did what they wanted despite your whining. Pure and simple human nature.

posted by mischief at 9:34 AM on May 15, 2002

Why should anyone respect anything you say? Who are you? What is your authority?

Authority has nothing to do with it. I respect everything anyone says, regardless of who they are and what their authority is. Try it some time. Asshole.
posted by mcwetboy at 9:38 AM on May 15, 2002

Should there have been two threads about Apple's server announcement yesterday? One on XServe, one on the upcoming 3U XServe RAID array?

I'll split a hair here: They were announced at the same event, by the same company. The price cuts were made on different days, by different companies. To me, another FPP seems justified. I'm not following any rules or guidelines, just using common sense.

Honestly though, I find the double post and metatalk fingerpointing on comments more irritating than the actual double posts. If I am interested in the what people have to say about the posts, I will read the comments (all 40 of them) in both threads. If I feel the FPP's are too similar and I don't care much about them, I will skip them.

It's true that the Metafilter membership continues to grow, and the signal-to-noise ratio has gotten worse, but this kind of policing merely adds to the noise.
posted by ry at 9:41 AM on May 15, 2002

"I respect everything anyone says, regardless of who they are and what their authority is."

Therein lies my point. That is who you are, and now you are trying to force your personality traits onto others, but you do not have the authority to do so. Therefore, you were ignored.
posted by mischief at 9:46 AM on May 15, 2002

Off-topic: Vacapinta, don't you feel A&L Daily is much sloppier than it used to be? They don't seem to cover the more serious magazines as thoroughly as they used to and they seem to have abandoned screening the quarterlies and academic journals altogether. There are a lot more newspaper articles than before and most stuff is unbearably short, superficial and gossipy. I hate their new "Nota Bene" feature as well. It's still good, of course, but it can no longer be trusted to go through the available goods. The decadence seems to have set in when the Lingua Franca connection dwindled. Or is it just me? Sorry, everyone else.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 9:56 AM on May 15, 2002

Is there any point to the self-policing model if people get huffy whenever someone (other than Matt) tries to point something out? I mean, in the "who the hell are you to tell us what to do" sense. It's not the first time I've seen this; it's happened to me (and lots of other people) before. It really pisses me off to be branded a teacher's pet and a whiner by someone hiding behind anonymity when I'm simply following the policing model that has developed here and trying to improve the site. This is how self-policing works, and there have been Metatalk threads ad nauseum about it, usually triggered by people who bristle at the thought that anyone else can tell them what to do on the site. Fine: quadruple posts, self-links, linkless threads and Amazon links with associate IDs all round, then — and Matt has to work full-time keeping us under control, because no one listens to anyone else, or everyone leaves because it's total anarchy.

Folks, it's a point of debate whether the PS2 and Xbox price cut threads are double posts or not. I thought they were — especially given that both consoles (and the Gamecube) were discussed in the comments, and in the same way! — and other people disagree with me. That's fine: I don't mind being wrong. But there's a difference between saying "I don't think that was a double post, actually, and here's why" and calling me a whiner and a teacher's pet. Is that really necessary?

Therein lies my point. That is who you are, and now you are trying to force your personality traits onto others, but you do not have the authority to do so. Therefore, you were ignored.

Did you read my original comment? Suggest continuing discussion in the original thread. Real forceful, that. Next time I should do it in standard Mefi style, with haikus about pancakes, maybe?
posted by mcwetboy at 10:00 AM on May 15, 2002

Well said, mcwetboy.

And mischief, if you're operating under a "disrespect until proven respect-worthy" philosophy, well, that's loathsome.
posted by Marquis at 10:12 AM on May 15, 2002

"to be branded a teacher's pet and a whiner"

Reread my comment; that statement was a hypothetical mental stream of someone in the original thread ignoring you, not from me personally.

"I'm simply following the policing model "
"triggered by people who bristle at the thought that anyone else can tell them what to do on the site"

Regardless of how you had worded your comment in the original thread, benevolently (as you did) or sarcastically or caustically, the comment would have been construed as authoritarian, as you yourself declare in this thread.

posted by mischief at 10:25 AM on May 15, 2002

*stands with mcwetboy*

I thought the way mcwetboy did this was polite and helpful. He was ignored; it happens. What happens next is something I've seen over and over again here: abuse until the person trying to be constructive decides it's not worth it. And that's one less constructive poster.
posted by rodii at 10:25 AM on May 15, 2002

rodii: Here is a perfect example of over-romanticizing.
posted by mischief at 10:29 AM on May 15, 2002

rodii: abuse? where in that thread does anyone abuse mcswetboy? the thread continued on subject. the abuse, if there really is any, is in this thread, but then that's not much of a surprise. it's metatalk after all.
posted by eyeballkid at 10:43 AM on May 15, 2002

Self-policing here, as I understand it, isn't about enforcing the rules, but about keeping some sense of community responsibility. This kind of site will work best if members have some long-term view of how they think it how it should be, and sometimes rein in their need for instant gratification. Obviously, those long-term views will vary widely, and one individual's will often be ignored, but they allow for more compromise than selfish behaviour, and compromise is what makes this work.

In this case, I tend to agree with mcwetboy that not front page posting every incremental change to a news story is better, because it encourages longer, more thoughtful threads with more links, that can sometimes work almost as portals. As Nick Sweeney said in his kottke.org interview: "MeFi still retains an implicit quality threshold, with its emphasis on providing supporting links and challenging easy polarisations." This also relates to what Steven Johnson wrote recently in Salon, about weblogs being as much an alternative to Google as to journalism. I appreciate that many come here only for the discussion, and I have no problem with that, but I don't think mcwetboy should be told "screw you, cop" for offering his polite suggestion.
posted by liam at 10:46 AM on May 15, 2002

Just to weigh in with mcwetboy and applaud his tactics: at the very least, if "down-page" considerations were taken into account, the post should have made clear it was an update and linked to the original PS2 thread.

Still, I agree with him it would have made a great post on the original thread, which was very recent, and would have revitalized, cross-fertilized and probably evanized it too. ;)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 10:47 AM on May 15, 2002

Regardless of how you had worded your comment in the original thread, benevolently (as you did) or sarcastically or caustically, the comment would have been construed as authoritarian, as you yourself declare in this thread.

So is this an ominous indicator of the poster's methodology or an ominous indicator of the mindset of the community? I know my take on it.
posted by Skot at 10:59 AM on May 15, 2002

I'm surprised at all the bile directed at mcwetboy. That post about the xbox price cut is a perfect thing to post in the older (1 day older!) thread; as a post of its own it's feeble at best. It means more junk to scroll through if you're not interested in the topic. If you are interested, which I am, it's counterproductive because the discussion is split. Come on - let's say George Bush goes on a cross-country crime spree, do we need a new post every time he holds up a new convenience store? Doesn't it make more sense to have just the one post about the whole spree, and keep commenting in there? Included in the PS2 price cut post is mention of the expected Xbox cut... *sigh* mcwetboy, I think you did the right thing.
posted by D at 11:08 AM on May 15, 2002

"an ominous indicator of the mindset of the community"

I didn't read either front page thread until after I read this MeTa post, so your former conjecture cannot be true. Considering that the discussion in the more recent front page thread continued despite mcwebboy's subsequent and direct MetaTalk link, your latter conjecture is the true one.


posted by mischief at 11:21 AM on May 15, 2002

rodii: Here is a perfect example of over-romanticizing.

Fair enough!
posted by rodii at 11:24 AM on May 15, 2002

Well while I agree that the self policing is a good thing. I even see the value in the pointing out double posts/self links/etc.

However there's a difference between a self policing community and a community policed by mcwetboy. You pointed out the problem, and nobody really seemed to care. Thus the community didn't see it as a problem and everyone should have moved on. You did your little service to the community. Those who are intrested in XBox vs. PS2 can post more comments. Those who don't care didn't read it.

As much as metafilter claims to be community policed, it's actually just at the mercy of the people who are here. Right now it's a place where some pretty smart people post links intresting links on news/society/politics and discuss them. If a bunch of people want to post links about the best goat-porn sites on the web and fill the comments with ascii-art pictures of vegetables the only person that has any power to change that is Matt.

(Un)Fortunately there's no way to make metafilter be something. Inablitity to keep out "unwanted" content keeps the community dynamic, but causes tension when the things that the older members came for change or disappear.

So while there are things that I find annoying, I tend to ignore them in order not to encourage that kind of behavior (on the internet any acknowlegement is encouragement), and if this site becomes something that I don't want to read any more I'll stop and find a new place to go. It's what I did with slashdot, and as much as I miss having a nerd site with a low signal to noise ratio there are appearantly thousands of people who still love slashdot, and I wouldn't want to take that away from them.
posted by betaray at 11:29 AM on May 15, 2002

Okay, so let me ask this:

This thread about a lawsuit against Verisign, has been superseded by following events, which I linked to at the bottom of the thread late last night. The thread itself has quickly scrolled down to the bottom of the page, and I know not many people may have seen my link in it.

However, a judge issuing an injunction against Verisign could be newsworthy enough to merit its own FPP, and I note that in my comment.

Would it be considered a double post? A follow-up? What's the etiquette here?
posted by WolfDaddy at 11:34 AM on May 15, 2002

betaray: However there's a difference between a self policing community and a community policed by mcwetboy.

Sigh. Any time anyone tries to point out anything, they get accused of trying to singlehandedly police Metafilter. A community is the sum of its parts. You can't espouse a belief in community policing and then complain when one member of the community tries to do some community policing — not if you want to be consistent, anyway. And I never said that my word was law around here; that was imputed to me by certain individuals simply because I dared to venture an opinion about how we should conduct ourselves here.

betaray: You pointed out the problem, and nobody really seemed to care.

Yes. And I wondered about that, so I posted this thread in Metatalk to ask how come. No worse, I think, than many a Metatalk thread asking why a post was deleted, for example. What, exactly, is the problem here?

WolfDaddy: However, a judge issuing an injunction against Verisign could be newsworthy enough to merit its own FPP, and I note that in my comment.

Not that my opinion has any more intrinsic weight than anyone else's around here (fuck, do I have to say that at every turn now?), but I think you've answered your own question: a follow-up may be worthwhile if it's newsworthy and would otherwise be missed. Now let's argue over what constitutes "newsworthy" and "would otherwise be missed". (If it was simple and clear-cut, we wouldn't need Metatalk, now, would we?)
posted by mcwetboy at 11:47 AM on May 15, 2002

WolfDaddy, I was going to post a link about the Verisign injunction until I saw your comment in the earlier thread.

If I had gone ahead and posted it, would that be wrong?
posted by timeistight at 12:05 PM on May 15, 2002

Like I said I don't see anything wrong with what you've done. I'm also not accusing you of trying to be the law around here. What I'm trying to was trying to answer your question. I should have been more clear.

I don't know how to structure this so I'll just explain the two quotes you pulled out:

However there's a difference between a self policing community and a community policed by mcwetboy.

I knew as soon as I posted this I should have said that I didn't really mean you specificly. I meant that due to the nature of metafilter, no one person can police it. It's mostly individual effort on the part of the posters. It's fine to point out that something is caustic, or stupid, or not deserving of a front page post, but don't expect for people to immediately change their mind, because they surely thought otherwise, or they would had said/posted it. Since this community is open to virtually anyone their opinions hold just as much weight as your own (which you and I both know, see below).

You pointed out the problem, and nobody really seemed to care.

Again this was trying to answer your question. There's no problem that you posted here in metatalk, but your expectations of seeing people move to the old thread on command are unreasonable.

I understand that you don't think you were trying to force people to do something, but I guess the rest of us are missing your point. You asked for something to happen. It didn't. Now you're asking why it didn't, and we're all telling you it's because people don't have to listen to you. However, now your telling us you didn't expect people to.

Maybe you could clarify what you're problem is with what happened?
posted by betaray at 12:29 PM on May 15, 2002

put a big old mcwetboy: in front of all of that
posted by betaray at 12:39 PM on May 15, 2002

betaray: Thanks for clarifying. (Part of the problem, I think, is that the discussion here has been focusing on what's been said in this thread, rather than what happened over there — a lot of what I say, for example, is in response to here instead of there. And the snarky atmosphere does seem to cast everything we say in this thread in the least favourable light, don't you think? But I digress.)

What was my problem? In a nutshell: I called double-post (sort of) and nothing happened. Did I expect something to happen? Well, kind of — in the sense that I thought there was a shared understanding of how things (ought to) work around here, not in the "obey me, fools!" sense. When things failed to occur, I wondered whether I simply didn't do it properly (not clear or nasty enough), or whether I was simply out to lunch. (Some of you have had considerable to say on the latter question!)

It seems to me that I ought to have added " . . . or was I mistaken in calling this a double post?" at the end of the, whatever you call it, that started this thread. That might have tempered some of the more negative reactions to it, and would have been a more accurate representation of what I was trying to accomplish here. (But I take too long to construct my posts as it is!)
posted by mcwetboy at 12:56 PM on May 15, 2002

fwiw since i was one of the people who continued discussion in the thread for today and didn't go back to the old one, i'll just say that the reason i did so was because the Microsoft price cut was announced this morning and so i felt the new thread was topical and current, and so rather than go back to a day old thread on sony's price cut, i felt like commenting there. i just find the active threads more engaging. it had nothing to do with anything else, and if my ignoring your suggestions somehow upset you then i'm sorry for that, but i thought the chances were good that the thread from today would end up being more engaging then going back to one for yesterday.

*shrug*
posted by zoopraxiscope at 1:04 PM on May 15, 2002

i have a headache
posted by clavdivs at 1:08 PM on May 15, 2002

it is metatalk related
posted by clavdivs at 1:08 PM on May 15, 2002

Augh! Is yesterday really that long ago?
posted by D at 1:35 PM on May 15, 2002

D: Augh! Is yesterday really that long ago?
zoopraxiscope: i felt the new thread was topical and current, and so rather than go back to a day old thread on sony's price cut, i felt like commenting there. i just find the active threads more engaging.

D: Tell me about it. (And another thing . . . ) I'm really surprised at how short the shelf life of your average thread is getting around here. Vicious circle: too many posts per day leads to yesterday's posts being too far down the page, which encourages more double posts, which results in too many posts per day . . . zoopraxiscope: Fair play to yeh, but the old thread was an active thread: there were comments being added two hours after the new thread was posted. (OK, I'll shut up now; this horse is starting to look a bit sickly.)
posted by mcwetboy at 1:49 PM on May 15, 2002

WolfDaddy, I was going to post a link about the Verisign injunction until I saw your comment in the earlier thread.

timeistight, go for it: a) I think I'm getting a rep around here as the "I Hate Verisign" guy and b) if you post it, I can spend my allowance on something else, like ice cream. :)
posted by WolfDaddy at 2:12 PM on May 15, 2002

Showing up late here, but my two cents: it was a double post, mcwetboy was right to point it out, and mischief's snarkiness about it here make me want to pour boiling hot coffee down his shirt. But I've already established that I need to calm down and get a life, so we'll let that last one go.

Really, people, is it that hard to scroll down the page to see if what you're about to post has been discussed within the last day or two? It's annoying and pointless to have the same conversation spread across two or three different threads.
posted by ook at 2:49 PM on May 15, 2002

Wolfdaddy: I'll post it tomorrow, if no one else does it first. Today it'd just get lost in the soda pop links.
posted by timeistight at 3:20 PM on May 15, 2002

mcwetboy - I agree. For what it's worth, I don't think there was any problem with how you framed your note. I'm not sure why it didn't have much effect, but you were polite and concise, and quite correct, I think.
posted by lucien at 5:08 PM on May 15, 2002

I'm really surprised at how short the shelf life of your average thread is getting around here. Vicious circle: too many posts per day leads to yesterday's posts being too far down the page, which encourages more double posts, which results in too many posts per day

As I (and others) have been pointing out for some time now, this will continue to be more and more of a problem so long as the system makes it as unwieldy as it is to track yesterday's-and-older threads. If I post in a thread, I have a way of tracking it for a while; if I don't post in a thread, it's gone, gone, gone. With as many NEW threads as are posted daily, it is simply not realistic to expect anyone to go back every day and check the last X number of days worth of posts on the off chance that someone may have posted interesting NEW links (or even discussion) in them. Which is why I feel a bit more liberal than some concerning what constitutes a doublepost, and why I find cries of "post that in the original thread!" are silly and impractical.
posted by rushmc at 7:46 PM on May 15, 2002

I'm sorry but I should just point out that the line "fill the comments with ascii-art pictures of vegetables " made me laugh.

Class.
posted by Frasermoo at 1:04 AM on May 16, 2002