Announcement: new user signups are back on. 20 people a day.

July 26, 2002 3:00 PM

New user signups are back on. 20 people a day are going to be allowed in, starting at noon each day. Only one signup per person, per day as well. Report any probs with it here.
posted by mathowie to MetaFilter-Related at 3:00 PM (70 comments total)

Is that PST or EST or GMT? Just curious...
posted by gen at 3:02 PM on July 26, 2002

Cool Matt. Thanks very much.
posted by timeistight at 3:07 PM on July 26, 2002

is it going to be the first 20 people that request it after noon, or a random 20 throughout the day?
posted by Ufez Jones at 3:07 PM on July 26, 2002

Noon pacific, of course, it's MetaFilter time afterall.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 3:08 PM on July 26, 2002

it's MetaFilter time

*cracks open brewski*

You know what Matt, it just doesn't get any better than this.
posted by machaus at 3:10 PM on July 26, 2002 [1 favorite]

Well, I guess I could have waited, but I'm still happy to have bought my way in. Best ten bucks I've ever spent.
posted by interrobang at 3:14 PM on July 26, 2002 [1 favorite]

Best ten bucks I've ever spent

These people (and many others who are not listed) think so too.
posted by vacapinta at 3:17 PM on July 26, 2002

Thanks for opening it up, Matt. I've been waiting an eternity to get in.
posted by Voice of God at 3:43 PM on July 26, 2002

Hazzah!
posted by silusGROK at 3:45 PM on July 26, 2002

I'd like to be the first to welcome all of you. You have absolutely no idea how glad I am to see you here.
posted by timeistight at 3:54 PM on July 26, 2002

Best ten bucks I've ever spent

Agreed. The amount of entertainment I've gotten out of this site in the last year or two definitely warranted a tip o' the wallet to Matt.

posted by aine42 at 4:02 PM on July 26, 2002

I promise to use these powers only for good.
posted by Smart Dalek at 4:03 PM on July 26, 2002

Most excellent!

So is this what you were referring to in the following quote from the sidebar, or is there yet even more to come?

Now that those bugs are fixed, I'm putting the finishing touches on a new feature for MetaFilter I think everyone will enjoy. More soon.
posted by rushmc at 4:13 PM on July 26, 2002

I was going to post this.

Welcome new people! Now just head on over to Obscure Store and pick out a story for your first FPP!

But then I decided not to.

But if I had, I would have been serious about the "welcome" part.
posted by Shadowkeeper at 4:14 PM on July 26, 2002

rushmc: don't be so happy; you already have a new enemy.

h
posted by interrobang at 4:15 PM on July 26, 2002

Matt, have you made any kind of guess as to how long you'll be able to keep signups open, based on current server load/current users or some other calculation, or are you just going to wait and see?
posted by mr_crash_davis at 4:32 PM on July 26, 2002

I'll just wait and see.

Hopefully a few dozen people quit each day, to level things out. Or I could decrease the allowable signups to ten a day.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:00 PM on July 26, 2002

Hopefully a few dozen people quit each day

Does that mean we need to start targeting various people for a little "mefi" rouging up, to encourage the attrition?

8-)
posted by jazon at 6:23 PM on July 26, 2002

Initiation time!

Bring out the sheep!
posted by adampsyche at 6:42 PM on July 26, 2002

Be sure to rouge them up.
posted by mediareport at 6:44 PM on July 26, 2002

it's MetaFilter time

That's my problem. I'm running on MetaFilter time!


posted by rodz at 6:45 PM on July 26, 2002

"Bring out the sheep!"

Bringing in the sheep, bringing in the sheep. We will come rejoicing, bringing in the sheep.

This is what I thought I was supposed to be singing in church until I was about thirteen years old. Can you blame a kid?
posted by mr_crash_davis at 6:52 PM on July 26, 2002

Be sure to rouge them up.

I'll be the victim, I'll be the victim!

Mainly since once I'm in drag, I'm hideous. All the better to further scare the newbier-than-me's out there :-)
posted by WolfDaddy at 7:11 PM on July 26, 2002

welcome, y'all, glad to have you. hey, have you seen the exquisite new* 'get your war on' comic strips from mnftiu?

If MeFi Users Had Taglines... mathowie: busting his ass for MeFi since 1999

posted by Sapphireblue at 7:22 PM on July 26, 2002

Ah, now I really do feel like I belong here. Be good now, honored and welcome newcomers; remember that those who snuck in ahead of you stuck their necks out awful far at times for you ;)

'sides, all us crusty vets will slap you silly if you get out of line. ;);) (that's a double-wink, in case anyone's wondering).

Guess by about the first week of December we'll be hearing about the 15k club, no?
posted by yhbc at 7:23 PM on July 26, 2002

There are some women out there who read MeFi and want memberships, right? Yes, no? Tomorrow's a new sign up day, 'kay?

See you then, ladies!

For the time being, welcome, welcome gentlemen, to our parlour. Bourbon and Brandy and fine rum for all.

Except whir, for whom I have only chastizement. Bad!
posted by precocious at 7:26 PM on July 26, 2002

Initiation time!

Bring out the sheep!

Oh no you don't, I'm chafed enough already.
posted by slipperywhenwet at 7:30 PM on July 26, 2002

Just remember, new converts:

Steven Den Beste died for your sins.
posted by Kafkaesque at 7:44 PM on July 26, 2002

rushmc: don't be so happy; you already have a new enemy.

I get all the best enemies.
posted by rushmc at 7:52 PM on July 26, 2002

I like the trickle method of opening the mefi pearly gates, but aren't we more or less opening the gates for those in the know? People are probably writing perl scripts to run at noon PST.

How about something like 'enter your email address here' and at midnight everyday it picks 20 people at random and emails them the good news.
posted by skallas at 7:54 PM on July 26, 2002

Steven Den Beste died for your sins.

You now owe me $150 for a new monitor, as mine was just given a Diet Mountain Dew bath.

We'll work out a barter. Got Beer Nuts?
posted by brittney at 8:02 PM on July 26, 2002

Yeah, but I'm taking medication for them.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:28 PM on July 26, 2002

Another point to consider, Matt, is the MetaFilter Time you've chosen. At noon PST, it's o'dark-thirty in Australia. That's 5am for those of you trying to do the math.

Might create an imbalance of US-centric signups. Just thought I'd point that out in case you'd prefer a more global community.

Skallas' idea would help.
posted by cyniczny at 8:31 PM on July 26, 2002

"...in case you'd prefer a more global community."

Nah, we took Miguel and the place went into the toilet.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 8:50 PM on July 26, 2002

As a matter of fact, I was just working on a shell script to notify me if the new user page changed when I noticed that it had changed. I think skallas' idea is a good one; in addition to being less US-centric it would give Matt a good idea about the demand for new accounts (as I think someone else mentioned). On the other hand, I'm loath to suggest anything that be more work for Matt.
posted by whir at 9:04 PM on July 26, 2002

Anything can be hacked, or tweaked, and the one I've chosen isn't perfect.

The only problem with the randomized waiting list is that it might take a long time before people get on the list.

Do I maintain the wait list indefinitely? How many times will a single person signup, in hopes of stacking the lotto in their favor? Do I limit to one spot on the wait list per IP address? Per domain?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 9:28 PM on July 26, 2002

"slipperywhenwet", as in Bon Jovi?
posted by riffola at 9:38 PM on July 26, 2002

Hmm, good point, Matt. I was going to suggest that people could pre-fill out their forms, and then X users could be activated per day, but that still wouldn't stop people from requesting bunches of different usernames. Email addresses are easy to manufacture, and if you go by IP you could cut out people behind proxies (and not stopping dialup/dynamic IP users anyways). I suppose you could set a cookie and stop those people who aren't very technically inclined.

Maybe if you varied the times that signups were made available you could obviate cyniczny's concerns, eg have them at 3:00AM PST for a few days. Just an idea, but that sounds easier than keeping a list of applicants.

By the way, thanks very much for opening the site up again.
posted by whir at 10:09 PM on July 26, 2002

I think the currently system is elegantly simple. As far as making things geographically fairer, why not just change the opening time by 6 hours every so often. Change the time from 12:00pm to 6:00pm to 12:00am etc. whenever Matt felt like it. That should provide equal opportunity around the world.
posted by timeistight at 10:21 PM on July 26, 2002

wolfdaddy: All the better to further scare the newbier-than-me's out there :-)

*cries*

posted by gummi at 11:28 PM on July 26, 2002

matt: The only problem with the randomized waiting list is that it might take a long time before people get on the list.

The current method also means you may never get in at all if you aren't quick with clicking the 'sign me up' button at high noon. Lets face it, many people will probably never get in, might as well make it more random. The current method begs for abuse.

If you went with my suggestion you could cut down on abuse by not allowing popular free web-based email addresses (yahoo, hotmail), restricting IPs, etc. But at this point its a lot of work for little return. Essentially you're mainting a mailing list.

A site I know does this: they have some mailing list service (you can get a free one at yahoo obviously) and people who want to get in sign up. Every so often there's an email from the admin telling them registration is open. Those sitting at their computers frantically click in hopes of making it. Those who don't simply wait for the next announcement. It wouldn't be too hard to automate a random email every day telling people that you're allowing 20 people in. This way it doesn't matter how many email accounts they might have.

Yes, there are ways around this too, but I would think automation on this kind of level would require a lot more work than the other proposals.
posted by skallas at 11:46 PM on July 26, 2002

How about opening up registration every 23 hours instead of 24? That way, "high noon" would slowly cycle its way around the world.
posted by shinybeast at 12:20 AM on July 27, 2002

Choose a random sign-up hour (or something shorter -- maybe fifteen minutes would do).

Have a timer appear on the front page letting people know that a sign-up period has started. Don't make it start on the hour, so people won't be hanging over their keyboards on the hour.

Show the timer only to people who are not logged in, so those with accounts will be less likely to see it and be encouraged to sign up for extra IDs, and so those without accounts will have to be regular readers before they get lucky and hit a sign-up period.
posted by pracowity at 12:50 AM on July 27, 2002

Yeah... I like that. But make sure that the registration page won't kick off any "page changed" scripts. Present the "open" and "closed" for registration signs as images.
posted by shinybeast at 2:18 AM on July 27, 2002

We need auditions.

"Thank you. Next!"
posted by luser at 4:55 AM on July 27, 2002

skallas, I do think that perhaps a waiting list + random grab each day might be better, but how do you handle multiple entries into the system?

I've also considered a straight first come, first served list, with 20 being added each night and emailed, but figured that'd get loaded up quickly.

There's also the problem of people responding to the demand. If 500 people want in, and there are 20 slots, what's to stop a current member from grabbing a spot in order to sell on ebay? Do I have to start taking donations to get to the front of the line, in order to make that a better option than black market reselling?
posted by mathowie (staff) at 8:26 AM on July 27, 2002

Do I have to start taking donations to get to the front of the line, in order to make that a better option than black market reselling?

Wow...is that really a problem?

*cues briank*

It's just a website.
posted by BlueTrain at 8:51 AM on July 27, 2002

I propose letting Matt's new system run as is for a while before the redesign comittee gets started. That way we can see which problems are actual and which are theoretical.
posted by timeistight at 9:15 AM on July 27, 2002

"Do I have to start taking donations to get to the front of the line?" Sounds like a good idea to me, Matt. Fact is, when I see less evolved sites successfully change to subscription I wonder why it hasn't happened here yet. Your management of MetaFilter is impeccable; do what you feel is best.
posted by Mack Twain at 9:24 AM on July 27, 2002

Where on Ebay can you bid on a slot?
posted by oh posey at 10:25 AM on July 27, 2002

For those of you worried about people writing perl scripts and such: don't. I got in and I'm about as illiterate as one gets in the field of code.

Just hitting "Refresh" frantically will get you a long way.

And damn am I glad I finally got in. Took me about a year.


posted by NekulturnY at 12:06 PM on July 27, 2002

finally...
the clone has returned to metafilter ;)
posted by Dreamghost at 12:06 PM on July 27, 2002

"Just hitting "Refresh" frantically will get you a long way."

That's so uncultured.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 12:11 PM on July 27, 2002

I've never loved my dinky 56k modem more than I have today. And of course, thanks to Matt for allowing us new folks a chance to join and contribute.
posted by lychee at 12:12 PM on July 27, 2002

Yippeee! I have been waiting for what felt like an eternity to be able to become a member here. Reading the posts with delight and enviously wishing I could add in my piece. I'm sure that many of us newbies share my thoughts when I say thank you! Thank you, thank you, thank you!
(I know that sounded disgustingly pathetic, but I'm really happy.)
posted by twos at 12:14 PM on July 27, 2002

I, too, am one of the "uncultured refreshers". ;)
I've been lurking for over a year.
Very glad to be here. Thank you, Matt.

posted by ChaosKitty at 12:19 PM on July 27, 2002

There are some women out there who read MeFi and want memberships, right? Yes, no? Tomorrow's a new sign up day, 'kay?

Kay. Do I get a pony for this?
posted by kelperoni at 1:25 PM on July 27, 2002

Hey, ChaosKitty! Don't forget us monkeys, now ;)
posted by yhbc at 5:28 PM on July 27, 2002

Hey! I'm new and a girl and I sure didn't get a pony.
Was it supposed to be in our "Welcome to Metafilter" packet or something?

*shakes envelope*

Hiya, yhbc. How could I ever forget you and the fellow monkeys? Besides, I thought the only way out was death. I'm a member for life, right? ;)
posted by ChaosKitty at 6:07 PM on July 27, 2002

Hi all. yay! I'm in today!

where's my pony? huh? huh?

someone post an I/P thread for me! ; > paris?

Thanks Matt (and Beth!)
posted by amberglow at 12:03 PM on July 28, 2002

I'm one of the lucky 20 from today. Thanks Matt.
posted by davebushe at 4:40 PM on July 28, 2002

*nodnod* Me too! And I have to admit I was one of the refreshers. I missed it yesterday taking a long time to fill out to the form, but today I was prepared so I could copy and paste my email address in. Heh. :)

Ahh after a year or so of reading, finally I can post! Thank you thank you thank you Matt. And hello fellow July 28ers...
posted by puffin at 4:55 PM on July 28, 2002

I'm also one of the lucky 20 for today and wanted to say thanks to Matt and everyone else that made new memberships possible.

Oh, and I promise to wait at least a week before I try to corrupt anyone.
posted by nemesis at 7:02 PM on July 28, 2002

Hello all! I've been lurking for ages, and I'm positively giddy to be here. I promise to try and restrain myself...
posted by JoanArkham at 7:29 AM on July 29, 2002

People this isn't a chat room.

I'm seriously trying to get some answers on how best to handle signups. I know you're happy to get an account and you're enthusiastic, but please don't post just to post. Re-read the original post to see that I'd like to hear people reporting problems here.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 11:06 AM on July 29, 2002

Hi everybody! I just wanted to intodu- oh wait, I'm not new.

Anyway, I think the currently implemented method is just fine. as you pointed out, Matt, just about any system can be manipulated. I seriously doubt (many) people would bother writing code to generate accounts -- we're cool, but we're not that cool -- and really, what if they do? They'll get banned if they try anything underhanded, and it's not like they can make any money off a 14,000+ user id. The biggest problem might be current members grabbing extra accounts, but even that will get old pretty quick.
posted by me3dia at 6:53 PM on July 29, 2002

You could do 10 at noon and 10 at midnight. Everyone should at least be awake at one of the times.
posted by s.e.b. at 11:24 AM on August 1, 2002

Or, I guess, 6-7 every 8 hours... or 5 every 6 hours... or... you know, you've probably already thought of this.

I was never here.
posted by s.e.b. at 11:28 AM on August 1, 2002

After a year or so of snooping, and a bit of frustrating attempts to get in on the 20 logins for free (i could never get on, and even when i got the link to the sign up page i didn't type fast enough (darn my fat fingers)). But i do have to say paying $5 is fine by me, it's cheaper then a movie and i've gotten a heck of allot more entertainment from it.
However, i'd love to see how much you can collect from new users who have been salivating to post versus the donations from old users who have been on awhile.
posted by NGnerd at 2:18 PM on August 3, 2002

there must be tons of people who no longer use their

membership .....no way i've ever seen 14000

people posting on this........

cant you have an expiry date or something to free up space

for more users? like a year or something?

anyway cheers matt , big hugs to you....
posted by sgt.serenity at 4:20 PM on August 4, 2002