55 characters = 55 links?

April 28, 2003 9:48 AM

55 characters = 55 links? http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/25409

While I appreciate all the hard work that y2kcarl put into the post, I have to ask, "Are the 55 links useful to anyone?"

I thought the idea was post a link or perhaps several, to point out somethign new and allow for a bit of discussion.

Who has the time/energy to look at 55 sites? Is the post more about style than substance?

Or am I out in left field here as a link minimalist?
posted by Argyle to etiquette/policy at 9:48 AM (94 comments total)

I don't see it as a big deal: it doesn't disrupt the front page, and each link adds to the overall theme. Maybe one "main" link would've been nice as well, but I don't see it as a big deal/necessary.

We've all got our things tho'. I hate people who don't use anchor tags on their URLs for instance.
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 9:57 AM on April 28, 2003

MetaTalk = MetaWank.
posted by Shane at 10:03 AM on April 28, 2003

I am grateful to y2karl for collecting these links together.

Who has the time/energy to look at 55 sites?

I am going through them right now

Is the post more about style than substance?

Style is underrated.
posted by vacapinta at 10:43 AM on April 28, 2003

This topic was previously metatalked here, in reference to tamim's bollywood post. Generally, I agree with Doug.
posted by onlyconnect at 10:49 AM on April 28, 2003

I hate people who don't use anchor tags on their URLs for instance.

What are anchor tags?
posted by ginz at 10:53 AM on April 28, 2003

Anchor tags. The things one uses when one can't get the link button to work ('twas a tiny little snark).
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 10:59 AM on April 28, 2003

More relevant link. Oops.
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 11:01 AM on April 28, 2003

Who has the time/energy to look at 55 sites?

Strictly speaking, only 37 sites are linked by the 55 URLs. That, at least, seems to indicate that the user was concerned with style and was willing to introduce redundancy of substance in order to acheive it.
posted by iceberg273 at 11:17 AM on April 28, 2003

One has to admire Y2Karl's ability to transcribe, but did we need links to single panels or work that isn't Herriman's? Do we the graphics broken out separately from a theory piece on KK that I feel certainly meets MeFi posting guidelines on its own?) Would that post have been better or worse had it contained link krazy.com and the German comics magazine that provided a number of the images, with two or three additional links for support? (And mining the Strapazin archives for images rather than linking to their site directly strikes me as poor form, although the site navigation is horrible and, you know, umlaut-ridden.)

Y2Karl will presumbaly ignore my opinion, but a little less Google image searching and a little more filtering would be greatly appreciated. I love Herriman's work; I've posted links tangentially about him here and on my personal weblog (where the sort of tour de force post Y2Karl seems to enjoy making would be much more appropriate, imho).

It's dandy that krazy.com has redesigned, and there were some excellent links in there (even a number that I didn't come across when doing my personal Krazy Kat post; the jazz piece was a great find). I'd rather see a bad post about Krazy Kat than a bad post about Iraq (or, for that matter, Bush's fiscal policies). But posting a huge number of links -- some great and some of questionable interest -- about a topic you wish to see discussed on MetaFilter (or which you wish to indicate you enjoy or know something about) is not the way that the posts I enjoy the most seem to get written.

Finding a trove of Krazy Kat Komics (or something like the Bellona Times critical discussion on the web) and choosing to share it with MeFi's readership strikes me as precisely what MetaFilter was intended for. I'm sure I'm in the minority on this and that someone will tell me it's a binary choice between IraqFilter and Y2KarlFilter, but while Y2Karl's impressive Googledumping skills would be a huge merit to a personal weblog, they strike me as a drawback for providing the kind of jewel-like treasures of the web that I first started reading MeFi to find.
posted by snarkout at 11:23 AM on April 28, 2003

y2karl,

please add to your future FPP's: trollish language, irrelevant polls, bad puns, references to your refrigerator's brand and your loved one's looks

also, remember to minimize the number of links and maximize the number of vague, pointless, navel-gazing or ad hominem MetaTalk threads
posted by matteo at 11:35 AM on April 28, 2003

snarkout, I came across your post night before last and was going to note it in a comment in the thread about the American Memory movies post, of which your link was part--it's just good form and all that--but I'm late for the dentist, so I will when I get back. Your post was great, as per usual, and if I had found it, I would have noted it in mine from the git go.

As for the rest, consider your opinion cheerfully ignored. I don't want a personal weblog right now. It's not like I'm skinning babies alive, harassing people in mefi chat, jealously dissecting other people's posts or that I have even been particularly rude to or complaining about anyone--S@L recently excepted--here lately. If style equals ego, so does bringing up your post--at length. Which I would have done, had the positions been reversed.There's certainly room enough here for both of our egos.

I purposely linked to images at Strapazin because one little homage was quite obscene and I hated it. XXX NSFW link there people. Avoid unless at home. The game is safe, however.
posted by y2karl at 11:44 AM on April 28, 2003

also, remember to minimize the number of links and maximize the number of vague, pointless, navel-gazing or ad hominem MetaTalk threads

Good, good.

Karl, you're welcome to disregard my opinion, and I had no doubts that you would do so. But you've been spitting out one monstrous post roughly every other day for a couple of months now. There's a fine MeFi tradition of suggesting to people generating that much content that it might find a better home on a personal page, the better to ensure that the cream of the crop is what shows up on MetaFilter (see the DenBesteFilter flamewars of 2001).

I thought most of your posts would have been good to excellent on a personal website where you're not constrained by the boundaries of MetaFilter. As I said, I'm sure at this point I'm in the miniority about what makes a good MetaFilter post.

If style equals ego, so does bringing up your post--at length.

Good, good. Next time I will redact any compliments about your subject matter or the links you find.
posted by snarkout at 11:59 AM on April 28, 2003

MetaTalk = MetaWank.

Sorry for the snark. It's Monday. And so many MeTa threads just go nowhere...
posted by Shane at 12:00 PM on April 28, 2003

As for the rest, consider your opinion cheerfully ignored. I don't want a personal weblog right now. It's not like I'm skinning babies alive, harassing people in mefi chat, jealously dissecting other people's posts or that I have even been particularly rude to or complaining about anyone--S@L recently excepted--here lately. If style equals ego, so does bringing up your post--at length. Which I would have done, had the positions been reversed.There's certainly room enough here for both of our egos.

Full disclosure: I know snarkout a little bit, having met him once in person and having hung out in the same online dive as he does for a while.

Snark is not posting here because of his ego, which one presumes he must have though one never sees any evidence of it. He's not posting because he feels in any way slighted. He's posting because he thinks that y2karl's post is a bad post, for the reasons that he's listed. To attempt to dismiss his objections as ego-based is illogical and offensive. If he wanted to draw attention to himself, he could have done it in the blue.

The only ego in this discussion belongs to y2karl, who appears to gain a significant portion of his feelings of self-worth by garnering the approval of people who don't know any better than to hail him for linking a great deal of redundant material.

If everyone who posted on MeFi had snark's ego, there would be room for an infinite number of egos. If everyone had y2karl's, there'd be room for somewhere less than one. If you don't want to have your own website, fine, but don't turn around and try to make MeFi your own website.
posted by anapestic at 12:06 PM on April 28, 2003

There's a fine MeFi tradition of suggesting to people generating that much content that it might find a better home on a personal page

Something I've been thinking lately is that people who push the posting limits, once every 2 days or 3 days, in a lot of ways could be seen as abusing MeFi.

There's a fair bit of popularity floating around MeFi now. We're still nowhere near /. in terms of exposure, but it is significant, and I worry sometimes that people (not you y2karl, this is a generic thought not oriented towards anyone in particular) will abuse that popularity.

I wonder sometimes how a monthly limit, atop of the regular 1 posts/2 days would be. Say 10 posts per month or something. If someone wants to, they can fill up their queue in 20 days (or is that 19? Man, my maths suck), otherwise they can stretch it out for the month.

There's copious noise here (this is not new, and everyone views different things as niose or signal), making people work to filter their own noise for the benefit of the Filter is inspiration behind the current posting limit anyway, isn't it?
posted by cCranium at 12:08 PM on April 28, 2003

The only ego in this discussion belongs to y2karl, who appears to gain a significant portion of his feelings of self-worth by garnering the approval of people who don't know any better than to hail him for linking a great deal of redundant material.

hey, if it gives y2karl joy, then what the hell, eh? if he needs the ego boost, to show off his hreffing skillz and the thrill of his google hunts, then who cares what the rest of us think?
posted by crunchland at 12:37 PM on April 28, 2003

I think something important to remember is that MeFi users have life cycles. To generalize: they come, they say inappropriate things, they get the hang of the system, they have a heavy use period, become important members, then they become part-time contributors or they burn out and explode. Y2 is having a bit of a renaissance this month in lieu of either of those end results. It won't last forever. Is he harming MeFi? Nope. MeFi is indestructable. I don't always find his stylings the most legible, so sometimes I read and click and sometimes I don't. (I skip anything with multiple paragraphs, long italic stretches, lists, random line breaks, or bad English. That's because I am a megabitch. So what? I'm a member of MeFi, not (sadly for all of you) its copy-editor.)

Since September 2001, y2karl has posted a little over 100 links to MeFi. I hardly find that oppressive. And unlike most heavy front-page-posters, he actually comments in other threads. I'm really not sure what everyone is so exercised about, and I can't see how what y2karl is doing "violates" our "rules."

N.B. Certain exceptions that prove the rule of the user-experience timeline are duly noted, particularly Portugese linkbots. ";)"
posted by RJ Reynolds at 12:44 PM on April 28, 2003

If you don't want to have your own website, fine, but don't turn around and try to make MeFi your own website.

and he's, like, the only one allegedly doing that right?

why don't we just do like Big Brother or Survivor?
A Deathmatch between users who have bad ratings on MetaTalk:

y2karl vs Miguel/Carlos/Miguel'sWife/whatever
foldy vs hama7
postroad vs FreedomParamus

the loser is then evicted and exiled to plastic.com
is this the kind of MetaFilter we want?
posted by matteo at 1:33 PM on April 28, 2003

the loser is then evicted and exiled to plastic.com
is this the kind of MetaFilter we want?
Is that your tongue in your cheek? ^_^
posted by thirteen at 2:29 PM on April 28, 2003

I am sure there are a lot of users who, like myself, do not usually enter the time-sucking domain of y2karl's posts, not because they are not high quality because they inevitably are, but because there is simply too much information for our tiny brains to handle in one bite. Despite believing that the "if you don't like the thread, ignore it" theory is counter-productive as a rule, this is, I feel, the exception to that rule. There is no issue with the quality of y2karl's posts, the style just does not suit everyone.

I find it hard to believe that someone is being hauled over the MetaCoals for having too many high-quality links. Tough crowd.
posted by dg at 3:34 PM on April 28, 2003

It seems absolutely freakin' ludicrous to me that people would bother to complain about a link-per-character post. So what if it's a lot of links? So what if there's a little redundancy? The post is not offensive, not politically charged, not FooFilter, not half a page long with three paragraphs. It's just a big-ass pile of links to a subject about which most people probably don't know terribly much.

I can buy arguments that it's not an ideal post, but most posts aren't, and a hell of a lot of posts are less so than this. I can't fathom arguments that this sort of post actually a problem.
posted by cortex at 4:00 PM on April 28, 2003

I'm sorry to y2kcarl for this turning into a bashing. I didn't mean for it to go this way.

One of the great things about MeFi is being to exposed to new things. I'm glad that y2kcarl brought Krazy Kat to my attention, I was ignorant of it in the past.

But what I am looking for is a little help in learning what the new idea/topic is about. IMHO, a sentence about who/what Krazy Kat is and a link to a 'newbie' page would have been helpful IN ADDITION to the char string links.

When a MeFi post is unclear on what it is about, it does not seem to draw the discussion that a clearer FPP does.

That's all I'm saying. Some like drinking from a firehose, I prefer a water fountain.
posted by Argyle at 4:03 PM on April 28, 2003

Here is a high quality link for you Cortex. It will keep you occupied for the rest of your life.

Karl really needs a Memepool account.
posted by thirteen at 4:19 PM on April 28, 2003

I find it hard to believe that someone is being hauled over the MetaCoals for having too many high-quality links. Tough crowd.

Seriously. Perspective: There was a front page link today to www.apple.com. But it's y2karl who got MeTaCarcerated because he posted something that 1) most people may not have seen before on the web, 2) contains interesting content, and stands a good chance of 3) warranting discussion from others. And he freaking annotated every link. Hell, I'd rather y'all pull me into MetaTalk because I posted one goofy link.

It's obvious that y2 put a good degree of effort into composing his post; it didn't take up much space on the front page, and the content linked was in general concise enough that the post was only overwhelming in abstract. He likes to share this stuff; he's prolific about it, and -- the crux of my point -- I have a feeling that we'd cheer all of his posts if they were made by separate people. This is a community weblog. That there are voices who strive to be uniquely heard or appreciated in the crowd should not threaten or unsettle you.

We think of MetaFilter as a filter, and it is. There's a whole bunch of profoundly uninteresting stuff on the 'Net; the chaff, so to speak. But it's also a portal -- the purpose is not entirely to keep content out; it's to let the good stuff in. I'd rather take Krazy Kat over Apple.com any day.
posted by grrarrgh00 at 4:27 PM on April 28, 2003

This is why I didn't want to get into it; I know Y2Karl has a large and vocal fan base, and I'm sure at this point my views of what makes a good post are out of whack with the majority of MeFi users. But in my mind MetaFilter was designed to filter, to find great things on the web and bring them to light. (In fact, as I understand it, it was originally meant to filter weblogs; that is, pull great finds from personal weblogs that might not have made it to Memepool or Boing Boing, much less Slashdot or the New York Times.) Most of my favorite MeFi threads -- Polish posters, Russian color photography (my all-time favorite post, I think), or magnificent obsessions -- follow this model. Find something wonderful and share it.

Before Miguel helped turn MetaTalk into a running chat room, people used to argue about what made a good post. For me, it's that moment of discovery. If the chief objection to people's criticism of Y2K. is that there are other people who are much, much worse, that's fine -- I'm not a fan of CNNFilter either. But if the chief objection is that, hey, Karl's posts are interesting, I'm somewhat puzzled. Everyone's opinion is as valid as mine (although I certainly think that I'm right; Anapestic's flattery aside, I've got enough ego for that), but why have posting guidelines at all if just being interesting is a good enough reason to violate them.

Finding some great Polish posters or some jaw-dropping Russian photos or some Icy Hot Stuntaz or a text adventure game archive and saying, "Wow, I need to share that" seems to me qualitatively different from Karl's approach, which is to pick an interesting subject and find a bunch of links -- many of excellent quality, quite a few not so -- and put together a post. How many thousands of words has Y2Karl posted to MetaFilter's front page in the last two months? Don't forget to count "[more inside]"s and title attribute text. The sheer posting volume is incredible; I'd say that it easily approaches (and probably tops) Steven Den Beste's post-per-day peak.

In what way would the majority posts -- these lengthy, lengthy posts, which often contain a dozen links or more and force Karl to jump through hoops to avoid taking up the entire front screen -- not be best suited to a personal site? I can pick an interesting topic and Google for some good links. I do it on my own site. If Karl had his own weblog, I'd read it regularly. I'd mine it for links, and some of those I'd quite possibly post to MeFi. I'd probably enjoy it -- Karl and I have overlapping taste. But, all apologies, grrarrgh, I find MeFi most interesting when (in the words of Kottke) it's less Meta, more Filter. When Karl is dumping links to the extent that, as he noted about a recent post, he can't check them all for validity, when he fills out a post with sub-par links because Notepad munged a bunch what he originally found, is where's the filter?

And if the answer is that we don't need one, what distinguishes MetaFilter from Memepool or just another bulletin board?

I'm sorry if this sounds like a personal attack, Karl. It's not meant to be; you're writing good stuff, but I just don't think it's good MetaFilter stuff.
posted by snarkout at 4:42 PM on April 28, 2003

Who has the time/energy to look at 55 sites?

Who clicks every link in every FPP?
posted by mischief at 5:04 PM on April 28, 2003

Metafilter would be a lot less interesting without well-crafted, fascinating (I want to say artistic, but I don't want to sound too fawning) posts like the ones y2karl and only a handful of others seem to have the knack for creating. Do we really need less variety on the front page? I mean, honestly, think what the alternative is.
posted by Hildago at 5:52 PM on April 28, 2003

save your breath, snarkout. Karl's already said he doesn't care. It's his site. He can do as he likes.
posted by crunchland at 5:52 PM on April 28, 2003

I'd just note that it's been pretty much blatantly obvious for a while now that one certain (vocally reviled and vocally adored in almost equal measure) quite idiosyncratic poster has been making two posts to the front page per day for quite a while now under dual logins, and this is a way worse transgression and flouting of both the substance and spirit of the guidelines and 'rules' than y2karl's (admittedly, uh, unique) post style. This makes me unreasoningly angry, when I'm in a cranky mood.

I would've made a Metatalk post about it, but they tend to degenerate into shitfights, and I don't really like shitfights, having taken part in too many lately.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:52 PM on April 28, 2003

i just finished looking at all the kk links. thanks, y2karl.
posted by andrew cooke at 6:00 PM on April 28, 2003

(vocally reviled and vocally adored in almost equal measure)

almost equal? I'm not so sure! Let's take a poll about it! What we need now is a brand-new, pointless, PollFilter MetaTalk thread
;)
posted by matteo at 6:22 PM on April 28, 2003

Damn, I hate it when my enemies make me laugh!
posted by MiguelCardoso at 7:09 PM on April 28, 2003

metafilter : you can't even blink without offending some MF'er.
Diana Moon-Glampers
posted by y2karl at 7:31 PM on April 28, 2003

I'm really not sure what everyone is so exercised about, and I can't see how what y2karl is doing "violates" our "rules."

and

and this is a way worse transgression and flouting of both the substance and spirit of the guidelines and 'rules' than y2karl's (admittedly, uh, unique) post style

I'm not aware that anyone accused y2karl of breaking any rules (whether or not you choose to put air quotes around the word). Also, no one said that posting fifty links to a post was worse than Miguel using multiple logins to circumvent the one post a day rule. The original questions asked here were whether so many links are useful and whether it makes the posts more style than substance. People should consider arguing that point rather than setting up and tearing down straw men.
posted by anapestic at 7:51 PM on April 28, 2003

was worse than Miguel using multiple logins to circumvent the one post a day rule.

Proof?
posted by dgaicun at 8:12 PM on April 28, 2003

The original questions asked here were whether so many links are useful and whether it makes the posts more style than substance.

Oh, is that what this is about? I am hoping that someday y2k actually hits a topic in which I have some interest. As for style over substance, does that really matter if the links are good (for someone)?
posted by mischief at 8:13 PM on April 28, 2003

anapestic, I'm sure you're able to parse out your own points through your own fog of self-righteousness, and we're all impressed by your astonishing ability to stay on point while other, lesser men dare to stray from the carefully circumscribed discussion that seems to exist in your head alone, but personally, I'd venture that you contribute almost exactly nothing to this site and community other than your occasional, tedious nannyposts in Metatalk, and I for one wish you would just not bother.

I'm sure you feel in essence much the same way about me, and that is as it should be, perhaps.

My point, which I admit was at best tangential, but which I will reprise at the risk of repeating myself since you either ignored it or did not understand it, is that although it's all well and good to take y2karl to task for his posting style, frequency or content (none of which bother me in the least), there's an elephant in the room that to which nobody, myself included until today, is keen to bring attention. I thought it worth mentioning in this context.

Though I can't speak for anyone else, I put air quotes around 'rules,' you agonizing pedant, in order to try and express in shorthand for those perhaps quicker on the uptake than yourself that we all understand and acknowledge that there are almost no rules per se here, and most of what is considered acceptable comes as a result of discussion and attempts at some degree of consensus, and further to imply that by not noticing and discussing multiple logins for twice daily posting (which is related if in nothing else at least to y2karl's posting frequency, which was noted above without commentary from yourself, by several), no emergent rule (with or without air quotes) will emerge.

I like the dual-identity poster in question, and I like his contributions to the site (clearly a great deal more than you do, based on your past comments to and about him), but I think the (yes, only slightly related) issue of posting frequency, as most clearly represented by the issue I mentioned above, is germane, particularly when that posting frequency is doubled through use of a shell account.

You don't, obviously, but I'm not surprised you don't have the good grace to allow that I might wish to bring it up.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:23 PM on April 28, 2003

stavros: You should either offer proof to backup your accusation, or withdraw it. Unless Miguel wants to chime in.
posted by timeistight at 8:34 PM on April 28, 2003

timeistight : you will note that I have not accused anyone by name. It's reasonably telling that first anapestic and now yourself named Miguel, though.

Obviously I can't prove anything. Examination of other threads where there have been callouts about the issue pretty much clinches the argument, though, I reckon.

That said, If I am indeed incorrect, I will gladly withdraw everything (except my annoyance with anapestic).
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:40 PM on April 28, 2003

I have not accused anyone by name

(Which I sense is kind of disingenuous, I know, but I did think it was pretty much uncontested common-knowledge MeFi lore, nudge-nudge wink-winking aside. Again, if I'm wrong, really truly, I will gladly recant.)
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:49 PM on April 28, 2003

I'm sorry if this sounds like a personal attack, Karl.

Well, for a fact, it is one, made at extraordinary length and extraordinary self-congratulatory sanctimony.
posted by y2karl at 8:50 PM on April 28, 2003

Jesus, it's like Harrison Bergeron meets Lord of the Flies in here today.
posted by y2karl at 9:02 PM on April 28, 2003

Again, if I'm wrong, really truly, I will gladly recant.)
If you are wrong, I will eat a dozen raw eggs and link to the photos.
posted by thirteen at 9:03 PM on April 28, 2003

it's like Harrison Bergeron meets Lord of the Flies in here today

*worships*

If you are wrong, I will eat a dozen raw eggs and link to the photos.

Deal!
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 9:08 PM on April 28, 2003

I have more than once explained my role in Carlos's posts. I cleared it with Matt when he signed on. We are two different people who happen to be best friends. We're neighbours. He's a famous theatre director, 52, Argentinian. I'm an equally famous writer. We've both been on TV dozens of times. We write a double column together in Portugal's main newspaper, Diário de Notícias. Anyone is welcome to phone the editor there, investigate, phone him, look at the Lisbon phonebook, consult the Internet, do whatever they like.

I'm his editor, that's all. Of course the posts have the same style. If I did want to produce a phony account, don't you think, with my experience as a writer, I could come up with something more convincing and less obvious?

As for those who mention my wife and daughters - like Matteo and thirteen - I'm afraid they reveal themselves more than I'd ever care to say.

As far as I'm concerned, after detailed explanations, anyone accusing me of having a false account under his name is calling me a liar. There is no proof that we are the same person because we aren't, as is publicly known in Portugal and as anyone with a minimum of sensibility could discover just by looking at our different posts.

As for there's an elephant in the room that to which nobody, myself included until today, is keen to bring attention , I'm afraid several other people have been quicker than you, my former friend. But none so hurtful and unexpected. I jotted down these words out of respect to that former friendship. You'll cry "drama queen" - perhaps you need to brush up on your own feelings, if you have still have them.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 10:09 PM on April 28, 2003

You also need some courage, wonderchicken - name those you accuse and, when you do accuse, start your own MeTa thread instead of prying on others.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 10:18 PM on April 28, 2003

Oh, Miguel, don't be too harsh, now. It's all too easy to think the worst of people, and if you have been done injury by stavros' misplaced suspicions, don't respond by thinking the worst of him. He doesn't think the worst of you--he's just not up to speed on this, ok? I, at times, wondered, to, but then I decided that even if it was, the focus and topics of Carlos's posts were so different from yours that, if it was you, it was still allowed under the multiple personality provison--you know, Sybil and all that. stavros is a nice person who respects your posts and has said nice things about you even in the midst of his morbid ruminations here. Which is more than I say for most who complain here.
posted by y2karl at 10:26 PM on April 28, 2003

I, at times, wondered, too, but then I decided that even if it was you,--that is to say.
posted by y2karl at 10:28 PM on April 28, 2003

People, they are not the same person. A cursory googling and a little Portugese shows this. look, they even wrote in the same magazine. Please stop with the unresearched accusations. Make ones you can follow up on, and keep the thread on topic.
posted by j.edwards at 10:41 PM on April 28, 2003

is it just me, or is this turning into a bad Borges story? or maybe it is a good one, depending on who is the fool.
posted by _sirmissalot_ at 10:44 PM on April 28, 2003

is it just me, or is this turning into a bad Borges story?

I love you forever.

"And I saw Miguevedo's bed... like a half tube, curled... and I ran, climbed down the ladder when I heard something coming up the walk... something heavy, and plural."
posted by j.edwards at 10:48 PM on April 28, 2003

damn, j.edwards, that was FUNNY. More magic realism in MeTa!
posted by Vidiot at 10:53 PM on April 28, 2003

First they came for the news linkers
and I did not speak out
because I was not a news linker.
Then they came for the prolific & cosmopolitan man about town
and I did not speak out
because I was not Portuguese.
Then they came for the erudite multi-linker and his annotations
and I did not speak out
because I don't use dhtml in my posts.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me except quonsar,
and he just posted his damn elephant gif.

OK, for the record, I am a fan of both y2karl and Miguel's posts. As far as I can see, both give far more than they take, and if either occasionally posts a topic that doesn't interest me or employs a stylistic quirk that is not to my preference, oh well. Not that I don't think we should strive to continual improvement. But is rancor necessary? tsk.

How often should one post? One link or many? Spontaneous or researched? All this reminds me of this thread...do we have a neatly manicured lawn with a thick luxurious carpet of grass, or a riot of lush green wild things always on the verge of chaos? I doubt any of us could agree. I like clever sheep's compromise with her spouse - a wild backyard, and a neat front yard.

On preview - Miguel, take heart...MetaTalk can be a horrid little hothouse sometimes. You may be offended by Stavros, but in the long run he will have done you a favor by putting to words what many have suspected and been less open about addressing . Oscar Wilde said it best: "True friends stab you in the front."
posted by madamjujujive at 11:08 PM on April 28, 2003

is it just me, or is this turning into a bad Borges story? or maybe it is a good one, depending on who is the fool.

It reminds me more of Kaycee Nicole.

I am still dubious. I have never really doubted that there was a real Carlos (I can Google as good as anyone), I doubted that he was actually posting to MeFi. My best friend would have no problem letting me use his name as an alias if I explained that I wanted to circumvent a rule. He might even think it was funny. There have been stranger things in this life. Of course they are neighbors sharing an IP address, and one needs the other to write his posts for him, and presumably the comments as well. One guy uses Sinatra in a slapdown and the other guy writes a post about it, walls are thin right? The wife wants in too, Miguel can write for everyone in Portugal. They must be lining up.

What could be more fun that participating in a web forum in an awkward language? I myself am fairly desperate to contribute to a Mandarin website, but I have no guide. When I pull that off, I am sure to be drowning in good times.

I was never harsh towards your wife, nor would I be. Beyond my suspicion that she is not really posting here that is. I mentioned your daughters because you have mentioned them. I did not dig them out of your personal weblog or anything. I am sure (quite sincerely) that they are lovely women. If you talked about anyone else with alarming regularity, I would have mentioned them.

I may be eating some eggs in the near future, but right now I have no reason to trust you. Claiming that this could not be you, because you are too smart to try such a dumb stunt seems like a chestnut to me. Everything I see you post suggests that you love this, not the place, but the attention.
posted by thirteen at 11:17 PM on April 28, 2003

Thanks, madamjuju!

If all this weren't insulting to Carlos, I wouldn't bother. Criticism and abuse are part of my profession. But he's his own man, enjoys MetaFilter in a different way from mine and to repeatedly doubt his identity and authorship is despicable.

For the record (and for when he wakes up in the morning and sees this), apart from being my best friend, he also was the first director to put on a play of mine in one of Lisbon's big commercial theatres (Em Carne Cor de Rosa Encarnada, Teatro Villaret, 1982); helped me found O Independente newspaper (and relaunch it in 2000) and K Magazine; helped me edit several anthologies of my scattered writings; campaigned with me politically; was instrumental in setting up my record label, Fundação Atlântica and the group Madredeus and recently has been a co-columnist with me in the magazine Linhas Cruzadas and Diário de Notícias newspaper.

Is this enough? At least for a few weeks? All this hullabaloo is interfering with my posting and his! ;)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 11:28 PM on April 28, 2003

I may be eating some eggs in the near future, but right now I have no reason to trust you.

I'd say the burden of "proof" is on the accusers, not the person bearing the accusations.

And thirteen, from your user page:
I am learning that the following is true.
"Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker's game because they almost always turn out to be — or to be indistinguishable from —self-righteous sixteen-year-olds possessing infinite amounts of free time." — Neal Stephenson

To be sure, I'm not saying that Miguel and/or Carlos are the above. But if you believe this, then why are you bothering with all this? No one's asked to see my driver's license or my passport when I post here. (If they did, I doubt I'd show them.) And, I'd say that to announce that you're "dubious" about someone being who they're claiming to be, without offering some pretty damned compelling justification, is a fairly rude thing to do.
posted by Vidiot at 11:32 PM on April 28, 2003

Every comment I see you post, Thirteen, suggests that you love taking gratuitous personal shots at people you don't like. If that's all you have to add to the place, by all means, do so. Nobody is stopping you from making cheap shots. It really contributes to the place and it makes people respect you, you know, when you make the place your own little rest room and us the urinals for your rancor.
posted by y2karl at 11:36 PM on April 28, 2003

but Miguel, how do we know you're Miguel?
posted by _sirmissalot_ at 11:39 PM on April 28, 2003

You're joking, sirmissalot - but a lot of people did doubt who I was. It's amusing that I, who have always stood by my real name, gender, age, everything, and never hid anything, should be accused of being a Kaycee Nicole by people presenting themselves as "thirteen" and other inscrutable monickers.

I shudder to think what what happen if I were an anonymous poster with no silly Googlies (which tell 0.0001% of the story) to back me - this in a medium and a weblog where not only is identification not required but positively shunned most of the time.

The - yes, I feel a Godwin coming on - Gestapo were far less strict with their demands for papieren. And the Nazi judicial process did require, after all, some proof for accusations. ;)

P.S. I was too harsh with Stav and I regret it. :(
posted by MiguelCardoso at 11:53 PM on April 28, 2003

P.S. I was too harsh with Stav and I regret it. :(

That's alright, Miguel. I'd be peeved to if I were baselessly accused of cheating.

I withdraw my accusations, and will desist in any further defaming of the good Cardoso and Quevedo names. And thank you madamejujujive and y2karl for understanding that I had no malicious intent.

Is it too soon for a group hug?
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:18 AM on April 29, 2003

I'm game for a group hug, if you are. Please excuse my offended heart - just put me in the category of Men Who Love Too Much! :)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 12:20 AM on April 29, 2003

(er... make that 'all right', and 'peeved too', and remove the extraneous 'that' from the bit Miguel quoted from my long post above.)
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:21 AM on April 29, 2003

Cor. Live and let live!
posted by plep at 12:23 AM on April 29, 2003

Done. If anyone's the drama queen, it's me. I think I need more hobbies.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:26 AM on April 29, 2003

Vidiot: You are probably right, I should have remained more detached. As for the second part, all conflict goes that way. There is a flood of circumstantial evidence, and a history of abusing the system. I allow for a fantastic confluence, but it makes no sense to me. Perhaps I am rude, but if I am right (sadly for me, and my cholesterol this seems less likely), what would that be then?

There is nothing to dislike about Miguel. He is like a friendly puppy. I have not felt the need to comment in his posts (I think, maybe once or twice, and that would be recent I am sure). I think his posts are inappropriate for the most part, but that is far less offensive that the feeling that he is gaming the system.

Y2karl: My feeling that you are being selective about my posting history. I may argue with some passion, but I feel little need to mention the poster. I have a pretty high post count, so I am sure there is a time or two that could be pulled out, but compared to your own history I am sure I do not measure up.

Just remembered the existence of Nofundy. Perhaps you have a point. regardless, I was not the one who turned this place into a restroom. Cheap shots? They do not seem that way to me. Suggesting that your Memepool style posts would be better on Memepool, wondering why the friends and family show up to post when a cap is put in place, recognizing that Nofundy is way over there? We have a serious fault running between us, but it is hardly the easy way to talk loud about it. I recognize that I am burning good will here, and that the truth of it is that guys like you do run the place now. I just hate to see the site beaten down so.

It's amusing that I, who have always stood by my real name, gender, age, everything, and never hid anything, should be accused of being a Kaycee Nicole by people presenting themselves as "thirteen" and other inscrutable monickers.
Not quite what I was saying, and spilling your info is hardly a virtue. I am contactable in any number of ways here, so I am hardly a cipher. I do not dislike you, I do think your posts are insipid and bad for Metafiler, but I have no feel for you to dislike you. I gloss over your stuff, and somehow I have absorbed an astounding amount of information about you. I know what you like to read drink and smoke, and bits about your family and friends. There was a time when there were jokes about A-listers here, but there was never a cult of personality. Your crazy story prolly is true. It is also true that you have behaved in such a way that my suspicions are not unreasonable.

I am off to bed. If you would like to take this private say the word.
posted by thirteen at 12:27 AM on April 29, 2003

I'd say the burden of "proof" is on the accusers, not the person bearing the accusations.

Not since Iraq! /rimshot
posted by thirteen at 12:29 AM on April 29, 2003

Cor. Live and let live!

*grabs arm, acute pain in the upper chest, face turns blue, dwindling, scratchy voice barely emitting*

Plep...on...MeTa...end...nigh...
posted by MiguelCardoso at 12:29 AM on April 29, 2003

Moose...Indian...Pancakes...
posted by Vidiot at 12:33 AM on April 29, 2003

peace at last

MetaTalk: drama queens lacking hobbies
posted by madamjujujive at 12:35 AM on April 29, 2003

(Check your inbox, Miguel...)
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 12:44 AM on April 29, 2003

(I've replied already, you loveable rogue and rotter!)

But no e-mails, ever, for the dastardly, outrageous (and by now conveniently sleeping, I hope) thirteen! ;)
posted by MiguelCardoso at 12:48 AM on April 29, 2003

I withdraw my accusations, and will desist in any further defaming of the good Cardoso and Quevedo names.

Good for you, Mr. wonderchicken! It takes a big man.

Miguel, I'm sorry you had to defend yourself like this, but I'm glad this came out. Maybe people will stop pounding away at this rumour now.

First they came for the news linkers

It does seem like we're becoming a self-police state lately, doesn't it?
posted by timeistight at 1:46 AM on April 29, 2003

I wholeheartedly agree with snarkout on the post issue (minus the Miguel part), and am quite glad MeanFliter has come to a close.
posted by hama7 at 3:10 AM on April 29, 2003

A tattersall whinny cloyed the horsedrawn puddles, and dimpled the pee of the mooncolored hounds. Al-Mu'tasim was breaching again.
posted by Opus Dark at 5:09 AM on April 29, 2003

He's a famous theatre director, 52, Argentinian. I'm an equally famous writer.

Miguel, you should translate some of your stuff into English, or point Mefi towards some of your available works, in Portugese or otherwise. I'm sure many here would be eager to familiarize themselves with what you have written. What titles should Mefites look for? Or are you mostly a journalist?
posted by Shane at 6:05 AM on April 29, 2003

Just remembered the existence of Nofundy...when a cap is put in place, recognizing that Nofundy is way over there?

Thirteen, I was with you until you brought nofundy's username into it. What does he have to do with anything?
posted by dhoyt at 6:43 AM on April 29, 2003

Miguel, I tangentially mentioned your wife just because it's funny how your whole family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances, and greengrocer seem to have a MeFi account and an interest in books and five-star hotels, that's all. It amuses me: is that bad? How does it "reveal myself more than I'd ever care to say"? Please take some time of your schedule and answer me, e-mail is OK, too, I'm curious.
(My idea is that, because of your lovely narcissism, you don't take criticism too well. And therefore critics must be either ignorant -- I love the way you respond to people who complain about your long FPP's, which boils down to "I'm a good writer and I've read a lot of books and you're not up to criticize my style" -- or they must be in bad faith, or out to get you with personal attacks.
I'm sorry, you're a plesant enough man, and obviously smart and well-read. But this site is not necessarily your Internet Fan Club all the time.

anyway if you're into self-analysis, check out this:

He's a famous theatre director, 52, Argentinian. I'm an equally famous writer. We've both been on TV dozens of times.

how's that for revealing oneself?
posted by matteo at 6:57 AM on April 29, 2003

What does he have to do with anything?

I figured he was what Y2K meant about my recent commenting history. It is not like I am sniping at all of you, but I have mentioned NF's dementia on several occasions.

/On the bike and off to work now.
posted by thirteen at 7:01 AM on April 29, 2003

Miguel, I have never had serious suspicions that you were actually creating posts under the names of Carlos and your lovely wife. But surely you (being the famous and sensitive writer that you are, with a deep understanding of human nature) can see that it doesn't look good to have the place turned even more into (what looks like) CardosoFilter. I know that if I posted as much as you, and were the object of as much complaining, I would discourage my wife and my best friend from taking part in the site (and perhaps even cut down on my own frequency of posting, although I realize that would be asking a lot).

And really:
He's a famous theatre director, 52, Argentinian. I'm an equally famous writer. We've both been on TV dozens of times.

Don't you think this is a mite unbecoming? Do you think Philip Roth says things like this? (Say, could Philip Roth be... quonsar? But I digress.)
posted by languagehat at 9:14 AM on April 29, 2003

What titles should Mefites look for?

I should probably just search. I found a couple of titles at Amazon (not Amazon UK, as I would have expected). But I couldn't find copies for sale. Is there anything I should look for published online?

O cemitério de raparigas sounds interesting. Cemeterio = cemetary, obviously, but rapariga = sign language? Or am I way off?
posted by Shane at 9:39 AM on April 29, 2003

Miguel wanted to say that our beautiful faces are well known here and nobody would confuse us the two. We must come to Metafilter for this. I am short, have a beard but am very handsome. He is too tall, no beard and not so cool, of course!
posted by Carlos Quevedo at 9:42 AM on April 29, 2003

This is ridiculous. MiguelCardoso has been repeatedly accused of abusing multiple memberships. When he points out how easy it would be to confirm his and Carlos' separate existence due to their rather high public profiles, he's mocked for arrogance. He's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.

Now languagehat suggests that MiguelCardoso's friends and family should all limit their posting. Why stop there? Why not institute special rules for anyone who has ever corresponded with him, or commented favourably in one of his threads. How about an Unmetafiltarian Activities Committee with the power to interrogate witnesses: "Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the MiguelCardoso fan club?"
posted by timeistight at 9:53 AM on April 29, 2003

I'm a fan of Carlos. He's definitely more handsome. And he speaks Spanish too.
posted by ginz at 9:55 AM on April 29, 2003

Thank you, timestight. I think languagehat's advice is well meant and I value his opinions immensely. But this has to be an epic derailment already, so I just wanted to reply to Shane's kind enquiries:

Shane, if you read German, there was a good translation of "O Cemitério das Raparigas" published last year. Check your inbox for more promotional material - kidding! ;)

And a massive SORRY to Argyle for so thoroughly messing up his thread. :(
posted by MiguelCardoso at 10:14 AM on April 29, 2003

Deutsche? Nein, aber mein onkel George sprict Deutsche.
Did I get that right?
posted by Shane at 10:42 AM on April 29, 2003

All metatalk threads eventually turn into being about Cardosa.
posted by crunchland at 10:43 AM on April 29, 2003

Damn! "spricht"!
posted by Shane at 10:43 AM on April 29, 2003

You people are f*ing harsh. It's like watching a bad soap opera on meth, condensing a month of drama into 22 minutes...

Yikes.
posted by Argyle at 10:52 AM on April 29, 2003

Here is a bad translation of the blurb. Bear in mind that I have not done justice to the German (particularly tieftraurig, which defeats me, and ewig gleichen, stets wiederholten; I have sidestepped Ich-Erzähler altogether) let alone the original:

"The Girl Cemetery" tells of the adventures and misfortunes of a noble and unhappy man. Disgusted with his amours, he decides one day to marry a woman he knows will make him miserable. Under the pretext that it will help with his work - a book concerning serial killers - she becomes involved with the murderer who killed her husband's former lover. Thereupon she begins to torment her man with the always immediate, yet ever repeated narration of this murder. At the center of the novel is the desperate search for love and for solitude, and the basic human inability to communicate with each other. In this screamingly funny and, at the same time, melancholy grotesque, Portuguese cult author Miguel Esteves Cardoso reports that hell is not others, but we ourselves.
posted by sennoma at 10:52 AM on April 29, 2003

It's like watching a bad soap opera on meth

Got any gum?
posted by timeistight at 10:56 AM on April 29, 2003

Here is an equally bad translation of the bio:

Miguel Esteves Cardoso, born 1955, is a lecturer in social sciences in Lisbon. He is one of the most important and also most successful Portuguese writers of the present day. At the end of the 80's he was known as the founder and publisher of the weekly paper "O Independente" and the magazine "K." and as enfant terrible of the Lisbon culture scene, but soon also made himself a name as a writer of [social commentary?], plays and novels. In Portugal and Brazil he is among the most widely read authors. "The girl cemetery" ("O Cemitério de Raparigas ", 1996) is Cardosos last published novel. Further works: "Em Carne Cor de rosa Escarnada" (1982), "OS homens" (1993), "O Amor é Fodido" (1994), "A Vida Inteira" (1995).
posted by sennoma at 11:02 AM on April 29, 2003

I'm game for a group hug, if you are. Please excuse my offended heart - just put me in the category of Men Who Love Too Much! :)

I am excited for my future loving of MC's English language blog.
posted by djacobs at 11:38 AM on April 29, 2003

timeistight: Please, come down off that horse. I didn't "suggest" anything; I said that's what my reaction would be were I in Miguel's shoes. Saying I want to set up an Unmetafiltarian Activities Committee is the kind of insulting hyperbole that's become so common around here. Migs knows I don't disapprove of his existence, I just think he'd have an easier time of it if he were less eager to post everything that entered his head. (The frightening thing is that he doesn't post everything that enters his head.) He would also have an easier time of it if he didn't encourage those close to him to emulate his enthusiasm. But Miguel's Miguel, and that's why it's so much fun to give him the occasional hotfoot!

What makes it even more fun is the agita it causes in Miguelistas like yourself...
posted by languagehat at 12:49 PM on April 29, 2003

I'm happy to do whatever I can to make MetaFilter more fun.

If you don't disapprove of my existence, I won't disapprove of yours.
posted by timeistight at 1:19 PM on April 29, 2003