Comments on: Ask the damn question on the front page

Ask the damn question on the front page

nthdegx — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 07:08:34 -0800

Ask the damn question on the front page, already! A few recent examples of a growing Ask MetaFilter trend that's starting to annoy me. I'd move for a few guidelines: 1. Ask a question on the front page. 2. Make some effort in striking a balance between salience and brevity on the front page.

By: nthdegx

nthdegx — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 07:16:10 -0800

The nitpick part of me thinks it would be nice if every post to Ask Metafilter could be phrased as a question, complete with associated punctuation mark (hint: "?"). However, that's not my main point. My point is this:

If you're going to ask about buying a new bicycle, it would be better if you revealed the fact that you don't have any legs on the front page. Anything that allows readers to gauge just how helpful they can be without them having to go into a thread can only be a good thing, imo. I have no problem with adding more information as a comment, but the degree of brevity with some of the posts strikes me as problematic. There are ways of doing it, and not doing it.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 07:23:17 -0800

I completely disagree. The less room a post takes up on the page, the better, so long as a general idea of the subject is given, which is true in all the cases you link. If you see "I'm trying to install a p2p client," you know whether you can be of assistance or not; since I know I can't, it saves me time and effort to just see the one sentence and move on rather than reading an entire paragraph of details that mean nothing to me. And nobody's making you "go into a thread"; if you don't want to bother, for heaven's sake don't.

By: mischief

mischief — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 08:08:04 -0800

I completely agree (with nth).

By: ook

ook — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 08:08:49 -0800

I completely disagree (with languagehat).

By: amberglow

amberglow — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 08:20:50 -0800

I'm with nth and mischief and ook--we should be able to get all relevant (if rudimentary info) from the Q itself, and not have to go into the thread (although I usually end up looking inside anyway).

By: dabitch

dabitch — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 08:54:54 -0800

I don't bother looking inside if the question is too vague. I see now that I could have answered rocketmans p2p Q, but I assumed he was running some other OS and never looked inside. In short - nthdegx got a good point, and I agree.

By: jpoulos

jpoulos — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 08:57:36 -0800

I agree with quonsar.

By: jpoulos

jpoulos — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 08:58:24 -0800

whatever he thinks.

By: PrinceValium

PrinceValium — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 09:05:08 -0800

The [more inside] should be used when the question is longer than a conservatively sized paragraph. That said, there are bigger problems in the cosmos.

By: stupidsexyFlanders

stupidsexyFlanders — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 09:34:48 -0800

There's no bigger problem that can't be solved by some mathowie coding. If I've learned anything on Metatalk, it's that.

By: Space Coyote

Space Coyote — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 11:05:59 -0800

I agree with everybody except languagehat. The whole habit people have of being vague to get people to click on the link / thread is irritating enough in MeFi proper.

By: crunchland

crunchland — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 11:08:33 -0800

I don't care what any of you think, I haven't made up my mind on the subject.

By: nthdegx

nthdegx — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 11:28:03 -0800

"If you see "I'm trying to install a p2p client," you know whether you can be of assistance or not"

That simply isn't the case. I can talk about p2p clients for windows, but it isn't until you get inside the thread that you discover it was for OSX.

Things only take up more room if they go over one line. Some of these posts could be four times the length, give the reader some vital info and still not take up an ounce more space. That said, I don't think anyone seriously has a problem with a 2, 3 or 4 line post, I'd certainly prefer that to 2, 3 or 4 words that communicate very little.

"And nobody's making you "go into a thread"; if you don't want to bother, for heaven's sake don't."

Heh. To be certain "there are bigger problems in the cosmos", but MeTa's not the place to talk about them. I don't think it's that big a deal, and I'm certainly not on anyone's case about it. I don't mean to pick on the p2p for OSX question so much, it just happens to be a good example. Ask Metafilter is a new thing, and I think some pervading idea of what constitutes a good post is good for the site, so here's my two pennies.

By: mr_crash_davis

mr_crash_davis — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 11:31:04 -0800

Every time you click an AskMe post, a kitten dies.

By: quonsar

quonsar — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 12:04:43 -0800

what quonsar thinks.

By: amberglow

amberglow — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 12:13:14 -0800

ooo, that was fun! again! again!

By: konolia

konolia — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 12:40:35 -0800

I agree with myself.

By: wendell

wendell — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 12:49:43 -0800

Oh great, now that '70s song "We Just Disagree" is going to earworm me all day, in spite of quonsar's best efforts to replace it.
If you ask me.... oops, wrong page.

By: rushmc

rushmc — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 13:30:14 -0800

I agree that the "stylistic postings" that occur on Metafilter are inappropriate in a question-answering forum such as AskMe. It's not about being clever, it's about being clear, to maximize the chances of getting a useful answer.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 15:35:57 -0800

I disagree with languagehat.

By: rocketman

rocketman — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 19:12:42 -0800

Well I guess I'm just a big asshole.

But I'm not really sorry.

By: inpHilltr8r

inpHilltr8r — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 19:21:59 -0800

I ate someone who disagreed with me.

By: Space Coyote

Space Coyote — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 21:55:11 -0800

I ate someone who agreed with me.

Fucker so didn't see it coming.

By: woil

woil — Sun, 04 Jan 2004 22:31:22 -0800

I think that we should change the slogan on the page from "ask and ye shall receive" to [More Inside].

By: nthdegx

nthdegx — Mon, 05 Jan 2004 02:58:45 -0800

Not at all, rocketman. It was just a good example. I've posted queries not in the form of a question, so to a degree I'm picking myself up here, too.

By: Witty

Witty — Mon, 05 Jan 2004 05:08:14 -0800

I take everything personally. And I also agree with nthdegx. He/She is just trying to make things better. What's wrong with that?

By: me3dia

me3dia — Mon, 05 Jan 2004 14:35:12 -0800

Do not eat the green acid!