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April 2005 Archives (all archives)
April 30
April 29
I've not been here long, but already I want a pony. It's been addressed tangentially before:
sort by recent comments." Add this to AskMefi - by monju_bosatsu and
we desperately need a "My AskMe"but my specific desired feature is to have the ability to know if an AskMeFi question of mine (or MetaTalk question) has been commented on further since I last checked/logged on, even if it is on my 'user' page, rather than on the main pages. I couldn't find such a beast, so if it is there, please let me know.
I agree bookmarking the specific threads would get the job done, but what's the point of asking for a new pony if the donor could just say - "You already have a perfectly functioning bicycle" Thanks.
posted by birdsquared to Feature Requests at 11:08 PM PST - 8 comments
Any MeFites in Philly, free, and bored tonight (Friday, April 29th)? If there's at least one "yeah" in the next forty-five minutes, I suggest we meet upstairs at Tattoo'd Mom's at 2300 (530 South Street, Phila, PA).
(Keep in mind, this is super impromptu. I'll be watching this thread, organizing as best I can.)
posted by Netzapper to MetaFilter Gatherings at 6:26 PM PST - 6 comments
Can
this thread please be deleted (I know it will anyway). I searched MeFi before posting it, but didn't see results. My most humble apologies.
posted by zerokey to Etiquette/Policy at 4:26 PM PST - 6 comments [closed]
MeFi Seattle: meetup much? Rumor has it that a quite amiable and
accomplished actress will be visiting Seattle May 8th and 9th. Surely we can spare a few hours for coordinated hooliganry, malted beverages, and inevitably the Most Revered Bearing of Digital Gadgets both Great and Small. Discuss within.
posted by fatllama to MetaFilter Gatherings at 11:35 AM PST - 25 comments
Avoiding duplicate threads with different URLs: In order to avoid
posts like this, a
tag search might further eliminate dupes. Would it be worth having (for example) the last three FPPs using the same tag(s) listed when you preview a new thread? And would that be easy to implement?
posted by GhostintheMachine to Feature Requests at 8:25 AM PST - 25 comments
April 28
In regards to
this thread (about the Metro Toronto Police trying to catch a pedophile, for those who don't wish to click)...
I live in Toronto, and I'd like to send this unit something -- flowers, a card, I don't know -- to say "Hey, you guys do one of the worst jobs in the known universe, and we as a community would like to say thank you." I feel that maybe these people don't get a lot of thanks or recognition from us common folks.
I don't know what would be appropriate. So... this thread is for suggestions for:
1) Appropriate something to send
2) If anyone wants to help pay, which I'm not exactly asking for unless we come up with an idea that's more than about $40 CAD.
posted by dirtynumbangelboy to MetaFilter-Related at 6:40 PM PST - 36 comments
I am trying to post a question to Ask MetaFilter and don't see an option to add a Web link.
It's clearly there if I go to respond to someone else's post or if I want to post to MetaFilter.
And I see that others have added web links to their questions.
Am I missing something?
posted by terrier319 to Feature Requests at 7:45 AM PST - 10 comments
All I want to do is change my log in or screen name. I have searched the site, and see only that I should email Matt; and I have tried that, but he hasn't had the time, I guess, to respond.
I would rather not have to re-up to get a new name on here. Any suggestions?
posted by swlabr to Etiquette/Policy at 6:21 AM PST - 49 comments
April 27
HTML entities, like Π or Σ get converted
in the input area to the actual displayed characters after a preview.
So when
the comment is posted, the displayed characters --
not the entities -- are actually submitted, and the submitted displayed characters are then converted to question marks in the posted comment.
The result is that a preview that looked fine turns into a comment that doesn't.
Also: using the
tag (say to preserve original whitespace) results in double-spaced lines, taking up too much vertical space. Using the tag prevents this, but whitespace is not preserved. Adding appears to be a (n ugly and hard to edit) work-around, but while leading non-breaking spaces within tags are retained in previews, they are stripped in the posted comment.
As a number of askMefi's ask for program code, and as even some FPPs may contain code fragments, this makes the code unreadable or even syntactically incorrect in languages than foolishly assign meaning to whitespace.
And it's a pure pain to spend the time to carefully add the whitespace and to Google the correct HTML entities for a post, only to see them stripped out.
(Browser: Firefox 1.0.3)
posted by orthogonality to Bugs at 5:39 PM PST - 70 comments
April 26
As a follow-up to
this post from last year, is anything happening with the members nearby feature being extended to cover people that don't have a zip code? If the latitude and longitude thing is too much work can we group people outside the US by country?
posted by mexican to Feature Requests at 10:15 PM PST - 18 comments
"popular group blog" Metafilter warrants a mention in
this article which discusses how local issues in places such as university campuses can become widely discussed nationally and globally within hours or days of their initial mention online.
posted by feelinglistless to MetaFilter-Related at 2:25 PM PST - 4 comments
We know who posts the most, who comments the most, etc. Do we know who the most helpful users of AskMe are (as expressed by the ratio [questions/answers])?
posted by stupidsexyFlanders to Etiquette/Policy at 9:58 AM PST - 52 comments
April 25
Matthew Haughey says he won't read our blogs if we use the term "mainstream media" (a.k.a. MSM).
A news flash for Matt: We don't care.
We don't care if you read our web logs...
My
Informed Comment ?
Ouch...
posted by y2karl to MetaFilter-Related at 10:14 PM PST - 101 comments
I'm looking for some insight into the standards for screening anonymous questions on AskMeta. [MI]
posted by rkent to Etiquette/Policy at 1:59 PM PST - 8 comments
April 24
I did not mark
this as best answer. I really, really doubt I did it accidently which is why I'm listing it as a bug. No offense, the answer isn't bad, but the best? I wish to wait.
posted by geoff. to Bugs at 8:05 PM PST - 3 comments
PonyFilter - search Threads&Comments in the blue? Seeing what posts have been flagged as? Or has these been asked about already? (metatalk search sez no...)
posted by PurplePorpoise to Feature Requests at 7:50 PM PST - 1 comments
This thread gave me an idea. Could we set it up so links going to amazon or iTunes contain a MeFi affiliate id, so when visitors buy songs or books, some money could go to a MeFi general fund for hosting or sending mathowie on vacation or whatever?
posted by null terminated to Feature Requests at 3:58 PM PST - 10 comments
Warnock's Dilemma is the situation you face when people don't comment on your postings. The problem with no response is that there are five possible interpretations:
1. The post is correct, well-written information that needs no follow-up commentary. There's nothing more to say except "Yeah, what he said."
2. The post is complete and utter nonsense, and no one wants to waste the energy or bandwidth to even point this out.
3. No one read the post, for whatever reason.
4. No one understood the post, but won't ask for clarification, for whatever reason.
5. No one cares about the post, for whatever reason.
This perfectly captures my thoughts when I see an amazing post with only 2 or 3 comments (of course, I believe everyone else is thinking point 1 as well). This probably explains why we can't equate lots of comments nor low comments with the quality of a post, since it could be good or bad in five different ways, as described here.
posted by mathowie to MetaFilter-Related at 2:39 PM PST - 42 comments
Readability Results for http://www.metafilter.com:
Gunning Fog Index 10.70
Typical Fog Index Scores:
6 TV guides, The Bible, Mark Twain
8 Reader's Digest
8 - 10 Most popular novels
10 Time, Newsweek
11 Wall Street Journal
14 The Times, The Guardian
15 - 20 Academic papers
Over 20 Only government sites can get away with this, because you can't ignore them.
Over 30 The government is covering something up
We're just like Time and Newsweek!
posted by mathowie to MetaFilter-Related at 9:11 AM PST - 36 comments
April 23
Did any other MeFites take the State Department's Foreign Service Exam today? What career track did you choose? Did you find the test to be easy or hard? Did you realize that if it wasn't for metafilter, you'd be hopelessly ignorant? Discuss!
posted by BuddhaInABucket to MetaFilter-Related at 7:58 PM PST - 9 comments
Is there a chunk of AskMe that has not been indexed? If not, why can't I find a certain question? (more inside)
posted by gluechunk to Bugs at 6:58 PM PST - 3 comments
April 22
Matt, we desperately need a "My AskMe" sort of deal. Things are scrolling so damn fast that it's nearly impossible to keep track of the good stuff.
posted by five fresh fish to Feature Requests at 10:05 AM PST - 16 comments
How much leg work/research is common for a FPP? I had
my first and I admit I didn't do much - as evidenced by the subsequent discussion. I was just happy to find something that came up empty on Search Metafilter.
posted by tvjunkie to Etiquette/Policy at 7:42 AM PST - 15 comments
April 21
I just caught the end of rcade being interviewed about popesquatting on NBC Today! He was funny and you could hear the studio cracking up. Nice one!
posted by carter to MetaFilter-Related at 7:49 AM PST - 88 comments
After I submit a comment, it sends me back to the page with all the comments, but it's the old version of that page, without my new comment. If I force a reload, mine will show up, though it used to show immediately. Is there some new caching or something?
posted by smackfu to Bugs at 7:31 AM PST - 6 comments
April 20
as i wander through every bike-related askme query and see the same user names replying to each question i've started to wonder: would there be a benefit to allowing mefi users to organize themselves into caucus-like groups? would it serve the community better if, in much the same way individuals are grouped by region on their profile pages, we could somehow align ourselves by interest/expertise to make better use of our collective resources?
posted by RockyChrysler to Feature Requests at 11:06 AM PST - 39 comments
April 19
"EST" = "Eastern Standard Time"; "EDT" = "Eastern Daylight saving Time"; "ET" = "Eastern Time" (no standard/daylight specified -- usually obvious which it is). It's to be expected that people will make these mistakes in
FPPs and comments, but could you tweak the code so it doesn't say "EST" when it really doesn't mean "EST"? Rather than trying to come up with some code algorithm, or trying to remember to make the DST change every six months, just call it ET / CT / PT / etc and be done with it. A pet peeve of mine ...
posted by intermod to Bugs at 6:36 PM PST - 18 comments
Despite some snarking here and there,
this thread is really fascinating stuf, complete with actual non-hostile debate! I learn something new every day. Kudos.
posted by xmutex to Etiquette/Policy at 3:40 PM PST - 28 comments
April 18
Now that tags for front-page posts have been around a while, how do you decide between, say, film and movies (89 posts to 87, respectively), tv and television (57-49) or math and mathematics (20-18)? Do you use both, go with the most-used, or what?
posted by mediareport to Etiquette/Policy at 8:27 PM PST - 14 comments
Archived results of a
user search are broken down in batches of 50. However, going to different pages of the results keeps giving the same 50. (I tried using NEXT and clicking individual page numbers.). I'm on Firefox on OS X.
posted by dobbs to Bugs at 10:32 AM PST - 11 comments
April 17
Anon posting is back on for Ask Metafilter, including all the extended areas and categories and tags and whatnot. I think I tested everything out and it worked, but let me know if you find any bugs, as I'm sure I forgot one.
posted by mathowie to Feature Requests at 11:51 PM PST - 13 comments
Some time ago I saw something here on Metafilter about one or more University Campuses (in California?) that laid out their sidewalks to follow pedestrian traffic patterns, possibly after monitoring said patterns for awhile. This may or may not have been the main topic of the thread. Can you help me find this thread?
posted by mai to MetaFilter-Related at 9:25 PM PST - 5 comments
After making
this post I saw that I had somehow deleted half of it (probably when fixing a tag on preview). Is there some way to implement an edit function of one's fpp? Maybe have a five minute grace period?
posted by Kattullus to Feature Requests at 3:27 PM PST - 8 comments
http://www.metafilter.com.1bu.com/
Metafilter is being "ripped" in its entirety and copied by a server running in China. Apparently this guy is hitting everyone and everything, copying entire sites and hosting them, but hotlinking to images. What he gains from this I don't know, but add his IP address to the firewall rules so he can't do this.
Some others he's doing this to include porn sites, antique sites, major searh engines, game companies...you name it, they've been duplicated and are paying for image bandwidth if a surfer his his copied version of your site.
I only pray that ebay can smite him:
http://www.ebay.com.1bu.com/
posted by Kato to Bugs at 2:48 PM PST - 13 comments
A few
photos of last night's East Bay meetup shenanigans. In keeping with the no-paparazzi aim of the meetup, these are all just buttons, art and chests, plus shoutouts. Thanks to the East Bayers for organizing and for bringing the cards.
posted by bendy to MetaFilter Gatherings at 11:06 AM PST - 19 comments
April 16
In Safari 1.3 the background of the top nav panel on AskMe is in MeTa grey rather than green.
posted by bonaldi to Bugs at 7:54 AM PST - 26 comments
April 15
Where are you? We're at the NYC meetup! And I'm taking the JONMC SAYS HI opportunity to pop my Grey-cherry. Jon says I look like prospero. In attendance are: jonmc, vidiot, amberglow, adampsyche, cunninglinguist, SmartDalek, lilboo, chicobangs, naxosaxur, bingo, dame, ursus comitas, hellbient, TNLNYC, and a few "real" people. I might've left someone out. Sorry if I did. (is this the first post AT a meetup?)
posted by Eideteker to MetaFilter Gatherings at 7:47 PM PST - 83 comments
April 14
I've been trying to track down a post about a guy who had a server (from which he was hosting his site) inside his body. Does anyone remember this or have I just gone mental and imagined the whole thing?
posted by fizz-ed to MetaFilter-Related at 11:36 AM PST - 4 comments
No posts on MetaFilter since 12 midnight? Am I the only one seeing this or have we truly reached the end of the internets?
posted by KevinSkomsvold to Uptime at 7:41 AM PST - 23 comments
April 13
It's currently 05:37 JST. Metafilter says it's 06:37 JST. I doublechecked, but the user configuration is correct: UTC + 9 hours. Is Mefi applying daylight savings time to Coordinated Universal Time, throwing off calculations?
posted by Bugbread to Bugs at 1:40 PM PST - 4 comments [closed]
April 12
Calling all Winnipeggers I will be in the 'peg this weekend and would loooove to cause/organize a meetup if there's interest. Anybody?
posted by raedyn to MetaFilter-Related at 2:13 PM PST - 11 comments
April 11
I don't know if this is a bug, per se, but it's certainly a problem. I submitted a text ad a while back and paid for it with PayPal. I never got any email, and the ad was never activated. I can log into the ad system and see it in the inactive section, but there is no option to activate it. It never ran, there are 0 views.
In addition I had a hard time figuring out who to contact about this. There is nothing in the ad system area, the wiki, the text ad information page, or the text ad order page telling me who to contact with a text ad problem! I found Matt Haughey's address on the About page, but it has been about two weeks now with no response.
Any suggestions? I'd love to know how to get the ad activated, how to prevent this in the future, and/or how to get my money back.
posted by robotspacer to Bugs at 1:28 PM PST - 4 comments [closed]
Posting with a malformed anchor tag makes a mess of the preview page, and comment text is gone when you hit Back to fix it. [more details inside]
posted by odinsdream to Bugs at 12:30 PM PST - 7 comments
I am baffled by the sudden disappearance of a link to 63days.com - I am unable to find it by searching MeFi either. I was not the original poster, but found the link fascinating and am confused about its removal. Anyone know about this?
posted by Uccellina to MetaFilter-Related at 12:26 PM PST - 19 comments
I wanted to create an FPP for this
ten second film festival, which I think would be of interest to many MeFites, but I've run into a couple of ethical and logistical conundrums: 1) The festival is being run by a friend of mine, so I suppose I might be a little biased as to this being The Best of The Web. 2) You really have to be in the Twin Cities area to see the screening and win a prize, even though submissions are accepted from anywhere. Any thoughts about this being FPP worthy?
posted by bigbadem to Etiquette/Policy at 10:24 AM PST - 11 comments
I'm pretty sure this has been requested before here, but can we please have a way to flag
posts with stupid tags, while the rest of the content of the post is just fine?
posted by grouse to Feature Requests at 9:09 AM PST - 21 comments
April 10
Could we please not allow someone to start an Ask MeFi thread before they have contributed to the site by posting comments somewhere? It is really not too much to ask. I know this could be abused by someone posting periods or "What so and so said", etc. I wonder if there is an elegant solution.
posted by riffola to Etiquette/Policy at 4:47 PM PST - 92 comments
April 9
I was out at Jillian's in Boston yesterday, and I saw another MeFite there who I recognized from a previous MeFi meetup. Thing is, I didn't remember her real name, and I'm not sure that she'd remember mine. Should I have said hi, and if so, what would be the rules on having friends of MeFites meet each other? Do we introduce other MeFites as friends, acquaintances, or what?
posted by sachinag to Etiquette/Policy at 3:10 PM PST - 45 comments
April 8
I was thinking about starting up another metafilter meta projects mailing list, since the one by Jerry Kindall isn't done anymore. Is this totally pointless or is there some interest/need for it?
posted by tozturk to MetaFilter-Related at 9:46 PM PST - 9 comments
I'd like to see individual comments feeds for all MeFi posts. This would make threads much easier to track. Also, could we get feeds for MeFi tags too perhaps? And what about feeds for each user's posts and comments, like how
43 Things uses them.
posted by sjvilla79 to Feature Requests at 3:20 PM PST - 32 comments
Just a tiny request-- could
this be converted to a "more inside" post w/ a spoiler warning? It seems like the best thing to do. This is no callout, an honest mistake, but it'd be nice to fix it quick...
posted by koeselitz to Etiquette/Policy at 9:17 AM PST - 6 comments
Is the DNS for metafilter.com down? I can't reach ns1.turlyming.com or ns2.turlyming.com. This might not be causing problems for everyone yet as DNS lookups get cached on local nameservers, but still needs fixing quickly.
posted by fvw to Uptime at 6:08 AM PST - 20 comments
April 7
I've been nudged enough - by more than a few interested parties - to point out that it just may be time for another Dallas MeFi meetup. Granted, we've an awful lot
to live up to this time around, but how many of us metroplexuals are in and when and where? (and yes, Eris, you brought this on - and maybe, just maybe, we can trump the record in my apartment of six people crashing at my place)
posted by Ufez Jones to MetaFilter Gatherings at 11:26 PM PST - 17 comments
So I posted a question about parallel universes on askmetafilter yesterday (got a bunch of great comments within the first hour) and when I checked in this morning I can't find the question either on the page or in the archives. Where is it?
posted by Panfilo to Bugs at 11:04 PM PST - 52 comments
My
user page lists 347 comments to MetaTalk, but when I click on that
347, I get a display of 1-50 of
432 comments. No similar discrepancy for MetaFilter or AskMetafilter. This as viewed in Safari and Firefox under OSX 10.3.8.
posted by squirrel to Bugs at 5:28 PM PST - 15 comments
Anybody else noticed a recent upsurge in the number of Mefi meetups? What could be the reason for the newfound urge of more members of the community to meet in RL?
posted by dash_slot- to MetaFilter Gatherings at 3:40 PM PST - 29 comments
I know it's been mentioned before, but I'd like to make a humble request for an extension of the length of the front page of AskMe. Questions just fly off the page, often in less than 24 hours, rendering the site less useful. An even better change would be to allow users the ability to choose the number of days displayed on the AskMe front page, just like on the MeFi front page.
Sorry if this is a redundant request. I bring it up because AskMe questions are vanishing from the front page ever more rapidly.
posted by Dr. Wu to Feature Requests at 11:29 AM PST - 40 comments
April 6
Who is
this...how exactly do they log in...and where have they been all this time?
posted by Jimbob to Bugs at 10:24 PM PST - 36 comments
Ok, so I was a bit rude hijacking
this thread but anyway
Tessa is in Melbourne and we are meeting tonight (Thursday 7th)
here. Late notice I know but I was apprehensive. I tried this
once before and it kind of didn't work. I know there's not many of us but still come on down from about 9PM.
posted by bdave to MetaFilter Gatherings at 5:46 PM PST - 13 comments
Portland Portland Portland! (The Oregon one)... MeFi Gathering this
Saturday, April 9th at
5:30 pm at the
Lucky Lab Brewpub on Hawthorne ... which means that you canine companions are very welcome to join us. We'll be there for brew and sandwiches, but any youngins must leave by 9 pm. Please post here so that I know about how many to expect; I will be there early with a sign and to get a table as they don't take reservations.
posted by SpecialK to MetaFilter Gatherings at 2:41 PM PST - 20 comments
Would it be possible to auto delete a post if the original author flags it as a double post? I double posted, I flagged it, but it is still there, perhaps I should be able to remove it?
posted by jonah to Feature Requests at 9:14 AM PST - 53 comments
Appalachian Mountain Mefi Mofi Meetup Reminder -
it's this Friday, April 8, as in the day after tomorrow, after work (5ish/6ish and continuing) at the Flying Frog on the corner of Haywood & Battery Park in beautiful downtown Asheville, NC. Hopefully outside, weather permitting. Be there!
posted by mygothlaundry to MetaFilter Gatherings at 7:29 AM PST - 7 comments
April 5
I want to take issue with
this post. The seemingly innocuous way greatgefilte couples the public acknowledgement of a conspiracy another, speculative one is a disingenuous way to lend credibility to a (what is in my opinion) a particularly slanderous myth. [more inside]
posted by ori to Etiquette/Policy at 11:17 PM PST - 67 comments
April 4
"
The post is what you bring to it."
What's the consensus? I find these 'random word links' very annoying. Can we at least have some etiquette rule that says if you have more then a hand full of links, the text of the link must reflect the content of the linked-to page? Or something?
posted by delmoi to Etiquette/Policy at 9:53 AM PST - 53 comments
April 3
Would it be possible to get trackbacks turned back on at some point? Also, a small bug: existing trackbacks have disappeared. I'm not sure whether that happened when trackbacks were initially disabled or when the comment-closing feature was added, but they're all gone.
posted by monju_bosatsu to Feature Requests at 1:21 PM PST - 12 comments
Fun idea? Or... not so much? Inspired by Fuzzy Monster,
here, I was thinking of a metapoem blogthing wherein anyone who wanted to participate could post a poem from any particular day, made up of three or four lines created from post "headlines" (first few words — the ones that typically constitute the initial link) from that particular day. If it seems like a fun idea, I have some questions inside...
posted by taz to MetaFilter-Related at 5:49 AM PST - 45 comments
MeFi lo-version...used to have it bookmarked for viewing on my Pocket PC, but somehow lost it. Does it still exist?
posted by davidmsc to MetaFilter-Related at 4:28 AM PST - 3 comments
April 2
Submitted for discussion:
This is a solid example of a lame 'newsfilter' post. A link to a very brief local news story with zero attempt at intelligent context.
posted by mediareport to Etiquette/Policy at 7:02 PM PST - 41 comments
I think it's fairly obvious that
this should not have been posted to the front page. The front page is not a forum for venting one's furstration.
posted by Sangermaine to Etiquette/Policy at 12:14 PM PST - 34 comments
I heart the Jewelboxing flash ad in the Blue sidebar! I have wasted many happy seconds mousing over the case to watch in infantile fascination!
...open the case... close the case! ...open the case... close the case!
posted by mwhybark to MetaFilter-Related at 12:00 PM PST - 12 comments
April 1
Just wanted to say that today's
rat post is the most digusting thing I've ever read on MeFi. I had to go back and read it two or three times just to be sure.
posted by 327.ca to MetaFilter-Related at 12:02 PM PST - 63 comments
I have prepared an FPP about an organization that was recently the subject of a couple Internet memes (and Metafilter threads) that is now being sued by a major international corporation as a result of one of their pranks. Their web site is vague and asks people not to post rumors, but they sent out a number of details to their mailing list, including ways to support them. Would it be unethical for me to post this semi-private information to Metafilter? Could I get them in more trouble with this lawsuit? Half of me feels that Mefites might be willing to contribute to the cause, but the other half wants to be extremely careful.
posted by Plutor to Etiquette/Policy at 4:57 AM PST - 28 comments