Contacting local mefites

September 3, 2006 12:09 PM

If I help plan a "meet up," is there a way to send out an email to all subscribers within an X-mile radius? Related -- is there a way for me to link to all subscribers who live in my city (i.e. as "neighbors") or are all links one-at-a-time? (Would it be weird to link to all subscribers in my city?)
posted by ClaudiaCenter to MetaFilter Gatherings at 12:09 PM (25 comments total)

There isn't a way to email everyone who lives in your area, this would be almost immediately abused beyond belief by spammers if it existed. In fact members' email addresses, if they choose to share them, are only visible to logged-in members just as a point of information.

You can look at your own profile, see who is near you and add them as contacts which makes it a little bit easier to get ahold of the ones who have contact information in their profile. They would, in this way all be "linked" to your profile. You do have to do this one at a time, and it's not weird at all. I link to the people who live near me, both of them.

Also, not that you asked, but the idea of "subscribers" doesn't really hold here, people pay a one-time fee and then they're members for life barring extreme circumstances. Feel free to ask more questions here, check out the FAQ, or email me, my email address is in my profile.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:27 PM on September 3, 2006

In my opinion, people that wanna go to a meetup check MetaTalk.
posted by k8t at 12:40 PM on September 3, 2006

jessamyn what have you done to the other 5 who claim to live near you? Did your chicken pictures scare them away?
posted by adamvasco at 12:42 PM on September 3, 2006

what have you done to the other 5 who claim to live near you?

Four of the other five live over an hour from me. Close as the crow flies isn't super close; some of them are in another state.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:55 PM on September 3, 2006

It is time that 'ahold' became a real word. Thanks jessamyn. Shall 'nother' be next?
posted by Cranberry at 1:02 PM on September 3, 2006

Gee, there must be a collective hallucination among lexicographers, because dictionaries seem to have entries for ahold. Here are some citations from the OED:

1881 LANIER Poems 17, I will heartily lay me a-hold on the greatness of God.
1887 MORRIS Odyss. x. 264 He caught ahold upon me.
1925 E. HEMINGWAY In our Time (1926) v. 79 Nick dropped his wrist. ‘Listen,’ Ad Francis said. ‘Take ahold again.’

So, any other perfectly good words you'd like to complain about?
posted by languagehat at 1:19 PM on September 3, 2006

Thanks, all. I was just curious because it seems like there might be interested people who would not necessarily notice a MetaTalk announcement, either because they don't regularly check and/or because the announcement is pushed off the front page when they do check. My own diligence re various internet sites varies, and I could easily miss an announcement, even though I might want to go. Anyway, thanks for the replies, very helpful. I'll post back when/if there is an actual announcement.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 1:37 PM on September 3, 2006

You mess with the language, and you get the hat.
posted by boo_radley at 2:08 PM on September 3, 2006

In my opinion, people that wanna go to a meetup check MetaTalk.

Unless they were like me, and kept going "what are these meetups everyone keeps talking about, and how come I'm never invited?"

Anyway, now my main MeFi bookmark is the MetaFilter gatherings link.

If you want to go through the trouble, I think it would be cool to email people who put their location in their profiles. Of course, you may or may not end up with a giant turnout if you do that.
posted by trevyn at 2:47 PM on September 3, 2006

languagehat, that second citation is actually a typo; it should read "1887 MORRIS Odyss. x. 264 He caught a cold upon me," referring, of course, to Odysseus' battles with the dread Rhinovirus of Sirius (it was a sirius cold), until the goddess Leucothea sent her army of leukocytes to help him out. Just FYI.
posted by taz at 2:54 PM on September 3, 2006

Actually, taz, in the time of Homer, a wine hangover was often misdiagnosed as the effects of the Rhinovirus of Sirius. The commonest remedy was a small portion of the same wine, also known as "the hair of the dog star that bit you."
posted by diddlegnome at 3:53 PM on September 3, 2006

Since when did "collective" become a world? Freakin' foreigners, bringing their fancy words in here. Sounds like a commie word.
posted by blue_beetle at 3:58 PM on September 3, 2006

So, any other perfectly good words you'd like to complain about?

Like a caged jungle cat, he strikes! Moments prior to the attack, the soon to be savaged villagers were completely unaware of his presence, and the imminent danger that was to befall them.
posted by jonson at 4:19 PM on September 3, 2006

any other perfectly good words you'd like to complain about?

My mom says problematize is not a word, but it's all the hell over the internets. Her refusal to acknowledge that this is a word is one of the ways in which I feel she embodies it.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:59 PM on September 3, 2006

Here's an OED cite for your mom:

1630 B. JONSON New Inn II. ii, Hear him problematize...

taz, diddlegnome: Brilliant!

Like a caged jungle cat, he strikes!

And like a thunderbolt he falls!
posted by languagehat at 5:15 PM on September 3, 2006

Heh, apparently I am in the vortex of MeFi, as there are 294 plus people within 38 miles. I guess I'll link to those within 3 miles -- (checking) yikes, that's 157!! Who knew? And why don't I have a social life? I've gotta make more effort.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 5:17 PM on September 3, 2006

And if she doesn't like Ben Johnson, here's George Saintsbury:

1910 G. SAINTSBURY in Cambr. Hist. Eng. Lit. V. 200 Hamlet himself is capable of being problematised to the nth.
posted by languagehat at 5:17 PM on September 3, 2006

Mod note: And why do you supposed that jonson is in an OED citation for the word problematize, hmm?

sometimes we all need lives claudiacenter, it's ok
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 5:21 PM on September 3, 2006

"...any other perfectly good words you'd like to complain about?"

Now that you mention it, I really don't much care for "alright". You wouldn't write alwrong, now would you?
posted by mr_crash_davis at 5:31 PM on September 3, 2006

I'd always thought that ask metafilter could spawn its own subsites: Ask the Linguist, Ask the Doctor, Ask the Psychotherapist

to kind of take a strain off the main site.
posted by vacapinta at 5:42 PM on September 3, 2006

huh.... now that I re-read my nonsense above, it really makes no sense at all. If languagehat is truly like a CAGED junglecat, how in God's name is he supposed to strike? I think I meant "coiled junglecat". Or possibly "oiled snugglekitten."
posted by jonson at 5:46 PM on September 3, 2006

vacapinta... you got something you want to ask the jonson?
posted by jonson at 5:49 PM on September 3, 2006

AskTheJonson:
I got this lesion on my back. I'm worried that when I meet a girl tonight and go back to her pad [my place has bedbugs] that she'll totally freak out. How do I prevent her finding this tender area, and -even worse- infecting it?
posted by yeti at 7:21 PM on September 3, 2006

k8t writes "In my opinion, people that wanna go to a meetup check MetaTalk"

Sometimes this stuff comes up when lots of people aren't actively reading like RGD inquiry yesterday.
posted by Mitheral at 10:52 AM on September 4, 2006

ClaudiaCenter - I believe there are quite a few SanFransiscans over at Metachat, too.
posted by porpoise at 2:32 PM on September 4, 2006