How and when to use humour

March 8, 2002 12:26 AM

Rules for use of humour (more inside)...
posted by Spoon to Etiquette/Policy at 12:26 AM (51 comments total)

Using Humour in threads and posts can be a risky business, misunderstandings are common place and often result in verbal violence and brain-wrongs. Therefore for our comfort and safety, the metatalk management staff have asked me* to convey their new standardised comedy colour coding system.

Comedy has now been split up into it's seven basic forms and each form given it's own colour, font and point size. This colour coding should be used in all future posts where there is a comedic element or elements. These seven forms of comedy and their respective fonts and colours are as follows:

satire - * - 12 point - * - Arial - * - Maroon
pun - * - 8 point - * - Times - * - Olive
repetition- * - 9 point- * - Arial Bold- * - Green
sarcasm- * - 10 point- * - Courier- * - Teal
irony- * - 11 point- * - Courier Italic- * - Blue
wit - * - 13 point- * - Times Bold- * - Red
humour- * - 14 point- * - Arial Italic - * - pink

oh, and repetition (which should be in 10 point Arial Bold Green)

Given these types, the following rules must now be obeyed:

1. Underlining maybe used to convey extra amounts of comedy in the following categories only:
Irony, Sarcasm and Satire.

2. The phrase "Do you see?" should only be used as:
a) A last sarcastic resort
b) As a final point of irony

This phrase may NOT be underlined except in extreme circumstances and at the discretion of Mr. M. Haughey.

3. One or more of the above forms maybe freely combined EXCEPT for repetition and sarcasm. In cases of mixed comedy media please use the point size and font of the primary comedy type and the colour of the secondary comedy type. Should there be a tertiary comedy type then please use the point size of the primary, the font of the secondary and the colour of the tertiary. If you wish to use any more than three types of comedy please refer the post to Mr. M. Haughey.

4. Invective, Cynicism and Sardonicism have been deemed freeform comedy types and any standard windows font, style, point size and colour may be used.

5. No puns.

These rules, if followed will make metatalk/metafilter a much more comfortable and safer place to be.
Thanks for your time.

*No they haven't.
posted by Spoon at 12:34 AM on March 8, 2002

Now that was funny. So much so that it didn't need any signalling. "How To Let People Know You're Making A Joke" treatises are always hilarious.

Funnier still is the fact that there would seem to be a demand for such a system(very well-constructed, Spoon, congratulations!). A lot of posters now safeguard their sarcastic comments with the truly unfunny sarcasm tags. These invariably ruin the best joke.

We can't all be masters like Kafkaesque, ColdChef, jpoulos, stavrosthewonderchicken, obiwanwasabi, dong_resin, eyeballkid, etc - in fact all my buddies here. ;)

They never use signalling -only a discrete "just kidding" at the end when the ambiguity/potential offense is excessive(i.e. when they haven't bothered to rewrite the joke for greater clarity).

So, fwiw, I think "here comes a joke" and "this is a joke" signals are self-defeating. So are "that was a joke" signals(I use smileys because my jokes are rarely apparent); but they're not as bad.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 3:33 AM on March 8, 2002

"These rules, if followed will make metatalk/metafilter a much more comfortable and safer place to be."

You seem to be missing a rule that outlines proper etiquette for the use of pancakes.
posted by insomnia_lj at 3:38 AM on March 8, 2002

There's always 'inline tags' for added nuance.... Most effective.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 3:54 AM on March 8, 2002

Just how does one go about changing the font and the color? ] read the preceding in 10pt courier teal [

Talk about a technicolor yawn!

posted by mischief at 4:35 AM on March 8, 2002

I think I am going to do a Bunnyfire, without the coming back.
posted by Frasermoo at 5:18 AM on March 8, 2002

Oh NOOOOO! Don't leave, Frasermooooooo! ~We all love you like stainless-steel love-pumping machines coated with reeking globs of nonoxyl-9~!

The preceding was an experiment in self-refernce, and was not intended to be taken humourously, regardless of how easily-amused you may or may not be.

Spoon, you die now.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:28 AM on March 8, 2002

very benchley, mr. spoon, very benchley.
posted by mlang at 6:34 AM on March 8, 2002

'tis a big wide world out there.

I is back.
posted by Frasermoo at 6:49 AM on March 8, 2002

Excellent job.
;)
posted by darukaru at 7:06 AM on March 8, 2002

mlang is jealous. I'm glad you are back Frasermoo.
posted by goneill at 7:07 AM on March 8, 2002

Senator Spoonly? Could I make a point of inquiry here?

Could we somehow prosribe a procedure for differentiating between humor that's not funny and humor that's not funny on purpose? We don't get much irony here in Texas.
posted by ColdChef at 7:14 AM on March 8, 2002

How about if I just raise my hand when I'm making a joke, or do that "quote thing" with my fingers....you can all see me clearly, can't you?
posted by briank at 7:33 AM on March 8, 2002

yes yes, you're all very funny. Now OBEY the rules or face my wrath.
posted by Spoon at 8:08 AM on March 8, 2002

I tried colours once and was almost banned. You yourself, great Spoon, should not let yourself fall out again of the good graces you only recently fell back into. Huh?
posted by MiguelCardoso at 8:30 AM on March 8, 2002

I just love how you Brits add a "u" to words like "humour." You must have plenty of bandwidth over there for all those extra letters.

(ps: are you sure you want 10pt for that?)
posted by pardonyou? at 8:51 AM on March 8, 2002

And by the way -- what do you mean "no puns"? That's cruel and unusual punishment!
posted by pardonyou? at 8:56 AM on March 8, 2002

I have a rule for humor: Spoon isn't allowed to make any more jokes.
posted by Doug at 8:57 AM on March 8, 2002

My eyes! My eyes! You've defaced the #666!
posted by eyeballkid at 9:15 AM on March 8, 2002

I second Stav's support for the use of those inline tag thingies. They look to be very useful, ~except for the tildes~. (The tildes are meant to signify lies or otherwise sarcastic remarks.)
posted by mattpfeff at 9:22 AM on March 8, 2002

i...am...not...enthralled...spoon, my pretty ones, spoon.
posted by y2karl at 9:36 AM on March 8, 2002

I don't get it. ~I must have had a humorectomy.~
posted by iceberg273 at 9:47 AM on March 8, 2002

Pardonyou: Just to premiere the pedant inlines: #You're quite right about humor and humour. It's not as we write humourist or humourous. That would be wrong. We write humorist and humorous just like you. I say screw the ewes.#
posted by MiguelCardoso at 9:55 AM on March 8, 2002

Folks, they're not inline tags. All tags are inline. They're inline categories.
posted by rodii at 10:05 AM on March 8, 2002

Thank you, Miguel. %By the way, I didn't mean to single out our UK members -- of course the unnecessary "u" is used by people in Portugal and even Canada.%
posted by pardonyou? at 10:10 AM on March 8, 2002

Folks, they're not inline tags. All tags are inline. They're inline categories.

xoxoxPedant.xoxox

Besides, you should have said, #Folks, they're not inline tags. All tags are inline. They're inline categories.#
posted by mattpfeff at 10:18 AM on March 8, 2002

"inline" emoticons or whatever we're going to call them hinder communication because everyone would have to keep a scorecard next to their computer to understand what anyone is saying. It looks like some sort of secret language.

The thread starter was funny, but please don't mess with font tags, the fonts are the sizes and colors they are so they can be readable by everyone.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 10:21 AM on March 8, 2002

How about if we embed midi files into all of our posts to indicate the mood in which they should be read?
posted by briank at 10:31 AM on March 8, 2002

Who else thinks that "readable" should rhyme with "edible?"
posted by ColdChef at 10:44 AM on March 8, 2002

Are font tags gone?
posted by goneill at 11:21 AM on March 8, 2002

Are font tags gone?

Are now, yes. I've been meaning to ax them for ages.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 12:06 PM on March 8, 2002

Good riddance to the font tags. Don't get me wrong, I like jokes and stupidness as much as the next guy, but the japery is getting a bit much lately. I prefer when someone makes a serious point, then inserts a bit of japery. Like having barbeque sauce with your steak, rather than just a spoonful of barbeque sauce.
posted by evanizer at 12:19 PM on March 8, 2002

"inline" emoticons or whatever we're going to call them hinder communication because everyone would have to keep a scorecard next to their computer to understand what anyone is saying

I disagree with that. It took a while for smilies to make it into popular culture - and they definitely went too far, with that I don't disagree - but now pretty much everyone can interpret :-), ;-), :-P and many other iterations.

It looks like some sort of secret language.

I totally understand this concern, and don't agree with the premise that they should become abundant on MeFi (just like I don't think smilies need to be used much here) but I can't argue with the fact that they help express tone and intent better than any other text method I've encountered, short of fake html which is just annoying to type.
posted by cCranium at 12:47 PM on March 8, 2002

"inline" emoticons or whatever we're going to call them hinder communication because everyone would have to keep a scorecard next to their computer to understand what anyone is saying. It looks like some sort of secret language.

Kinda like all that newfangled junk the kids keep talkin' abowt. Wazziss "intarnet" and damd if I never heard-a no "harr drive". Onc't I made some "quicktime" but I git th'pitcher that ain't quite what the kiddoos mean by that term. It's like you gotta kep a dictyunary near by'n justa have a conv'rsashun.
posted by daveadams at 12:47 PM on March 8, 2002

I guess that means I was the last person to post with a font tag. "times, 8pt, olive" I'll never forget it. {sniff}

aside: I didn't like them either, hadn't used them before today, and didn't intend to use them outside of this discussion
posted by pardonyou? at 12:49 PM on March 8, 2002

"inline" emoticons or whatever we're going to call them hinder communication because everyone would have to keep a scorecard next to their computer to understand what anyone is saying. It looks like some sort of secret language.

There's really only one inline tag that's necessary: the bald-faced lie tag. AKA the sarcasm tag. ~AKA the God kills a kitten tag.~ Surely we can all remember a single symbol. How many times have arguments been caused on the net because someone didn't know that another person was using sarcasm? Inline tags are far superior to emoticons for two reasons: they clearly delineate both the beginning and the end of the tongue-in-cheek statement, and they do not have the drippy high-school-girl-passing-notes connotations associated with emoticons.

While I understand the reticence of the old guard to embrace change, the evil of poor communication clearly exceeds the small inconvenience of learning to use a tilde properly.

The use of other inline tags can be reserved for cognoscenti.
posted by anapestic at 2:20 PM on March 8, 2002

There is only one way to use a tilde properly. It goes over the n.
posted by kindall at 4:25 PM on March 8, 2002

It goes over the n.

Or in front of the student's subdirectory name...
Or to negate a logical statement (it is the formal symbol for "not" in symbolic logic most of the time, after all)...

Inline catagories are handy, the lie one most of all. It is helpful, gets the point across, and best of all, it's easy to remember. I have sworn off emoticons (emoticon free for two years), so it's particularly useful to me. ~Plus my opinions beat all of yours.~
posted by j.edwards at 5:42 PM on March 8, 2002

Pretty handy for cleaning your teeth, too, kindall.

And since ~j.edwards is the New J.Ko~, I think we should listen to what he has to say.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 5:43 PM on March 8, 2002

I use the tilde over deserving n's only ~10% of the time.
posted by youhas at 5:47 PM on March 8, 2002

xoxoxDarn you, stavros.xoxox
posted by j.edwards at 1:17 AM on March 9, 2002

#Well I use tildes the way they're really supposed to be used. Here's the ~useful phrase~ "Don't give your mother the hunting dog" in Portuguese, in order to appreciate the proper use of accents:

Não dês o cão de caça à mãe.

The Spaniards use it only over n's, %being the simpletons they are%, as in mañana and niña, meaning morning and little girl. (In Portuguese: manhã and menina.)#
posted by MiguelCardoso at 5:18 AM on March 9, 2002

Hm. The only Portuguese I know comes from reading "Speaker for the Dead," but in that book they used macrons rather than tildes over the vowels. Are they equivalent, or are the tildes used online because you can't get the macrons, or what?
posted by kindall at 10:07 AM on March 9, 2002

*Saturday bore coming up*

I suppose, Kindall. It would probably be considered polite if the tilde weren't available, as a lot of proper names have them. I.e. John; Juan in Spanish; Jean in French, João in Portuguese and Galician. There are certainly no macrons in Portuguese(there are in Punjabim I think) though I can't think why normal tildes weren't available for that book(what is it?). A lot of quite literate people confuse the circumflex accent, as in "eles têm"(they have)with the tilde, as in "eles são"(they are).

Thanks for asking. This is way off-topic but you know all those "why do people hate America?" threads? I think it's 99,9% down to the fact that people know a lot about America and Americans know next to nothing about all the other countries.

Unless you realize how ridiculous and unfair this is - imagine 200 countries knowing who Seinfeld is, all expecting Americans to know all their own 200 local versions of Seinfeld - you might be tempted to sympathize.

Still, it's nice!
posted by MiguelCardoso at 11:39 AM on March 9, 2002

Punjabi, dammit.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 11:40 AM on March 9, 2002

Miguel, I'm a bit shocked that you're not familiar with Speaker for the Dead. It's the mediocre sequel to the modern sci-fi classic Ender's Game, and most of it takes place on a planet where everyone speaks Portuguese. The author, Orson Scott Card, is a Mormon, which apparently has a direct bearing on the themes in the books, which do not mention Mormonism as far as I know.
posted by bingo at 6:42 PM on March 9, 2002

I would say "the decent sequel to the overrated potboiler Ender's Game", myself, just to be difficult.
posted by rodii at 8:44 PM on March 9, 2002

Hey Bingo, I've never heard of Orson Scott Card either! Apart from Ray Bradbury, I'm afraid my brain lacks the science fiction appreciation modules. I couldn't even get past the first few pages of "Stranger In A Strange Land". Now you're really shocked, right? It's a pity, because I like the sound of it and, above all, the kind of people who like sci-fi(real bookworms, passionate, intelligent, subversive). But there you are.
posted by MiguelCardoso at 11:24 PM on March 9, 2002

I'm afraid my brain lacks the science fiction appreciation modules... It's a pity, But there you are.

Pitiful indeed.

posted by y2karl at 7:32 PM on March 10, 2002

"Speaker for the Dead" is one of the few books ever to make me cry. I'm afraid I can't be objective about it, I really love that book. I am devastated to hear that all those macrons should have been tildes.
posted by kindall at 9:58 PM on March 10, 2002

Miguel, Stranger In A Strange Land is a poorly written book. I'm not surprised you like Bradbury, because he's one of the few (relatively) early sci-fi writers who cared much about language. But things have changed. I'm not saying Card is the best example, but he is a decent writer, in terms of the actual writing.

Actually this reminds me of something that T. Coraghasen Boyle said when I saw him at an appearance. Someone asked him about a sci-fi related subject, and he said he doesn't read genre fiction, because the writers are not interested in language. A couple of months later, I read a story of his in the New Yorker. Great story, but it included a metaphor comparing the color of the sky to the color of television static. It's a good metaphor, but it's also used in the famous first line of Neuromancer, William Gibson's cyberpunk prototext: "The sky was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel." I'm not saying that Gibson is the wordsmith Doyle is, or that he's the best example of prose-positive sci-fi, but he does care about language, certainly more than Heinlein did.

Have you read Dune? It's well-written, very intelligent, really more of a mythical-political fantasy than a sci-fi novel. I think you'd like it.
posted by bingo at 12:53 AM on March 11, 2002