Has MeFi ever gone green in the blue for St. P's Day?

March 17, 2005 7:51 AM

Has MeFi ever gone green in the blue for St. P's Day?
posted by NickDouglas to MetaFilter-Related at 7:51 AM (67 comments total)

Huh???

What are you doing?
posted by mediareport at 7:55 AM on March 17, 2005

No, it hasn't.
posted by iconomy at 7:58 AM on March 17, 2005

Whee! Cheap stunts pandering to ethnic stereotypes! I'll take three of the green Bud Lites!
posted by orthogonality at 7:59 AM on March 17, 2005

seriously: as a continental European infidel I have never ingested green beer (a beverage I find rather alarming). I know the color is nontoxic, but does your pee turn green too?
posted by matteo at 8:04 AM on March 17, 2005

It does if the water in the toilet is blue.
posted by anapestic at 8:07 AM on March 17, 2005

So gross.
posted by tpl1212 at 8:08 AM on March 17, 2005

Uh, Metafilter isn't Google.
posted by agregoli at 8:12 AM on March 17, 2005

posted by breezeway at 8:14 AM on March 17, 2005

I dunno, it seemed like a perfect irony...you know, the Green...the Blue...the Gray...

I'll just sit in a corner and slit my wrists. I will then listen to Irish death metal to ease the pain.
posted by NickDouglas at 8:15 AM on March 17, 2005

Don't do that. Your blood isn't green.
posted by anapestic at 8:17 AM on March 17, 2005

trharlan writes "Is using the color green on St. Patrick's Day really 'pandering to ethnic stereotypes?'"

Aye begorra me fine lad! Erin go bragh and 'tis a fine question ye be askin'! I'll be answerin' as soon as I catch me that yonder leprechaun an' sell his gold for enough dynamite to blow Ulster and all those fookin' Orangemen off th' Emerald Sod of me home and on to their lily-livered Protestant "Heaven"!
posted by orthogonality at 8:18 AM on March 17, 2005

Metafilter may not be Google, but Matt did do something goofy a few times, something involving little things flying around on the main page. What was it - can anyone recall? Cupids for Valentine's Day?
posted by iconomy at 8:18 AM on March 17, 2005

Don't mention the cupids. It only encourages him. I hate those things.
posted by anapestic at 8:18 AM on March 17, 2005

yes! i remember floating cupids!
posted by quonsar at 8:19 AM on March 17, 2005

it seemed like a perfect irony

There are already two St. Patrick's Day-referencing threads in the blue today, Nick. This would have been a perfect tangential question in either of them. But that wouldn't have gotten your name on the gray's front page, would it?

A quick count shows there are 4-5 groups of folks trying to arrange MeFi meetups right now. It's just disrespectful to bump those threads (and all the others) with something like this that has no compelling reason to be on the MeTa front page. Learn that lesson, already, would you? Stop using MeTa as your personal chatroom.
posted by mediareport at 8:25 AM on March 17, 2005

Didn't Matt do an April Fools thing where he pretended that mathowie was a computer program?
posted by Arch Stanton at 8:28 AM on March 17, 2005

It's just disrespectful to bump those threads (and all the others) with something like this that has no compelling reason to be on the MeTa front page.

This has been a problem for a while now, and even if the worst MeTa threads didn't get posted, stuff would still scroll off very quickly. I've wondered whether either the meetups shouldn't have their own page or MeTa should go to 15 instead of 10 active posts. The latter seems like it would encourage more noise posts, though.
posted by anapestic at 8:30 AM on March 17, 2005

Sorry.
posted by NickDouglas at 8:31 AM on March 17, 2005

meetups always scroll off, and then updates get posted...either they should be made static, or get a separate sidebar or something.
posted by amberglow at 8:32 AM on March 17, 2005

The meetups should go on a sidebar so that they can stay up for a week or two.
posted by Arch Stanton at 8:32 AM on March 17, 2005

This has been a problem for a while now

Agreed. That's why someone like Nick - a brand-new repeat offender - is the last thing MeTa needs. I also agree about going to 15 active posts, using a sidebar for meetups, and more heavy deleting of crap threads like this one. If that means threads that used to pass muster when the site was smaller no longer do so, well, that's just wonderful by me.
posted by mediareport at 8:33 AM on March 17, 2005

Is using the color green on St. Patrick's Day really "pandering to ethnic stereotypes?"

Not at all. We associate green with the Irish because Ireland itself is so green - they don't call it the Emerald Isle for nothing. It's a horticultural reference, not ethnic.
posted by orange swan at 8:33 AM on March 17, 2005

Of course, I didn't look before I posted that, and there is a link on the MeTa sidebar, so, uh, never mind.
posted by anapestic at 8:34 AM on March 17, 2005

and no need to apologize Nick...there was nothing wrong with your question.

I wouldn't want it, unless we gave all the rest of us equal time.
posted by amberglow at 8:35 AM on March 17, 2005

anapestic, I meant a meetups sidebar link on the Mefi home page, not the MeTa home page.

Sorry.

Yeah, well, despite amberglow, I'll believe it when you stop.
posted by mediareport at 8:37 AM on March 17, 2005

noise posts

disrespectful

your personal chatroom

has been a problem for a while

crap threads like this one

You have the opportunity to say whatever you want, and you choose this.
posted by breezeway at 8:39 AM on March 17, 2005

I meant a meetups sidebar link on the Mefi home page

Yeah, that would be useful.
posted by anapestic at 8:39 AM on March 17, 2005

Yeah man, why doesn't MeFi turn saffron each time the Haughey family has Indian for dinner?
posted by riffola at 8:39 AM on March 17, 2005

*charges in waving shillelagh*
posted by jonmc at 8:42 AM on March 17, 2005

iconomy writes "something involving little things flying around on the main page. What was it - can anyone recall? Cupids for Valentine's Day?"

The miniature flying chimpanzees for Inaugural Day 2005?
posted by orthogonality at 8:43 AM on March 17, 2005

mediareport, i suggest an enema for whatever crawled up in you and is festering. chill. really. Nick is not a troll nor an asshole.
posted by amberglow at 8:46 AM on March 17, 2005

Damn it, this time I'm going down in a blaze of glory.

Mediareport, your testicles' size is found wanting! Have at thee!
posted by NickDouglas at 8:47 AM on March 17, 2005

Geez, one day your a member of the Clinton cabinet, and the next jonmc is waving you about. And here I thought she took a job at some university.
posted by anapestic at 8:49 AM on March 17, 2005

And by "your," I mean "you're." Alas.
posted by anapestic at 8:49 AM on March 17, 2005

anapestic writes " This has been a problem for a while now, and even if the worst MeTa threads didn't get posted, stuff would still scroll off very quickly. I've wondered whether either the meet-up shouldn't have their own page or MeTa should go to 15 instead of 10 active posts. The latter seems like it would encourage more noise posts, though."


If going to a meet-up isn't important enough for you to bookmark the meet-up thread, how's it important enough for you to be bitching about?
posted by orthogonality at 8:50 AM on March 17, 2005

It's just disrespectful to bump those threads (and all the others) with something like this that has no compelling reason to be on the MeTa front page.

Lord knows what might happen to a thread which falls off the gray.
posted by caddis at 8:53 AM on March 17, 2005

Orthogonality, what if you and a number of others never saw it in the first place because it scrolled off the page too quickly?
posted by orange swan at 8:54 AM on March 17, 2005

You always have such a way with words, orthogonality. You should enter the diplomatic corps.

I think the problem is more that people won't ever see the meetup announcement if they don't check MeTa every single day because it will have scrolled off the front page before they get to it.
posted by anapestic at 8:55 AM on March 17, 2005

mediareport, i suggest an enema for whatever crawled up in you and is festering.

A shillelagh enema, faith an' begorrah!
posted by jonmc at 8:56 AM on March 17, 2005

By the way, this thread does not offend me. I am not sure why mediareport is so upset. A meet-up sidebar does sound like a pretty nice pony though.
posted by caddis at 8:58 AM on March 17, 2005

Sorry, the above may have sounded harsh than I meant it to -- and it was more directed an mediareport than anapestic.

My point is just that there are easy, constructive actions that anyone can take -- such as bookmarking -- that get you what you want regardless of what is posted to MetaTalk. And MetaTalk is for, well, MetaTalk, not the preservation in perpetuity of meet-up announcements.

If you bookmark, for instance, the problem is pretty much taken care of -- so I just don't get why rather than bookmark, people complain -- and complain, no less, that MetaTalk is being used as it was designed to be used.

In general, I don't get it when people complain, often at great length, about "inappropriate posts". There are plenty of posts that I find a waste of my time. I have a simple solution: I don't read those posts. But I also don't ask that those posts be deleted or discouraged, because apparently someone does get something out of them. Matt's in no danger of running out of disk space, and anyone with time for Metafilter at all isn't so pressed for time that he can't take the five seconds or so to see that a thread is not to his taste and skip it. And skipping a thread takes far less time and energy than calling it out on MetaTalk.

So a bunch of people are having fun with an "inappropriate" post. It's no skin off your nose. Relax, spend the time you would have spent complaining, contributing a better thread.
posted by orthogonality at 9:01 AM on March 17, 2005

This might help with the size issue Nick mentioned (perhaps N so SFW, YMMV).
posted by breezeway at 9:06 AM on March 17, 2005

orange swan writes "Orthogonality, what if you and a number of others never saw it in the first place because it scrolled off the page too quickly?"

Now that's a fair point. I think MetaTalk does scroll too quickly. Until and unless Matt decides to change that, it's a problem. But I don't know that it's a problem worth stopping all new discussion for.

Everyone gets to post to Metatlk once a week, if I recall. Presumably, if you have seven or more attendees at your regional meet-up, they can, within the rules, post a reminder once a day in the week leading up to the meet-up.

And it's "orthogonality" with a lower case "o".
posted by orthogonality at 9:06 AM on March 17, 2005

Can't we settle this over some nice Shamrock Shakes?
posted by iconomy at 9:08 AM on March 17, 2005

threads that scroll off the page could easily be fixed by increasing the length of the page, or allowing the user to set his/her own length. this is not done because the long standing metafilter tradition is to use deliberate site limitations in a futile attempt to force certain human behaviors. its never worked, and never will work, but it's endlessly amusing to watch. brownnosers, sycophants and buttlickers, you may now flame away!
posted by quonsar at 9:10 AM on March 17, 2005

the size issue Nick mentioned

Which I only brought up to compensate for my own diminutive genitalia. Which are, yes, green.

I'm sad that Media took off; won't anyone engage me in a sexuality-questioning fencing match?
posted by NickDouglas at 9:14 AM on March 17, 2005

posted by breezeway at 9:17 AM on March 17, 2005 [1 favorite]

So a bunch of people are having fun with an "inappropriate" post. It's no skin off your nose. Relax, spend the time you would have spent complaining, contributing a better thread.

There are other considerations, however, and mediareport was addressing those, although he did it rather more harshly than he should have.

There is no shortage of threads here for people to have fun in. There is, however, a limit on the number of threads that show up on MeTa at any one time. Hardly anything sticks around here for more than two days before it's consigned to the purgatorial abyss of the archives. So I don't think it's totally unreasonable for someone to suggest that the fun should take place in an already existing thread rather than starting a new one.

This is not anything like the worst thread ever, and I do think that once such a thread is here, there's not much point in yelling at people about it, except perhaps that it might keep other people from posting MeTa threads about issues that might have been better put in an email to Matt.
posted by anapestic at 9:18 AM on March 17, 2005

what is that, breezeway?
posted by amberglow at 9:23 AM on March 17, 2005

They are flatworms penis-fencing.
posted by breezeway at 9:24 AM on March 17, 2005

The penis fence is some sort of medieval male chastity device?
posted by anapestic at 9:26 AM on March 17, 2005

Geez, one day you're a member of the Clinton cabinet, and the next jonmc is waving you about. And here I thought she took a job at some university.


*applauds, politely*
posted by norm at 9:41 AM on March 17, 2005

WTF is going on here? This may be the most random thread in the history of thread.

Whee! Cheap stunts pandering to ethnic stereotypes! I'll take three of the green Bud Lites!

brownnosers, sycophants and buttlickers, you may now flame away!

Geez, one day your a member of the Clinton cabinet, and the next jonmc is waving you about. And here I thought she took a job at some university.

my own diminutive genitalia. Which are, yes, green.

They are flatworms penis-fencing.
posted by Quartermass at 9:46 AM on March 17, 2005

See, now, norm is a true gentleman. Not only does he applaud politely, but he edits so as to avoid rubbing my grammatical errors in my face.
posted by anapestic at 9:50 AM on March 17, 2005

WTF is going on here?

yeah, we could all be playing chess.
posted by quonsar at 9:59 AM on March 17, 2005

Yeah man, why doesn't MeFi turn saffron each time the Haughey family has Indian for dinner?

That I could live with. Having the site go down every time someone slips saltpeter into their food is just maddening, though.
posted by trondant at 10:22 AM on March 17, 2005

shall wee sen this one ta tha purgatory cathedral?
posted by clavdivs at 11:42 AM on March 17, 2005

Hmph. Google.com hasn't farted around with their logo, yet Google.ca has.
posted by deborah at 11:51 AM on March 17, 2005

*charges in waving shillelagh*

They are flatworms penis-fencing.

Ahem, jonmc.
posted by Specklet at 11:56 AM on March 17, 2005

Stop thinking about my shillelagh, specklet.
posted by jonmc at 12:17 PM on March 17, 2005

And it's "orthogonality" with a lower case "o".

hey, good luck with that.
posted by quonsar at 12:43 PM on March 17, 2005

quonsar writes "hey, good luck with that."
posted by orthogonality at 12:46 PM on March 17, 2005

To celebrate I've only been reading AskMeFi today. Apart from just now.

Damn.
posted by i_cola at 4:28 PM on March 17, 2005

I'm sad that Media took off

It's called work, Nick. But I'll pass on discussing testicles with you, thanks. I'd do it in a heartbeat with someone I thought could contribute a relatively thoughtful point once in a while, but I'm having a hard time recalling any comment of yours that actually added something interesting to a thread. Aside from "look at me! look at me!," that is.

Please, point me to a few and I'll gladly reconsider my opinion that you honestly don't know why you're posting threads like this.
posted by mediareport at 8:22 PM on March 17, 2005

stop. now. please.
posted by amberglow at 8:25 PM on March 17, 2005

Ok. But you really think, amberglow, that the question that started this mess was a cool use of MeTa? Yeesh. I mean, I know you like to be nice and all, but there's such a thing as too nice.
posted by mediareport at 8:35 PM on March 17, 2005

MeTa should go to 15 instead of 10 active posts. The latter seems like it would encourage more noise posts, though.
Well, changing from 5 posts to 10 displayed has not encouraged superfluous posts at all, so why not?
posted by dg at 9:10 PM on March 17, 2005