MetaTalk posts tagged with policy

Is this style of post appropriate for MetaFiilter?

SeizeTheDay — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 11:14:16 -0800

Is this style of post really worthy of the site? I know we've had single link posts to the NYTimes; I've posted a couple myself. And usually, they're fine. My concern is the second link - the comments section of the Times, which I don't think is appropriate for the front page. There are a few reasons I think this is wrong: 1) Many of the comments in our thread are using the comments in the Times as a means of attacking others, without giving those people (in the Times) an opportunity to respond. Not only do the Times commentators not know they're being discussed, and often times openly mocked, but even if they were to discover this site, they'd have to pony up $5 to defend themselves. 2) We have an unwritten rule (or maybe it's written and I didn't see it) that we don't attack other communities. It's unhealthy for open conversation, and frankly makes us look like a bunch of asshats. 3) MetaFilter posts are about the links, and not about chatrooms. There are literally millions of sites with room for open comment, and it's a real policy shift when we're simply allowed to link to those forums as fodder for discussion. I understand that there's room for interpretation here, but it's a slippery slope when a front page post link simply links to conversation, and not real content. 4) It's a touchy subject, political in nature, and one where I believe there should be stronger enforcement of real content to be allowed to stay on the front page. IMHO, it was an sub-par post, but really led to a thread full of the worst of what MetaFilter has to offer, and I really think we can do better.

Rules of Relationship Filter

battlebison — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 08:07:51 -0800

A few recent threads on MeTa have made me wonder, what's the stance on relationship filter questions in AskMe? I should maybe include a disclaimer: I don't like relationship filter-y questions. I feel like they take up more than their fair share of AskMe and often wish there were some negative tags feature, like "All but relationship-related posts". That said, I'm not trying to really shake things up or change things. I'm just looking for an official word on what the stance is so that I know what to flag and what are reasonable questions for me to ask. I've read the FAQ and I've searched the site but I haven't been able to find any official word as of yet. Maybe because exactly what defines "relationship filter" is kind of arbitrary? Or is it too polarizing a topic to try to regulate at this point? This could have been a private message to one of the mods, but I figured I'd make it public for any discussion or thoughts.

AskMe Etiquette

zarq — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:19:59 -0800

Making recommendations against a physician or business on AskMe? In this post, anonymous is looking for a gastroenterologist. I had a terrible experience with a gastroenterologist in NYC a few years back, who failed to test for or diagnose an underlying gallstone problem while treating my esophageal reflux. Wound up in the hospital for emergency surgery. I don't have an axe to grind, but do think anonymous might benefit from a mild warning about the physician, with a "ymmv" disclaimer, of course. Is it kosher to do that in the thread? Obviously, I can't MeMail anonymous.

Should I get my own blog?

kimdog — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 06:22:29 -0800

In a FPP, how appropriate is it to post links to something, and then give additional information about the subject from a first hand perspective? Someone recently sent me a link to a fabulous trailblazing musician, who is completely worthy of a FPP. And I was shocked to realize that I had met this person long after they disappeared from the music scene (their whereabouts had been considered a mystery). Would a posting about this person be kosher? Or should I get my own blog? I have absolutely no hand in any of the links I want to post.

Walter Cronkite, never accused of pedophilia

mr_crash_davis mark II: Jazz Odyssey — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 18:57:15 -0800

So Michael Jackson gets an obit post re-do, but this is the best we can do for Walter Cronkite, the most trusted man in America?

Get Your Own Blog. Well, Perhaps I May...

Cool Papa Bell — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:20:39 -0800

Etiquette call: Using one's own comments on one's own blog? Let's say I started my own blog. On my blog, in addition to other content, I decide to "graduate" some of my MeFi comments to my own blog, where, theoretically, they get a different audience. For example, in yesterday's Palin thread, I decide to reprint my own comment on my own blog, sans anyone else's content, and linking to the freely available Washington Post column that the post linked to. I would be diligent in ensuring that only my MeFi contribution would be re-posted this way. Kosher or no? I can see valid arguments on either side.

No other information

parmanparman — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 12:22:30 -0800

If an FPP about a member (even if they happen to be famous) is posted, but it doesn't provide any fruitful information for others to right a situation where they feel they have been overcharged, then why is it allowed?

Cool? Not Cool?

KevinSkomsvold — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 07:49:02 -0800

Question regarding the use of AskMe: Is it appropriate/not appropriate to ask a question regarding the reputation of a specific company? I'm thinking about using a considerably cheaper data recovery company but would like to ask if anyone has had experience with them. Cool? Not cool? I know there was a similar thread about this but can't seem to find it.

He ain't Ralph.

St. Alia of the Bunnies — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 18:27:42 -0800

Someone to whom I am not married to has linked me in Contacts using the descriptor "Spouse." What recourse do I have? Maybe for certain categories (like spouse) we could require the person linked to agree??? I mean, my real-life husband is pretty easygoing but this is kinda....unacceptable. And fwiw I did use the contact form to email mods hours ago, so no one needs to suggest that.

What the spam is this?

hal_c_on — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 08:42:13 -0800

Is this question/user serious? Why do I feel like this user is trying to ask MeFi how to send all sorts of spam? Is this acceptable on MeFi? I mean can someone actually poll MeFites THESE questions so they can become more effective spammers? Not trying to be a pain or anything, but as soon as I read that question, I thought "Oh shit...the beginnings of a spammer". Looking at his profile and previous questions pretty much confirmed it, and made it obvious that he's using the hive mind to poll a large group of people.

Miracle Whip Zingr?

Ynoxas — Tue, 12 May 2009 10:24:05 -0800

Miracle Whip Zingr beta? That deserves a graphic ad on the front page, even when logged in? Did the advertising guidelines change recently? No its not a big deal, I'm a big boy and know how to avoid ads. But it sure struck me as odd and rather out of place.

MetaTwitter? (or, Kill It While It's Young)

hippybear — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 20:54:08 -0800

Is the @ tag really welcome in MetaFilter? I've seen at least one MeFi thread with a derail about people using the @ sign to address others, rather than linking to the comment being responded to or other ways of addressing co-MeFites. Is the use of this really a welcome development? It feels somehow cheapening (to me), but then, I'm not a Twit (or is that Twat?), and would prefer to see its conventions stay there and not infect EVERY corner of the series of intertubes. Is it unreasonable to want to stamp out the @ as a form of reply indicator? If so, how can we discourage this?

What the dilly yo?

LilBucner — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 05:53:59 -0800

Why was my post bumped? It was the one about Phish playing Fenway on 5/31/09; included a link to the video on Phish's front page featuring the Fenway organist, who happens to be someone I know. I thought the video was cool, regardless of the general musical tastes of MeFites. What's up? Just looking for some clarification, as I thought it was a decent post.

Was this FPP really THAT Farkish?

ZenMasterThis — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 20:12:59 -0800

Was this FPP really THAT Farkish? We were having fun and lively discussion about sexism, consumerism, standards of beauty and grooming. Cortex: Perhaps you were a little heavy-handed on this one?

Homeworkfilter

Baby_Balrog — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 12:22:51 -0800

Hey! I thought we didn't do people's homework for them. What gives? I seem to remember that being a rule several years ago. Are we cool with this now?

Hope me understand

Krrrlson — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 18:04:46 -0800

Would Metafilter admins appreciate deliberate shit-stirring on their site? If not, why encourage it elsewhere by approving the question?

Cortex: My friend write, he get message, he show metafilter. Why no?

hal_c_on — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 21:37:43 -0800

So ummm... Yeah, I'm pretty sure the OP of the thread below me was asking in a VERY creative way: Why is there a metafilter policy against telling others via postings what you received in MeMail? Easy on the trigger, cortex. Just because you CAN delete and end threads, doesn't mean you should.

Does MeFi have a privacy policy?

genome4hire — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 01:41:04 -0800

Why doesn't Metafilter have a privacy policy? The MetaFilter Network LLC is an Oregon-based company, which collects a one time membership fee from registered users, and makes enough money from advertising to support a few awesome admins, and pay for shiny new servers. Metafilter is a fairly high traffic site, and receives 11.5 million pageviews from 3.5 million unique users every month. MetaFilter would thus seem to meet any reasonble definition of a commercial website. California's Online Privacy Protection Act (OPPA) requires that all commercial websites that collect "personally identifiable information" on users who reside in California must have a conspicuous privacy policy on their web sites – even if that company is based outside California, including overseas. This law went into effect in 2004, and as a result, practically every corporate website in the world now has a "privacy policy" link on the bottom of the front page, which leads to a document explaining what kind of information the website collects. There is probably at least one Metafilter user in California, and thus, it seems reasonable to assume that Metafilter is collecting personally identifiable data on California residents. Furthermore, a recent comment by Cortex seemed to imply that Metafilter is logging the identity of users who author anonymous posts. After seeing Cortex's comment, I tried to find more information about the extent to which Metafilter is logging on my activity with the website, but I couldn't find anything. There certainly isn't a privacy policy linked from the front page, and 10 mins of googling didn't come up with anything. So.. my two part question is this: Why doesn't Metafilter have a privacy policy, and if one does exist, why isn't there a prominent link to it on the front page as required by California law. (I'm not a lawyer, but I am a privacy geek)

First They Came for the AskMe Questions About Rectal Porn...

davidstandaford — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 13:35:21 -0800

People who choose to complain about a question instead of trying to answer it are bad enough as is, but it was so excessive for this question about porn that the question itself got deleted and I think that's really inappropriate. What was especially egregious about this example was the question was an anonymous question, which means a moderator had already approved it for Ask MetaFilter. But instead of letting well intentioned people try to help the question asker, people came in to complain about the question itself and ruined it. If you don't have a helpful answer for the question, then don't answer it. If you must, flag it, email a mod, or post to metatalk. Because of the nature of metafilter, it only takes a small number of people shitting in a thread to ruin it for everyone. And while metafilter isn't a democracy (and rightly so), this is an especially annoying example because it only takes a tiny tiny minority of people to ruin a question. There are lots of questions that a small number of people might object to for some reason and they could easily ruin all of them if they wanted (or at least require a ton more work by the moderators) and I think with examples such as this we should discourage that type of behavior and chastise those people who engage in it. [I realize that it's possible that this question also accumulated a ton of flags and it was deleted solely for that reason. It's hard to tell from the deletion reason whether jessamyn is referring to the answers posted or flags that might be used on the question, but even if it was massively flagged, that doesn't excuse poor behavior by the people who answered the question. And even if it was flagged, I still think it was a fine question and people who don't like the question can skip it and answer something else.]

Policy clarification

Krrrlson — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:56:43 -0800

Please elaborate as to why an informative, multi-link post on a distinct topic, without editorializing or inflammatory language merited deletion, while a one-sided, inflammatory, single-link Youtube post is considered best of the web. Why does the former need to be "added to one of the open threads" but not the latter?

Anonymous questions of the most mundane order

disillusioned — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 21:42:38 -0800

Is it me or are some people abusing the anonymous question loophole? Sometimes, it's pretty strange to me, some of the questions that are asked anonymously. And some may have their reasons, but I'm guessing most people who ask questions that make no sense (even with a creative) do it so they don't "waste" their question. Ironically, I would've thought this impossible given Matt's comment about recent code that makes this impossible, but I asked an anon < 7 days ago and I can still ask a normal. So, this may be a bug report more than anything, Matt.

Cool or Not Cool?

pjern — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:39:18 -0800

Do we really want to post links to known IP thieves? I'd sort of like to get a consensus over whether posting links to certain sites is considered OK, of whether doing so (driving traffic to their sites) implies condoning their ethics. Certainly it would be simple enough to add a filter for certain sites, to pre-call them out and let posters look for more legitimate sources for their links.

What ever happened to respecting people's opinions?

SeizeTheDay — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 08:08:54 -0800

I think this question violates the spirit of individual choice, and isn’t really appropriate for AskMeFi. Everyone makes choices and decisions. I don’t know if I feel entirely comfortable that there is an entire thread dedicated to “changing someone’s mind”. If a person is “racist”, it’s sad, but perhaps the better question is, “How can I help this person be less of a racist?”, and not, “Even though this person is a racist, how can I convince them to act against their own beliefs?” The whole question seems politically motivated, manipulative, and ignores the fact that this person (Grammy) is a “racist”. A similar question, to me, that seems out of bounds includes, “How can I convince my g/f that she should really be into anal, even though she’s told me repeatedly that she doesn’t want to do it?”

Is it self posting if my wife is involved.

asavage — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 12:01:21 -0800

I want to put up an FPP about a not-for-profit that's done something cool, and important, and I want it to get some publicity, because I believe in their mission. But my wife works for them, on a volunteer basis, in a pretty important position.... I'm assuming that it skates too close to the rule for self posting. Or does it? Can I include a disclaimer in the post?

Where to put MeFi post updates? Discuss

carsonb — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 14:01:37 -0800

MetaFilter post updates that cannot be posted to the original thread should be posted to MetaFilter and abide by the New Post guidelines. MetaFilter post updates should not be posted to MetaTalk. MetaTalk...it's for site policy discussions, bug reports, and feature requests. I'm not disagreeing with mathowie, but MeTa should also be for meetup announcements and podcast threads. Additionally, I'd like to apologize for derailing numerous MeTa threads while trying to argue this overall point.