A FPP from scanned magazine pages they had uploaded December 3, 2005 6:06 PM Subscribe
Someone recebtly created a FPP from scanned magazine pages they had uploaded. Beneath the mantra of "best of the web" how far can one go? I often find great subjects for a post are not adequately documented online. In that case is it okay to upload some images, or create a little page to fill in the blanks in anotherwise post-worthy subject?
Yeah I don't know what example you're referring to but in general you are not supposed to have created the subject of the link in any way, even in just a curatorial capacity. The theory is that if it's worth linking to, someone has already put it on the web. This is not going to be true all the time. But we're better off with the rule than without, due to all the perils of self-linking.
Nowadays, if you've put up an archive of some old material you've scanned, Projects seems like a fine place to let people know about it. I wouldn't hesitate to put it up there.
posted by scarabic at 6:13 PM on December 3, 2005
Nowadays, if you've put up an archive of some old material you've scanned, Projects seems like a fine place to let people know about it. I wouldn't hesitate to put it up there.
posted by scarabic at 6:13 PM on December 3, 2005
No. The guidelines say a lot of things.
This was a great thread.
Not a self link since the person who posted it didn't publish the magazine, nor write the article.
posted by fire&wings at 6:14 PM on December 3, 2005
This was a great thread.
Not a self link since the person who posted it didn't publish the magazine, nor write the article.
posted by fire&wings at 6:14 PM on December 3, 2005
Fire&Wings, it really isn't a good idea.
I understand wanting to compile links or provide a representative sample and, in theory, it is a fine plan. However, despite your best intentions, the fact remains that it would be a self-link. You simply cannot do that on the front page.
posted by cedar at 6:27 PM on December 3, 2005
I understand wanting to compile links or provide a representative sample and, in theory, it is a fine plan. However, despite your best intentions, the fact remains that it would be a self-link. You simply cannot do that on the front page.
posted by cedar at 6:27 PM on December 3, 2005
In my opinion, self-links have to involve one of the following things to be a problem:
a) A creative role by the poster.
b) Advertising which benefits the poster.
c) Obvious links to or integration into the poster's main site.
I see nothing conceivably wrong with uploading something interesting made by a third party, and linking straight to the jpegs.
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:33 PM on December 3, 2005
a) A creative role by the poster.
b) Advertising which benefits the poster.
c) Obvious links to or integration into the poster's main site.
I see nothing conceivably wrong with uploading something interesting made by a third party, and linking straight to the jpegs.
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:33 PM on December 3, 2005
Not a self link since the person who posted it didn't publish the magazine, nor write the article.
I don't really think that's a complete definition of self-link. If the person chose the content, that's an application of his editorial sense. That makes the content his, in a way. His "selection" if not his writing, etc. As I said above, you don't have to be the author. Being the editor or the curator is enough. I don't know how that particular post managed to skirt the issue nor should we digress into picking apart examples.
This is one rule which is pretty strict and broadly applied.
posted by scarabic at 6:34 PM on December 3, 2005
I don't really think that's a complete definition of self-link. If the person chose the content, that's an application of his editorial sense. That makes the content his, in a way. His "selection" if not his writing, etc. As I said above, you don't have to be the author. Being the editor or the curator is enough. I don't know how that particular post managed to skirt the issue nor should we digress into picking apart examples.
This is one rule which is pretty strict and broadly applied.
posted by scarabic at 6:34 PM on December 3, 2005
a) A creative role by the poster.
Well I hope I've made the argument that the editorial selection of content to collect and host does constitute a creative effort. I think plenty of folks would support the concept that editorial judgment is a big part of what makes up a magazine, article, museum exhibit. It's not like editors are mere vessels.
posted by scarabic at 6:35 PM on December 3, 2005
Well I hope I've made the argument that the editorial selection of content to collect and host does constitute a creative effort. I think plenty of folks would support the concept that editorial judgment is a big part of what makes up a magazine, article, museum exhibit. It's not like editors are mere vessels.
posted by scarabic at 6:35 PM on December 3, 2005
If the person chose the content, that's an application of his editorial sense. That makes the content his, in a way.
You could apply that to any FPP in history :)
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:36 PM on December 3, 2005
You could apply that to any FPP in history :)
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:36 PM on December 3, 2005
OT: it's mildly amusing how often, recebtly, shows up on google search.
disclaimer... I am an awful speller at times, as evident from the very start of this post, so I am not being judgmental, only observational
posted by edgeways at 6:36 PM on December 3, 2005
disclaimer... I am an awful speller at times, as evident from the very start of this post, so I am not being judgmental, only observational
posted by edgeways at 6:36 PM on December 3, 2005
As near as I can tell, nthdegx, who made the metafilter post, did not do the scanning/hosting. He was linking to what someone else put online.
posted by scarabic at 6:38 PM on December 3, 2005
posted by scarabic at 6:38 PM on December 3, 2005
If you go through the effort to scan something in, you're too invested in it.
posted by smackfu at 6:38 PM on December 3, 2005
posted by smackfu at 6:38 PM on December 3, 2005
You could apply that to any FPP in history :)
Of course you can apply it to the post. If you can apply it to the content being linked to IN the post, that's where trouble arises. It can be made to sound like splitting hairs, but it really isn't.
posted by scarabic at 6:38 PM on December 3, 2005
Of course you can apply it to the post. If you can apply it to the content being linked to IN the post, that's where trouble arises. It can be made to sound like splitting hairs, but it really isn't.
posted by scarabic at 6:38 PM on December 3, 2005
Sorry, I think this feels like a rule for the sake of having a rule.
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:43 PM on December 3, 2005
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:43 PM on December 3, 2005
I don't think a JPEG is the "content" in any meaningful sense. It's the text and images that the JPEG represents that is the content.
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:45 PM on December 3, 2005
posted by ab'd al'Hazred at 6:45 PM on December 3, 2005
In my opinion, self-links have to involve one of the following things to be a problem:
a) A creative role by the poster.
It wouldn't be hard to make a case that by compiling data, building a page (or fifty) and uploading it to a server the poster was taking a creative role.
b) Advertising which benefits the poster.
Granted, but even this can be iffy. What if those links, pictures or editorial comments were in a blog template that included Google ads?
c) Obvious links to or integration into the poster's main site..
I manage many domains that are registered and owned by other people. I work on these sites. I host these sites. I troubleshoot them when they break and some of them are pretty damn cool. You know what, I won't link them and I regard any site that I have touched as a self-link.
Self-linking is what Projects is for and should be the one sancrosant MeFi rule. It used to be that way... back when we were elitist and snark was banter rather than hate speech.
If it's really good and remains undocumented, make a Wikipedia page or buy a domain. Email me, or any one of fifty other people, and I'll post the sucker myself. But first, remember that this is a filter and if it's nonexistant on the web, it would likely be hard to describe as 'the best of the web'.
posted by cedar at 6:58 PM on December 3, 2005
a) A creative role by the poster.
It wouldn't be hard to make a case that by compiling data, building a page (or fifty) and uploading it to a server the poster was taking a creative role.
b) Advertising which benefits the poster.
Granted, but even this can be iffy. What if those links, pictures or editorial comments were in a blog template that included Google ads?
c) Obvious links to or integration into the poster's main site..
I manage many domains that are registered and owned by other people. I work on these sites. I host these sites. I troubleshoot them when they break and some of them are pretty damn cool. You know what, I won't link them and I regard any site that I have touched as a self-link.
Self-linking is what Projects is for and should be the one sancrosant MeFi rule. It used to be that way... back when we were elitist and snark was banter rather than hate speech.
If it's really good and remains undocumented, make a Wikipedia page or buy a domain. Email me, or any one of fifty other people, and I'll post the sucker myself. But first, remember that this is a filter and if it's nonexistant on the web, it would likely be hard to describe as 'the best of the web'.
posted by cedar at 6:58 PM on December 3, 2005
No self-linking is not an arbitrary rule. It has functioned extremely well to keep out spam and inject a kind of "peer-review" into the quality standards. Of course, the reason for the rule is entirely arbitrary: demanding quality just for the sake of having quality. I agree with you in spirit, there ;)
I also agree that merely hosting the content is much less of a degree of "investment" than having written it, etc. But smackfu's point applies.
posted by scarabic at 7:01 PM on December 3, 2005
I also agree that merely hosting the content is much less of a degree of "investment" than having written it, etc. But smackfu's point applies.
posted by scarabic at 7:01 PM on December 3, 2005
Front page posts have pretty hard and fast guidelines. If you link to your own site, even if you're pointing to a scan of something else that happens to be stored there, it's not cool. Matt and I don't want to have to choose if it's bad for reason A, B or C or if the poster is or is not going to be benefit in some way by linking to their own site. It's simply not okay; it's potentially spammy and defeats the purpose of linking to good stuff on the web. MeFiProjects primarily exists so that MeFites can link to their own stuff and give other MeFites a chance to elevate it to front page post status if it seems worthy. There may have been people who have gotten away with self-linking historically, but in general it's a bad idea, and would make your post deletable.
That said, I've seen people get around this by crafting a post that stands on its own merits and then including some bonus content of the sort you describe in a comment inside. If it's in a comment not the main post, and if it's pretty obviously a self-link [i.e. you're not couching it in "look at this thing I found" when you know it's your own stuff] that can add meat to an otherwise lightweight post.
posted by jessamyn at 7:01 PM on December 3, 2005
That said, I've seen people get around this by crafting a post that stands on its own merits and then including some bonus content of the sort you describe in a comment inside. If it's in a comment not the main post, and if it's pretty obviously a self-link [i.e. you're not couching it in "look at this thing I found" when you know it's your own stuff] that can add meat to an otherwise lightweight post.
posted by jessamyn at 7:01 PM on December 3, 2005
Actually it is worth mentioning that just having links from MetaFilter to your own domain can improve your PageRank. In other words, you could post and link some magazine pages to boost traffic to other pages on your site that have AdWords, etc.
posted by scarabic at 7:02 PM on December 3, 2005
posted by scarabic at 7:02 PM on December 3, 2005
It's tough to say a scanned magazine is a great post. It's kind of a copyright violation on the one hand, and on the other hand, it has to be something really, really amazing to be worthy of a post.
In the past truly amazing stuff that was scanned it has shown up in posts. I don't know what you're planning to link to fire&wings, but magazine/newspaper scans-as-posts are very few and far between.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:32 PM on December 3, 2005
In the past truly amazing stuff that was scanned it has shown up in posts. I don't know what you're planning to link to fire&wings, but magazine/newspaper scans-as-posts are very few and far between.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 7:32 PM on December 3, 2005
I heard a really funny joke the other day. So I wrote it all out and then put it on a web page. This would make a great MetaFilter post!
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 7:59 PM on December 3, 2005
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 7:59 PM on December 3, 2005
I heard a really funny joke the other day. So I wrote it all out and then put it on a web page. This would make a great MetaFilter post!
Please keep me updated of this ongoing saga. tia
posted by Dreamghost at 8:03 PM on December 3, 2005
Please keep me updated of this ongoing saga. tia
posted by Dreamghost at 8:03 PM on December 3, 2005
That's the worst image macro I've ever seen.
It's no knifebutt.jpg or hard3.png but it will do.
posted by Dreamghost at 8:22 PM on December 3, 2005
It's no knifebutt.jpg or hard3.png but it will do.
posted by Dreamghost at 8:22 PM on December 3, 2005
it's been done before, with matt's blessing.
If you don't want to use projects, you can email matt or jess and ask permission first.
If you're not sure about a spesific thing, it never hurts to ask.
posted by delmoi at 12:53 AM on December 4, 2005
If you don't want to use projects, you can email matt or jess and ask permission first.
If you're not sure about a spesific thing, it never hurts to ask.
posted by delmoi at 12:53 AM on December 4, 2005
Hello visitors from MetaFilter ( www.metafilter.com/mefi/46731 ).
Next time it would be nice before you hard link to these pics,
especially when i've now done 10gb of traffic in one night!
quote from the site you linked to , it's down.
posted by sgt.serenity at 2:30 AM on December 4, 2005
Next time it would be nice before you hard link to these pics,
especially when i've now done 10gb of traffic in one night!
quote from the site you linked to , it's down.
posted by sgt.serenity at 2:30 AM on December 4, 2005
For the record I didn't upload the images. I looked for them. Beyond the copyright issue I fail to see that text in a scanned image has to be any more amazing than straight text in a web page, unless Matt's implication is that all links from MeFi should be to something really amazing. A lot of people seemed pleased to have seen the article, and since Matt's relative disinterest in videogames is on record I'll take the casual swipe at my post with a pinch of salt.
posted by nthdegx at 4:19 AM on December 4, 2005
posted by nthdegx at 4:19 AM on December 4, 2005
sgt.serenity - I can't really make sense of that comment, can you? Someone else scanned the article further down the thread if you're interested. He took a dig at me in the Spaced Out forums, too, but I since mailed him a semi-apology and offered to help with any fees incurred.
The point about the magazine being in shops is bollocks, though, because I don't accept that there's one rule for Spaced Out fans and another for MeFi readers when it comes to issues of copyright.
posted by nthdegx at 4:23 AM on December 4, 2005
The point about the magazine being in shops is bollocks, though, because I don't accept that there's one rule for Spaced Out fans and another for MeFi readers when it comes to issues of copyright.
posted by nthdegx at 4:23 AM on December 4, 2005
I think he meant "Next time it would be nice [if you asked] before you hard link to these pics" and the snark about buying a hardcopy is just snark, about buying a hardcopy.
Having a link to uploaded scans of a recent issue of a pay magazine does seem slightly dodgy to me. This is no register link around or unavailability problem, especially considering Edge ships to almost every country in the world.
posted by hugsnkisses at 6:19 AM on December 4, 2005
Having a link to uploaded scans of a recent issue of a pay magazine does seem slightly dodgy to me. This is no register link around or unavailability problem, especially considering Edge ships to almost every country in the world.
posted by hugsnkisses at 6:19 AM on December 4, 2005
Yeah, the sound of all those readers cancelling their subscriptions as a result of the post keeps me up nights I can tell you.
posted by nthdegx at 6:32 AM on December 4, 2005
posted by nthdegx at 6:32 AM on December 4, 2005
"This is what happens when you put some of the best singers in UK music in a studio to record a new track." - Would this post be allowed to stick?
Although scanning the front page I see this post and now I just don't know what to think. Oh well, off to cancel my Edge subscription!
posted by hugsnkisses at 7:16 AM on December 4, 2005
Although scanning the front page I see this post and now I just don't know what to think. Oh well, off to cancel my Edge subscription!
posted by hugsnkisses at 7:16 AM on December 4, 2005
I assume you mean that the "this" is linking to a song. If so I think it's a poor comparision because a magazine article scan is not to a magazine what an mp3 is to a CD. That said, I hope it would be allowed to stick.
Any way, there is still a distinction to breaching copyright and linking to a breach of copyright in my humble opinion, and MetaFilter is pretty boring when it plays moral-sherrif to the internet's wild west.
posted by nthdegx at 8:10 AM on December 4, 2005
Any way, there is still a distinction to breaching copyright and linking to a breach of copyright in my humble opinion, and MetaFilter is pretty boring when it plays moral-sherrif to the internet's wild west.
posted by nthdegx at 8:10 AM on December 4, 2005
I heard a really funny joke the other day. So I wrote it all out and then put it on a web page. This would make a great MetaFilter post!
You are an idiot.
I would like a straight answer on this as I genuinely have a few posts in the making that would benefit from some small pieces of background material.
Sadly, it is not the case that every person of note from history is documented fully online. I am not asking to link to my site I just built about this great inventor from 1880 - that's projects material.
Q: Is it okay to flesh out a worthy FPP otherwise made up of links to existing websites, with an image or two, when the information in the image is indispensable to the success of the FPP and not related or created by me? Whether hosted on my own webspace or not.
posted by fire&wings at 4:01 PM on December 4, 2005
You are an idiot.
Well, fuck.
"Q: Is it okay to flesh out a worthy FPP otherwise made up of links to existing websites, with an image or two, when the information in the image is indispensable to the success of the FPP and not related or created by me? Whether hosted on my own webspace or not."
I'd say "no". Why? Because one of two things are true:
The deeper reason that this isn't a good thing to do, and why the slippery-slope argument isn't just rhetoric but is truly relevant, is that the kind of post you're describing is clearly something that you see yourself as creating and crafting. The post itself is in spirit sort of a "self-link" in that it's primarily about itself, not what it links to out there on the web. That's not "filtering" and it's not "meta".
Yes, some people do this. They're pushing the envelope and making the front page of MetaFilter a performance piece, which it wasn't designed to be, and shouldn't be in my opinion. They're pushing the envelope, but they're still utilizing only material they've found elsewhere on the web. Using material that they themselves have placed on the web pushes it over the edge into something that certainly isn't MetaFilter.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 6:32 PM on December 4, 2005
Well, fuck.
"Q: Is it okay to flesh out a worthy FPP otherwise made up of links to existing websites, with an image or two, when the information in the image is indispensable to the success of the FPP and not related or created by me? Whether hosted on my own webspace or not."
I'd say "no". Why? Because one of two things are true:
- Those images are available on the web elsewhere from your own site; or
- You went to the trouble to scan images in order to supplement your post.
The deeper reason that this isn't a good thing to do, and why the slippery-slope argument isn't just rhetoric but is truly relevant, is that the kind of post you're describing is clearly something that you see yourself as creating and crafting. The post itself is in spirit sort of a "self-link" in that it's primarily about itself, not what it links to out there on the web. That's not "filtering" and it's not "meta".
Yes, some people do this. They're pushing the envelope and making the front page of MetaFilter a performance piece, which it wasn't designed to be, and shouldn't be in my opinion. They're pushing the envelope, but they're still utilizing only material they've found elsewhere on the web. Using material that they themselves have placed on the web pushes it over the edge into something that certainly isn't MetaFilter.
posted by Ethereal Bligh at 6:32 PM on December 4, 2005
Not so much for "extra information vital for the post" as for "something really cool on it's own that I've found":, but you can always upload, post on your own blog or page, show it to friends, and if it really is as cool as you think, the internet will do its thing and someone else will link it here eventually. I've seen it happen.
posted by luftmensch at 10:17 AM on December 5, 2005
posted by luftmensch at 10:17 AM on December 5, 2005
Just been away for a few days but felt the need to finish my response:
MetaFilter is pretty boring when it plays moral-sherrif to the internet's wild west.
Do we really have to get into such pretty boring put-downs as that? If I were trying to play "moral-sherrif" I would have alerted the appropriate authorities, not legitimately raised an issue I felt existed in a post dedicated to discussing issues from an FPP.
But this seems like an issue which you seem rather eager to play metafilter-sherrif about so there we go. IPR is fun.
posted by hugsnkisses at 5:11 AM on December 10, 2005
MetaFilter is pretty boring when it plays moral-sherrif to the internet's wild west.
Do we really have to get into such pretty boring put-downs as that? If I were trying to play "moral-sherrif" I would have alerted the appropriate authorities, not legitimately raised an issue I felt existed in a post dedicated to discussing issues from an FPP.
But this seems like an issue which you seem rather eager to play metafilter-sherrif about so there we go. IPR is fun.
posted by hugsnkisses at 5:11 AM on December 10, 2005
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posted by nicwolff at 6:10 PM on December 3, 2005