Big Number Celebration? January 14, 2014 9:51 PM   Subscribe

The other day, I clicked on a username, and I was kind of surprised to see that their user number was up in the high 180k range. We did the big raffle for user number 100,000, and I was wondering if there were any plans for something for the big 200k. Excitement? Adventure? Marmots?
posted by Ghidorah to MetaFilter-Related at 9:51 PM (33 comments total)

I'm feeling less special. :(
posted by mazola at 10:11 PM on January 14, 2014


You will always be the fondly remembered healthy cooking oil of my childhood.
posted by elizardbits at 10:35 PM on January 14, 2014 [25 favorites]


Shuffling through profile numbers via the URL, a disproportionate number of them seem to not exist. Do people just start to sign up and get put off by the $5?
posted by solarion at 12:44 AM on January 15, 2014


Yes, that's exactly what happens. There are only 62,634 actual user accounts in total (as of the most recent infodump), and the difference is entirely due to people initiating the signup process -- which reserves an ID number -- but balking at the paypal step.
posted by Rhomboid at 1:53 AM on January 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


Ghidorah: I was wondering if there were any plans for something for the big 200k.

Yes, the occasion will be marked by us choosing a username for the 100k-reserved account.
posted by gman at 3:27 AM on January 15, 2014 [12 favorites]


I SUGGEST MMMMMMMMMM [...] MMMMMMM
posted by MuffinMan at 5:52 AM on January 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


the occasion will be marked by us choosing a username for the 100k-reserved account.

You should note that you'll be taking it from jamaro's son, 'who at 15 is currently at "Youtube" in the quality of his online contributions so it may be a long while yet.'
posted by filthy light thief at 5:56 AM on January 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


There are only 62,634 actual user accounts in total (as of the most recent infodump), and the difference is entirely due to people initiating the signup process -- which reserves an ID number -- but balking at the paypal step.

I thought that the (lack of) potential for reusing old user IDs and infilling our ranks was discuses before, but I can't find it. Does anyone remember what the ideas/justifications were for not doing this? Because I feel like we're living in some spec neighborhood situation, where people were able to reserve lots in a Great New Beachside Community by showing up to a timeshare presentation, but few people actually bought into said timeshare, and now it's a few generations later, so the community isn't totally vacant, but there are still a lot of vacant lots strewn about.

On this random tangent, would it be feasible to generate such a pseudo-community map, with user numbers mapped out as individual lots, and each "lot" color coded to represent 1) if a user has signed up, and 2) if the user has made more than 20 comments and/or favorited more than 20 posts/comments, and bonus points for 3) indicating that someone "just moved in" if they have actually registered a user name and have made some comments or marked favorites within the last 3-6 months? If so, that would be fantastic, and I would provide the maker of such a map with cookies and mixCDs and such.
posted by filthy light thief at 6:07 AM on January 15, 2014


Why?
posted by cjorgensen at 7:24 AM on January 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


Excitement? Adventure? Marmots?

Crucify them! Crucify them!

then post a gif of it on the front page as a warning to the others
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 7:50 AM on January 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


#200,000? Bah. I prefer to celebrate #262,144.
posted by Salvor Hardin at 8:15 AM on January 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


I feel like there's way less discussion of user numbers and significance invested in them than I remember from my early days of reading the site, and I feel like that's a good thing.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 8:48 AM on January 15, 2014 [4 favorites]


I feel like there's way less discussion of user numbers and significance invested in them than I remember from my early days of reading the site, and I feel like that's a good thing.

Oh gosh yes, I totally agree! I think the same is true about references to "The Cabal" and other in-groupish stuff which, when I first joined, made me feel like it was going to be hard to feel like a real part of the community.

The downside, of course, is that now that I would GET the in-jokes there are fewer of them, but I do feel like that's actually a positive thing in general, even if I would like to be part of some hilarious internet in-group references.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 9:07 AM on January 15, 2014


I suspect it's because even the six-digit users have been around for 4 years now so it's a bit of a stretch to call them newbs.

On the other hand, I'm 100K plus, so what do I know?
posted by maryr at 9:09 AM on January 15, 2014


I think the same is true about references to "The Cabal"

I don't understand. How could there be references to something that clearly does not exist?
posted by Horace Rumpole at 9:22 AM on January 15, 2014


I feel like there's way less discussion of user numbers and significance invested in them than I remember from my early days of reading the site, and I feel like that's a good thing.


Whatever. Newb.

<3,

The Cabal.
posted by eyeballkid at 9:51 AM on January 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


No, 200k is bullshit and meaningless. No new celebration until 1,000,000!
posted by klangklangston at 9:59 AM on January 15, 2014


Hell, as long as we're talking about celebrating big numbers, I will share this story that JUST HAPPENED.

For the past couple of days my favorites count has been hovering in the 8900s. I had a plan for today, that included stuff like going to Staples and doing dishes and laundry. Things went off track as stated in an email to my husband: "Aaaaargh plans derailed I am exactly at 9000 favorites right now so I have to wait until I get one more before I can have lunch."

Mr. Pterodactyl, being a jerk, obviously tweeted this because he is a jerk. This was seen by my best friend from high school who, I found out after joining, is also a member of Metafilter who kindly tweeted back at me "I got you" and favorited a question I'd asked, enabling me to send the all-important tweet "It's over 9000!". For some reason this was important to me and the confluence of events including email, Twitter, MetaFilter, and connecting with people in different ways made this one of the most amazing things that has happened to me recently.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 10:07 AM on January 15, 2014 [10 favorites]


Favorited. Now go get a sammich.
posted by wenestvedt at 10:28 AM on January 15, 2014


At my local co-op, my member number in the double digits and I very often get a "whoa, old school!" from new folks at the register. It's the only thing I've been an early adopter of.
posted by vespabelle at 1:36 PM on January 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


At this point, I almost never want to name the 100K account just because it bugs gman so. :)

The other part of the prize was traveling to a meet-up or having a meet-up come to you. Did that ever happen?
posted by crossoverman at 3:14 PM on January 15, 2014


You know, I look at this, I look at my account number and all I can think is "36000's? Jesus! I'm OLD!"
posted by Kid Charlemagne at 3:21 PM on January 15, 2014


You know, I look at this, I look at my account number and all I can think is "36000's? Jesus! I'm OLD!"
posted by Kid Charlemagne at 3:22 PM on January 15, 2014


I just googled my userID and discovered it's the ZIP code for Uncle Sam, LA. Amazon tells me that it's also the product number of a fancypants watch as well as a winch rigging kit.
posted by antonymous at 3:26 PM on January 15, 2014


Upon review I find that I'm so old dementia has set in and I'm double posting things. Sigh.
posted by Kid Charlemagne at 3:32 PM on January 15, 2014


I didn't even know I had a user number until this thread. So then I went to find it and got excited about the 902 part but had a really hard time remembering the rest of it and actually had to google Luke Perry to find it and then the disappointment came. Looks like someone wasted the number by not completing the signup... And, like Kid Charlemagne, I also am having that memory-lapse-induced-I'm-old-feeling...
posted by Tandem Affinity at 7:45 PM on January 15, 2014


200,000 should be rewarded with the new crypto currency. I give you the MeTa Bean.
posted by arcticseal at 7:51 PM on January 15, 2014


Sorry, I can't make change for anything larger than a $20, same as in town.
posted by maryr at 8:45 PM on January 15, 2014


I noticed that I've been repeating myself a lot more as I'm getting older.
posted by slogger at 6:02 AM on January 16, 2014


cjorgensen: Why?

If you'r asking me why I'd like a "neighborhood" map of user ID usage, it's because I'm a planner geek and a generally inquisitive person who finds infographics can be informative. Are there patterns in how many people almost signed up for a MetaFilter account? Was it more common at any time? Are there whole "blocks" of unused numbers?
posted by filthy light thief at 8:13 AM on January 16, 2014


Out of curiosity I just popped open http://mefi.us/infodump/usernames.txt.zip for the first time and while you could map the ID gaps pretty easily (for instance the last three signups listed jump from 191137 to 191163 to 191192) it doesn't show reserved IDs.

HOWEVER

It does show that someone decided to spell out 'hi novx' using a new username for each letter, apparently prompting someone else to then ask, not 10 minutes later and also in serial username form: '?, Why?, Who?, Why, WTF?'

Also, one Saturday night the weekend before that, someone named themselves "( . ) ( . )" three times in a row.
posted by postcommunism at 11:44 AM on January 17, 2014 [1 favorite]


Oh shit, I remember that. I was a bit tipsy, and it was supposed to be "hi nox," but there's no undo, so I could only go forwards. nox, as you can imagine, was unimpressed.
posted by filthy light thief at 7:14 PM on January 19, 2014


(that story is a complete lie)
posted by filthy light thief at 7:14 PM on January 19, 2014


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