102: Retired March 5, 2015 4:43 PM   Subscribe

Episode 102 was recorded yesterday and completed moments before we made my retirement post live so things are a little weird and scattered since I didn't know how people would take it yet. It runs about 90min long and covers the month of February on the site.


Helpful Links

Podcast Feed
Subscribe with iTunes
Direct mp3 download

Misc
Jessamyn's trip photos

MeFi Jobs
Buy prints from a Berlin museum and buy a souvenir in Lima, Peru

MeFi Projects
Glowy Clock by ignignokt

Save a love-one's voicemail greeting by zrail

LiSE, the Life Simulator Engine by LogicalDash (reminds me of Lark)

Readtailor:licensing indie publishers for library use in ebooks by bitter-girl.com

Console Obscura - a retro gaming culture and history podcast by stenseng

@Play a blog about roguelike games by JHarris

A Twitter bot that draws your code by 23 (example)

MeFi Posts
1916.tiff: recovering old type from a river

Andrew B Myer's photos-as-illustrations

The time everyone corrected the World's Smartest Woman

Paper craft version of 80s arcade cabinets you can download/print/cut/assemble (iPad arcade)

What a boyfriend's ex-girlfriends are up to right now (New Yorker)

Happy Birthday Maple Leaf flag Canada!

Harris Wittels RIP

A history of Satan

Automatic webcam grabs of github commits (example, commit logs from last night)

Minimal audio: Super Smash Bros with realistic hand-clapping, Dr Phil without the dialogue (A Few Silent Men)

Ask MeFi Questions
Can I chainsaw a snowbank? (bondcliff says Nooooooooo!)

How did railroad tickets work in the early 20th century? (old London train info)

Little ways to make the world a slightly better place?

What is the Zenni Optical of other things that I could save money on?

Authentic Viking Party Music Suggestions

Got any tips for buying old cast iron pans? (mudpuppie has loads of answers)

Show me old instances of generations claiming the new generation were worse/lazy

How did toilet cruising work?

Does Colin Firth own a yacht or not?

What short story is this? (spoiler: THE ANSWER IS ALWAYS "All Summer in a Day")

#WomensMarch!

MeFi Music
B'doo Deh Du by not_on_display
posted by mathowie (staff) to MeFi Podcast at 4:43 PM (64 comments total) 10 users marked this as a favorite

Is someone else going to take over doing these?
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 5:07 PM on March 5, 2015


"...the gentlemen are having a very difficult time talking about it for reasons I do not understand..." :D
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 5:10 PM on March 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


Um... are you talking about my sock puppets? <_<
posted by halifix at 5:11 PM on March 5, 2015


I believe that Matt said he'd still be doing the podcast in his farewell post, so I don't think that the podcasts are going to change. Thank goodness.
posted by sockermom at 5:13 PM on March 5, 2015


oh boy, ear wax!
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 5:14 PM on March 5, 2015


I may or may not have registered another spelling between when the podcast was recorded and when it was posted
posted by draygun at 5:22 PM on March 5, 2015 [11 favorites]


Senior ConTENT Director... good work if you can get it..
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 5:22 PM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


Yeah, I'll keep doing the podcasts in the future.

And spoiler alert: about five minutes in, we finally start talking about my new job at Slack (and what Slack is, what it does, what I will do, etc)
posted by mathowie (retired) at 5:33 PM on March 5, 2015 [7 favorites]


and an andre mention! i love slack now just bc dudes i really respect are there.
posted by nadawi at 5:37 PM on March 5, 2015


If you listen closely, cortex says all our names differently!
posted by draygan at 5:41 PM on March 5, 2015 [8 favorites]


It's nice that he takes the effort.
posted by dreigan at 5:41 PM on March 5, 2015 [5 favorites]


He still gets mine wrong though. I'm Italian, not Slavic.
posted by dragan at 5:42 PM on March 5, 2015 [8 favorites]


Oh cool. Slack is awesome.
posted by octothorpe at 5:58 PM on March 5, 2015


Only you could take retirement and make slacker into a full time job.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 6:06 PM on March 5, 2015


Oh, man, Slack was one of the best aspects of my last job. It feels a little like what Google Wave was supposed to be.
posted by ignignokt at 6:06 PM on March 5, 2015


(and what Slack is, what it does, what I will do, etc)

GIVE ME SLACK or cake
posted by octobersurprise at 6:57 PM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I am so excited I made glowyclock.com happen! Ok, I really had nothing to do with it, but I feel like I did. I'm glad this made the podcast or I wouldn't have found out it had been moved to a domain.
posted by cjorgensen at 6:59 PM on March 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


Slack is slick, I love it. And the people involved in it are cool (Torrez!) Congrats!
posted by naju at 7:32 PM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


so I just checked out Slack, and I am completely unclear on how it can be anything other than a charity operation if you never have to pay to use it

somebody please inform me please
posted by DoctorFedora at 7:34 PM on March 5, 2015


It has search, but you can only go back so far unless you pay for it. I ran into a bunch of situations in which I would have paid for it if I had control over the budget.
posted by ignignokt at 7:37 PM on March 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


Aha! That explains everything.
posted by DoctorFedora at 7:43 PM on March 5, 2015


Oh wow, I did a brain dump of all this weird, arcane, and usually useless stuff I have in my head, and it ultimately led to jessamyn emphatically saying BAM!, and that's one of the coolest things ever.

I have to admit, though, that I made two errors in that comment that have really been bothering me. I didn't correct them in the AskMe question because it would have been inappropriate to turn that thread into one about my obsession. This seems like a better place for the mea culpa -- and that's all it is, a mea culpa -- because it's not like this is important or life-saving knowledge.

1) Neither Wagner nor Griswold made cornbread pans. Birmingham Stove & Range introduced the first (because the CEO's wife wanted one), and not until 1967. Lodge immediately copied the pattern, but they left the center hole on the top side of the pan open, whereas BSR's is not. When I said the cornbread pan might be collectible if it was Wagner or Griswold, I added an unrealistic and impossible "if" to that thread, and I feel crappy about it.

2) I said that unmarked Wagner would have "'8-in skillet'" or some variation thereof, in small, blocky letters" on the underside of the pan. This is so niggling, but one of the characteristics of Wagner is that they spelled out "inch," and "skillet," and "chicken fryer," and everything else. They didn't abbreviate. That's right, mofos, Wagner don't abbreviate. It was one of their hallmarks, and one way you can id their stuff.

Again, I realize that these are unimportant details, but it's been bothering me that I got them wrong. Now that I have posted a correction in a relatively concealed location on the site -- but I have posted a correction -- I feel much better.

Having bested Alton Brown, in mathowie's mind, is also cool, but mostly I feel better about correcting those mistakes. Thank you for your time.

posted by mudpuppie at 7:58 PM on March 5, 2015 [16 favorites]


Work has been trying to get me to use Slack lately. Now that Matt is there, I may use it more.
posted by deezil at 8:20 PM on March 5, 2015


My excitement was so high to hear Matt's news in person that I got my kids home from school and sat them doing homework in the kitchen while I listened on my iPad. In the kitchen.

Not giving a rat's arse about the language they're hearing. You're totally worth it Matt.

Love your guts.
posted by taff at 9:00 PM on March 5, 2015


I opened the transcript. Plz hope.
posted by Pronoiac at 10:52 PM on March 5, 2015


Slack is like the one collaboration tool I've used that is actually useful so it makes sense that the founder of the only useful Questions forum now works there. Congrats dude!
posted by Potomac Avenue at 11:10 PM on March 5, 2015


The Harris Wittels link is missing (leads back to this post).
posted by phoque at 4:41 AM on March 6, 2015


I fixed it.
posted by jessamyn (retired) at 5:08 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


"Retired" indeed.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:13 AM on March 6, 2015 [4 favorites]


Hey!
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane (staff) at 6:59 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


I have no idea how they've monetized Slack, but I'm assuming that you'll be reporting directly to Bob Dobbs himself. Let us all know when the next devival is, yeah?
posted by Mayor West at 7:00 AM on March 6, 2015 [4 favorites]


posted by draygan

I really enjoyed Matt's process of noticing someone signing up three new accounts all at once, being like WTF because the most common use case there is Someone Is Up To No Good in a spammy context, and then figuring out what they were and that it was just somebody goofing on my (pristine, unassailable) idiolectic tendencies.

It occurs to me that it's possible that all of this happened on mic on the podcast, but now I've typed it anyway, so.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:22 AM on March 6, 2015 [9 favorites]


I can only assume there has been no follow-up to the chainsaw question because the asker no longer has any arms with which to type.
posted by bondcliff at 7:41 AM on March 6, 2015 [6 favorites]


I listened to a chunk on my drive to work, and I would like to say: Can jessamyn please do color commentary for my life, because that would be rad! And: I feel kind of bad now, because my team at work has been going through a "let's try things that are not email to communicate and keep track of stuff because email blows for that in a lot of important ways" and I think we're going to end up going with Trello instead of Slack, mostly because my little subteam used it first and most heavily, and it seems to do the things we need it to do most. But I will look more at Slack now!
posted by rtha at 7:54 AM on March 6, 2015 [2 favorites]


rtha, you could do both! slack integrates with trello notifications. so like trello for task management and slack for other communication?

i would pay some amount of my own hard-earned money if i could get my company on board with trello and/or slack. my employee and i use trello but i can't imagine getting the other 65 people to use it without serious executive buy-in. and the execs here prefer meetings [ugh] to just about anything else.

i love slack, and i'm excited to hear what matt has to say about it in this podcast.
posted by misskaz at 7:59 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


WHAT HO, MOD AND RETIRED MODS!

This podcast had better stay in the "Neat-o stuff on MeFi" angle and not slide into "bunch of retirees complaining about the new staff over dominoes" because I can go over to that bar that the local Fraternal Order of Police chapter bought off the bankrupt VFW chapter if I need any of that.

/ Harumph.

That said, I was eating some trail mix while I listened to you guys talk about your bodily detritus this morning, and I would humbly implore you to please leave out that kind of thing in the future. My skin crawled clean off my flesh by the time you finished, and now it's all linty and stuff on the inside.
posted by wenestvedt at 8:30 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


Also: Is someone else going to take over doing these?

Flagged for insensitive, offensive content. Never change, Podcast SuperFriends!
posted by wenestvedt at 8:32 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


The important thing as a Bay Area resident is that we now have the potential for a monthly mathowie IRL meetup.
posted by halifix at 9:42 AM on March 6, 2015 [5 favorites]


Nice! I was hoping you'd go to Slack.
posted by michaelh at 10:43 AM on March 6, 2015


Oh my goodness, jessamyn is delightful in the first segment of this: ripping off Matt's bandaid and then continuing to be the voice of truth to him: "you've been burnt out for years." And we get to hear "not my circus, not my monkeys."

Also, it's charming how Matt is so obviously relieved to be shedding his stressful MeFi responsibilities but still manages to worry about how the announcement MeTa will go.

It is a happy thing; the best possible transition.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:01 AM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]


HAHAH I had to pause last night, listening now.

Jessamyn: "Click the link."
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:07 AM on March 6, 2015 [2 favorites]


and hey thanks jessamyn! I don't think I've ever had a post on the podcast before!
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:11 AM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]


I really should catch up with cousin Cate. I remember she was working for some international consultants between Eastern Germany and Morocco when she fell afoul of that Baroness Dumbass -- or whatever his name was. I always thought she had the talent for rising up to a directorship in that dinky little UNIFY org -- or whatever its name was -- but she never could assert her rights to move up in the world.

And she had terrible taste in dogs, too.
posted by Malory Archer at 11:46 AM on March 6, 2015 [2 favorites]


I what
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:56 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


fffm - I almost posted that - there are some golden moments but I think my favorite is Jessamyn saying, "THERE'S A WHOLE SYSTEM TO WEED OUT PEOPLE LIKE YOU, SO NOBODY SUCKS YOUR DICK BY MISTAKE!" :D

("That's a problem...")
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 12:05 PM on March 6, 2015 [5 favorites]


I'm a little disturbed that Jessamyn considers the death of people she doesn't like to be "not bad." As a vocal opponent of death, I take issue with this position.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 12:48 PM on March 6, 2015


"I have news about the site that I need to talk to you about" is a very specific sort of context that does strange things to the conceptual weight of various things, needless to say.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:51 PM on March 6, 2015


Well I was trying to filter it through a cortex-lens, like...

1. it's important enough to interrupt me on vacation
2. it's news that can't be delivered over email but CAN be delivered over chat
3. it's weird/not-bad (according to cortex) which I guessed meant "Don't fly home for this" but also "I'm going to tell you this and I expect it to not ruin your vacation"

Our personal lives basically only overlap via MetaFilter folks, so I twigged that it was MeFi-something but had no idea what. Would cortex think that the death of a longtime MeFi ankle-biter would seem "not bad" to me? That was my best guess.
posted by jessamyn (retired) at 1:00 PM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


Just today I set up a powershell script to send me a message on Slack when it's complete. I thought, "This is tremendously nerdy."

Slack is doing everything right. They're charging for a product, I hope it's enough to pay the bills. They're maintaining focus on things that are actually important. I have really high hopes for them, and kinda wish I could help them out somehow.

PS: The podcast is always fun too!
posted by DigDoug at 1:07 PM on March 6, 2015


I just wanted to say that I loved the "cold open" for this episode.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 2:00 PM on March 6, 2015 [4 favorites]


YES WE CAN
ACHIEVE SLACK


...and thanks for picking my song!
posted by not_on_display at 2:44 PM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


The favorites-to-comments ratio is an interesting metric, but is it really measuring the quality of a post? It's safe to say a high number means tacit approval, but what does a fractional number indicate? This post, for example, currently has a ratio of 3/72 (0.042) with a lively discussion, so it's probably not a bad post even though it's mine. Therefore, I think the Haughey Ratio measures delight versus disgust.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 2:58 PM on March 6, 2015


More jessamyn singing Taylor Swift songs on future podcasts please.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 3:33 PM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]


I don't get a chance to listen to the podcast nearly as often as I would like, but I just wanted to say: jessamyn you made me laugh more times during my listening to this then i have in several weeks. Thank you. :)
posted by royalsong at 3:36 PM on March 6, 2015 [2 favorites]


Also, what ho, mods, mods emeritus!

Funny thing about Glowy Clock: I intended for it to be on 24/7 on our iMac and our old extra wall-mounted iPhone. After putting it on those devices, Metroid Baby informed me that she actually has a mild phobia of digital clock displays!

Somehow, our original hardware rainbow clock did not trip it, but she found Glowy Clock to be creepy when it was everywhere at night. So, I just have it Chromecasting to the TV during the day for just myself. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
posted by ignignokt at 4:01 PM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]


The favorites-to-comments ratio is an interesting metric, but is it really measuring the quality of a post?

So of course, pb made an internal tool to calculate this and we only looked at posts with a >1 ratio. Stuff that falls in the 3-5 range is almost uniformly amazing (stuff like galleries and stories where people are kind of silent get tons of favorites but few comments). It's interesting so far, I wonder if it becomes public in some way soon.
posted by mathowie (retired) at 5:03 PM on March 6, 2015 [2 favorites]


MetaFilter: Hmph, that's droll.
posted by wenestvedt at 5:54 PM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


It's interesting so far, I wonder if it becomes public in some way soon.

NOT YOUR CIRCUS, NOT YOUR CODE MONKEY.

dywypi updated the snowbank-chainsawing AskMe to reassure us that she's still alive. I'm still wondering what happened on Xurando's sleeping-in-a-log AskMe, though.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 6:14 PM on March 6, 2015


we only looked at posts with a >1 ratio

It would be interesting to see the inverse. I bet a lot of MetaTalk threads would fall there. So maybe it's a measure of (lack of) strife?
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 6:18 PM on March 6, 2015


Does there happen to be a batch download for previous episodes? iTunes only goes until episode 84.
posted by royalsong at 6:27 PM on March 6, 2015


> It's interesting so far, I wonder if it becomes public in some way soon.

DUDE! THIS IS WHY YOU HAVE METAFILTER LABS.
posted by boo_radley at 7:15 PM on March 6, 2015


It's interesting so far, I wonder if it becomes public in some way soon.

What does this even mean? I'm really hoping retired mathowie becomes cryptic and speaks in fables all the time.
posted by jessamyn (retired) at 7:39 PM on March 6, 2015 [5 favorites]


The infodumpster already does favourites/comments for a given person's posts. It's my vanity google for my posts, because I always took it as a measure of a post having gone well.

For all posts, here are the posts with the highest ratio.
posted by frimble at 9:12 PM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]


Does there happen to be a batch download for previous episodes? iTunes only goes until episode 84.

I use players like Overcast and Instacast, and you should be able to see every single episode back to 1 on those.
posted by mathowie (retired) at 10:29 PM on March 6, 2015


« Older Sixteen Years   |   One last chance to be moderated by Matt: feel free... Newer »

You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments