June 2007 Archives (all archives)
June 30
I come not to praise Caesar
NYT Mag on Wikipedia as Breaking News Source. Three years ago, MeFi was the place this stuff went down, in my web at any rate. I miss it, and prefer MetaFilter's style of developing breaking news to Wikipedia's. But I understand the orientation that led Matt away from it, and God knows it's more efficient than reading through an entire thread in the blue to figure out where things stand as of the time you loaded the page. Posting this here seems more in tune than in the blue, yes?
MOAR NYC MEETUPS. KTHXBI
NYC Meetup: I'm coming to town to see my old (and new) mefite friends. Let's get together on Friday the 13th (of July), 7pm at d.b.a.
Hey, what have you got to lose?
Catfood asked where she could find an intelligent weight loss support group online— a Metafilter for dieters, basically. Ferociouskitty set one up on Spark People. It seemed like a great idea that could use a little publicity.
who was that guy, the one with the plane...?
UpdateFilter: while I was waiting in line for an iPhone with my friend yesterday (for him not for me) I was catching up on a little work. I was showing my friend the MeFi admin interface and someone looked over my shoulder and said "is that MetaFilter?" I said yes, was he a member? He said no but a video that he had made got linked on MeFi last February and had catapulted him to mini-stardom for a few weeks. He gave me some backstory on the movie....
OK boys, no hitting below the belt.
And in this corner, weighing in at 30706, is Big Bad BeeeeeeeePeeeeeeeee! And in the very same corner, weighing in at 52373, is CeeeeeeeeeePB!
Or, you know, things are getting a little ugly over in the "The UK is one big terror magnet thread...."
The Few, The Proud, The Beans
This AskMe should be encased in glass as the definitive example of "overthinking a plate of beans." Or a few plates. Perhaps it can be part of the sign up process for new members. "After reading this, are you sure want to join such a community?"
Playlist RSS headaches
Playlist RSS pedantry: <link> might not be encoding special characters. This item isn't encoding as such in this playlist and is thereby horking up XML parsing.
June 29
history repeats itself
that thing.
Hay i herd u liek iphones.
big response
Just curious why yet another Ask Metafilter answer was immediately deleted with no email explanation. Thanks.
Books 'n' booze
Reminder: London meet up on Saturday 30 June, South Bank & Hammersmith. 11.30am under the clock at Waterloo (look for a gold balloon) for those doing BookCrossing, and 4.30-5 onwards at the Dove, Hammersmith, for those doing alcohol. Full details on the other thread.
June 28
Where's that great parody of askme-as-life-helper?
A while back someone posted to meta a great little parody of the sort of sequence of questions we're all familiar with where someone uses askme to help them through absolutely every stage of their life.
Where is it? I can't seem to find.
July Running challenge
The current MeFi running challenge is in its final days. I'll post the final results in a couple of days. I don't want to jinx it, but I might actually win this one...(Previous challenges : 1.0., 2.0.,3.0.,3.1.)
We're already gearing up for the July distance challenge. I've sent a new invite to the current participants. If you've got the nike+ sports kit for the ipod nano and want to measure yourself against the dreaded metathletes, post your nike+ screenname in this thread, and I'll send you an invite to the challenge.
A horse and his boy
1 (555) NO-CABAL
Is there a better way to follow activity in favorited posts?
Is there a better way to follow activity in favorited posts?
Meet-up DC!
London meetup, 28 June 2007
You remember that thing about London meetups happening far too frequently? Well, it's happening again. Short-notice meetup, tonight (Thursday 28th), Cittie of Yorke, 7pm onwards.
June 27
Rollover questions? $5 per question? Pony?
God help me, but I'm starting a thread on getting additional AskMe questions. There are weeks that go by with no need to ask anything ... but then there are times when a second question would be a life-saver. Whatabout either (a) "rollover questions," a la Cingular's rollover minutes, say, up to a maximum of 2-3 in the bank at any time; or (b) a fee to ask a second question in one week?
I can think of several times when I would have ponied up an additional $5 to ask, say, a work-related question where I knew AskMe's community would have the best answer.
Can I get a hat with horns? A metal bra?
WTFLongboatBBQ?
Electionfilter!
The newsvine elections area is pretty cool. Vote inside...
Why did my question get deleted
For what reason did this get deleted? I am interested to hear informed peoples' explanations of the significance of Albert Schweitzer. I'm a little offended that my question got deleted, and with no posted reason. What's the deal, yo?
Rolex! Five dollar!
I don't want to break the law, I'm just curious where I could go if I did.
Where's the body?
June 26
Inline images live!
A spiffy solution to the inline-images ban (if you use Firefox). [more inside]
Anything goes on MetaTalk?
I was a bit confused by Jessamyn's post. Are insults really kosher in MetaTalk?
Yeah, yeah, why do I care?
I'd really like to talk about this sleep question.
Bucket wash this
June 25
MetaMetaMeta
Back-taggers: Ludicrous speed--GO!
Hey back-taggers! What are the top 10 tags displayed on your userpage? (For both MeFi and AskMe.)
Also, we're nearing 50%—let's do a page (or 3 =) today!
Something's rotten with bitrot.
b1tr0t needs a time-out. Telling someone who was seeking psychological counseling but didn't want to tell their parents to use adultfriendfinder.com instead was ... well, I'd like to think the green has just slightly higher standards.
Portland Meetup Thread
Can we unlock this Portland Meetup thread?
Feeling a little dizzy
Hello, hello... Hola!
Quick Draw
I've never seen one of my posts deleted so quickly. You guys are good!
Time for another Grand Rapids meetup?
Time for another Grand Rapids meetup? wobh will be making an appearance here next week, and I thought that it would be a great time for a meetup. I suggest Thursday, July 5, 8pm, at the Pickwick on Cherry Street. If that is not a good time, Friday would also work, or Monday (July 2) in a pinch. Other nominations for locations are also welcome.
June 24
Absurd Questions, Hopefully Unabsurd Answers
Instead of continuously derailing the question about questions, we may as well move discussions of said-questions here.
Update: US jails Aussie internet pirate
As an update to this thread on the Aussie software pirate who was extradited to the US to face charges, he was sentenced to more than four years in a US jail today.
But who will think of the QUESTIONS?
AxeMe's orphanage. It's just so sad - don't the unanswered deserve a shout-out on podcast?
Cruz Users
The Blue at The Red: Pictures of the June 22nd, 2007 Santa Cruz, CA Meetup! (original thread's closed...)
Mister Box
My iBook displays the first character of this post as a box. I recently used DeLocalizer -- did I delete something important?
June 23
Dear AskMe
Dear Askme, where can I get crystals to channel my energy flow and make me a better person? Free or cheap, please. (MI)
what's your wii number?
WiiFi: Friend Code Time Round 2
Not answering is the best answer
I like that this AskMe question doesn't have a "correct" answer, and yet most all the answers so far are spot-on.
June 22
Beautiful Balls of Mud
Not too long ago there was a post about a guy who hand-polished balls of mud thus creating works of art. My searches fail me. Can anyone point me to that? Thank you.
Noonereallyneedstotypeasinglewordthatsoverthirtycharactersorso.
How about a filter that limits posts from having words over a certain length? Usually it's pasted URLs, and they always break the tables and require a manual cleanup. For instance.
The Upside of Treading Lightly
Metafilter gets a plug in my local weekly Columbus Alive. Text inside.
Best Tagline Contest
Can we have an end of year competition for the best "Metafilter: Spoof tagline" comments? (e.g. MetaFilter: Squirrels, jesus, orange juice, or whatever.). It could link to lots of good threads, with the winner being decided by whoever gets the most favourites. My suggestion for a prize would be the magic ability to turn on img tags for a single unannounced 24 hour period of the winner's choosing, anytime in the next 12 months.
June 21
I'm not reading that thread anymore
Pony request... I'd love to be able to take threads off of my Recent Activity page.
24/7
Ooh, I'm so excited! My very first pedantic MetaTalk post! The text of the link on the user favorites page says "You can also view a list of the most popular in the last 24 hours," but the actual Popular Favorites page lists the "most favorited posts in the past 7 days." Do I get a prize?!?
memo
wendell sent a mass email to like 1000 users and so sorry I responded. I've also disinclined my email address.
And Now For Something Completely Thematic
Announcing the Metafilter Music Challenge! After a discussion here last month, we're starting up an opt-in theme-based challenge over at Music. A bit more inside!
Admins, please help!
Help!
a question I asked yesterday on ask.metafilter disappeared. I received no message from admin about it. I looked both in my recent activity and on the questions posted yesterday.
Yet I am not allowed to post another question for a week. My question was not inappropriate in any way and I should have been contacted if it was. I demand the question restored (it was: tips on looking for a new job while currently employed) or to have the right to post another question immediately.
I also emailed this via the contact form.
Starting web based business
I have an idea for a web-based business and not only need a web page but a program to keep track of units/credits, no money involved. It would involve marketing/advertising which I have experience in but no experience in computer programming. Where do I go from here?
June 20
Dog tags.
My profile says I posted two AskMes tagged with "dog", but I really haven't.
West side is the best side
NYC 6/22 Meetup Reminder. Please RSVP ASAP (in THIS thread) so I can make a proper rez...
Are you there MeFi? It's Me, K8t.
Sidebar nomination: 12-year-old girl changed-your-life books
Meetup list in the blue
I'd like to see the meetup list on the front page in the blue, just to get bigger turnouts (and a better sense of community). I imagine there's quite a few people who don't regularly visit Metatalk, but would like to go the meetups.
Automatically convert pdf links to an HTML viewer?
Feature Idea: adding a PDF viewer? I recently installed a firefox plugin that redirects all PDFs to an inline viewer. For instance, check out this post today and then look at the PDF in docufarm. On windows, I hate waiting for Adobe's PDF plugin to load and on a mac I hate downloading and then opening in a viewer (and having to delete from my desktop later). This seems really simple and easy, and you can download anything you want to keep. Sometimes good posts hinge on a PDF, and this would make that easier to read online. Does it make sense to move PDF links over to docufarm?
Where were we going again?
Is it possible for admins or orginal posters to edit at the top of a meetup post? Like in this recent meetup thread. It's confusing to read through the whole thing and come out with no idea of whether time, date and place have been settled.
Where has the LP gone?
I am wondering what happened to Live Preview on the MeFi posting page. I miss that feature and it skips an extra click. But one of Admins probably has an answer involving a lot of Tech Mumbo Jumbo, or someone will kindly (hopefully) direct me to the previous MeTa thread regarding this.
Good Morning, and Welcome to our Watch List!
You know, it's probably not necessary to link to a page that teaches bombmaking and glorifies theft and rev0lution d00d, in order to provide a granola recipe.
Musical Themes / Constraint-Driving Songwriting
I posted an idea here a few weeks ago, and I was just wondering if people were still up for it.
MeFi on Red Hot Pawn?
Anybody want to play chess?
June 19
Hillary Post Whacked
This deletion doesn't make sense.
Please accept my apology
Back in January, I posted a pretty offensive thread.
I'm not sure if this is appropriate for MetaTalk, but I would like to apologize for it. I was in a bad place at the time, and hope that anyone who was offended will forgive me for this indiscretion.
Deleted posts orphans my comments. :`(
So I noticed that comments I've made in a posts which are subsequently deleted don't show up in my profile's activity...
Eponysterical
What's the origin of the term "eponysterical"?
June 18
Ajax Favoriting in Opera
Favoriting on the blue has stopped working with Opera on Windows XP. Works fine on all other sites.
Yes, I know there just was one...
Is it time for a Boston-itself-Boston meetup soon? I flew in thismorning, got my apt settled & now don't have work until the 26th. I'm right by Symphony, & can get anywhere the T goes, but I have neither bike nor car so I can't make much past that. I'm also (sadly, believe me) under 21, so I fear a pub crawl (as much as I'd love it) is out of the question. Also, would anyone living here be up for not-too-serious-slightly-more-than-but-basically-touch rugby on a semiregular basis?
Impromptu Madison Meetup?
In response to a post, I've successfully compelled my wife to celebrate Frida's 100th birthday tonight at Frida's on State St here in Madison, Wisconsin. No planning or thought has gone into making this a real Mefi meetup. Our reservations are for 7pm. If you're in the area, drop by and say hi. I hear margaritas are cheap tonight, or something (I'm not a drinker).
Oh, not again! It gets worse every time he doesn't show!
June 16
Denver Meetup Redux
DENVER (and Boulder) Metafilter MeFites will once again be gathering to drink libations and act smart. We could really use some help.
Kareoke humbles us all
LOS ANGELES MEET UP
June 29, 8:30pm, Boardwalk 11.
RSVP inside.
Pimp My Preferences
Sorry if this is a dumb question, but is there a "metafilter skins" or "mefi css" customization repository where I can choose more interesting themes? Or some super-customization method? I'm really feeling the need to see some yellow and purple stripes with kitten wallpaper lately; feelin' weary with the same old blue, green, and grey after all these years.
Brevity is the soul of. . . what again?
Flagging a post as "too long."
I like to bump and shoot things
MARLBORO, MA meetup Bump. Because seriously, are we* doing Lazer Tag first? I'm moving some stuff into my new apartment that day an I need to know if I should budget time for
Sidebar for partly-scheduled meetups?
Could we have a section of the Upcoming Meetups sidebar for meetups that are in the works but don't have a date set?
June 15
10: Advice for Introverts
Here's show 10 of the podcast for June 15, 2007. It's about 25 min long.
Cry JRun Cry!
Blank fields for font sizes in Preferences make JRun cry. Possible SQL Injection attack point?
WTF, Wendell?
So Wendell apparently harvested a bunch of Mefite email addresses and sent a pointless message to all of them, and a herd of the recipients went off on a "reply all" binge with equally pointless replies. Now I have a mailbox full of crap. This is without a doubt the lamest, most wrong-headed bullshit move I have experienced here. Thanks for nothing, jerx.
BRAND NEW DAY!
My Favorite Pony
On the blue, it's a tad odd that "Popular" and "Popular Favorites" are different. I suggest they be combined into a single page which has both FPPs and comments, and also has the (7 days, 30 days, all time) option from the second link.
Metafilter Tokyo gathered in 2007.
HI WE'RE METAFILTER TOKYO AND WE DID TOTALLY OVERTHINK A PLATE OF BEANS (oh and like meet up and stuff).
NYC meetup - can we do some place on the west side?
Next NYC Meetup. Completely last minute (tonight, 6/15), or next week, the 22nd?
No E-mail? No? Really? Why not?
Please to put an email in your profile? Most of us don't bite, really. Okay, sure - if your "persona" here is attack-nerd or something, and you're sure you'll get spammed with hate mail, leave it out, but if you're a regular user who likes to participate, can't you at least set up a throwaway webmail address (in gmail, for one, you can create a filter to forward your messages to your regular mail, and you won't even have to log in to your account to check if you have any new messages). more...
June 14
Not Awesome
Cleanup in Aisle 62093, please.
Backtaggers: When you backtag an AskMe post, do you base it solely on the original question, or do you incorporate information about comments/answers?
Backtaggers: When you backtag an AskMe question, do you base your tags solely on the original question, or do you incorporate information about comments/answers? I realize there is probably no hard and fast rule, I'm just curious how y'all are doing it.
Good stuff.
Just want to say . . .
thanks to the mefi community for a good day of links . . . where else can I shoot the s- about gay marriage, aerodynamics, fluid simulations, Safari & the iPhone, and someone slagging on liberals, all on one page :)
Tokyo Meetup Reminder
Since this thread wasn't really a reminder per se, with permission , here is a reminder , Tokyo Mefites! Tonight's the night!
Not another asshat call-out
My comment on This thread was deleted, not because of snarkiness or asshattery, but because I doubted the scenario was real. I sincerely complimented the quality of the writing in the post, but simply pointed out (based on my own professional experience as a writer) that it sounded too much like an idyllic encounter written to engage the reader for me to be able to accept it as an actual dilemma. Jessamyn suggested that kind of comment belonged in email or the grey--since the poster is anonymous, here it is.
June 13
Hey new user! Ask Metafilter is part of a larger site, with history and community!
With AskMe getting lots of press (as in here) as a unit seperate from Metafilter (meaning, blue, grey, white, mauve, etc.), there should really be a message on ask letting the droves of new users know that it is a part of a larger community, with other features, a resource for post discussion and discourse, and a user base not completely dedicated to the green. People who enter through Angel Island should know New York exists. /metaphor)
Projects RSS: why no creator?
Projects RSS: why no creator? [mi]
I love sweet baby jesus (sexy teenage Jesus, not so much)
Uh-oh (Jesus in the desert part deux)
whose favorites?
Fantasy feature: hover over "x users marked this as a favorite" and see the names of the people who did the favorite marking. Whaddaya think?
Fuzzy, precise, and popular.
Not exactly a feature request, nor a bug- anyway: is it possible for different views of the "activity by so-and-so {favorited}" not to open up a new tab for each particular view?
Making an AskMe anonymous after the fact?
This comment on this AskMe made me wonder - would it be possible to make an AskMe question anonymous after it had already been posted?
Around the World in 30 days ....
Meetups planned with over 30 days advance might need a little more time in the grey.
Moderation needed
Can admins take a look at this AskMeFi question? It's a genuine question about a biblical story but it's being hijacked by the atheist brigade.
London Meets
I will be traveling across a plethora of hemispheres, and will be in London between the 19 of June and the 8th of July. I'm normally of southern hemisphere so if anyone wants to meet for a drink - that would be lovely. Name a date (and possibly a place as I don't know the geography terribly well) and I will be there.
June 12
Overeager moderation?
Overeager moderation? I'm sure that I saw a spot-on comment (from Optimus Chyme, I believe?) about a possibly hypocritical comment concerning gay vs. interracial marriage. Now it's gone. WTF?
AskMe 'really useful'
Something called www.ask.metafilter.com has made the Independent's list of 101 really useful websites. Just so you know.
Toronto. Meetup. BEER.
Toronto meetup, anyone?
Comment spam
Personally I think putting the word "penises" in a title makes it NSFW.
I'm a little sorry I opened this post at work. Maybe a little "NSFW" or title changing could happen? Supposedly the question was about blogging. Not a huge deal either way.
"I'm telling you to loosen up my buttons babe (uh huh)"
Enabling the italics and bold buttons beneath the comments box for Safari users?
Searching on more than two tags?
So with all the (very very greatly appreciated!) tagging going on, is there some way to search on more than two specific tags at a time? I love the /tags/thing1+thing2, but that seems to be all there is...
June 11
Meet the new ad, [not the] same as the old ad.
Just wanted to say that the new t-shirt ad on the blue is sooo much easier on the eyes than the old one, so thanks.
Mefi permanent cache links
Should the MeFi complex permanently cache links? Is it legal?
I recently desired to access some link I had added as a comment. My comment included a link to a PDF of testicle size. However when I now follow the chain the PDF has been removed.
Why was it removed? Either because the link became so popular that somebody figured they could make money off of it, maybe generated by my linking to it, or because of space limitations or reorganizations on the server. Anyway the link and its content have now evaporated and only maybe can I find a new link to it.
The cost/gigabite is now so low that it seems the MeFi complex could cache every link added. As long as the cache was not exposed to the outside to allow google searches (and similar traffic).
If some linked page was once put in the public domain does that mean that once it is removed it is no longer in the public domain?
What exactly is a link?
Should linking to a Google cache of pedophile site as opposed to the actual site itself be allowed? (It's the last link, titled "Here it is").
old::hotness tag
Feature request: A flag for posts that are useful, but from the deep archive, i.e. closed comments, and may be untagged; the purpose being to make them available for future feature requests.
Offensive noise.
Completely ridiculous, disgusting askme response.
Mondo Meta 2.0 Help
A call to MetaFilter readers (unregistered, too) to help put the finishing touches on the Mondo Meta version 2.0 MetaFilter tool.
My Post Wishlist
I was wondering how feasible a few adds on for people who post threads would be. I was thinking would it be possible for the OP to be able to see stats like how many people viewed the full thread and how many clicked on the different links? it would give a fairly good idea of how much interest a post generated, over and above what you can see from the number of favourites, etc.
Mobile Meta
I'd really like to be able to browse the meta* sites on my brand spanky new Pocket PC mobile phone gps thing, but IE keeps squishing all the text into a very very narrow column.
Is there a plain formatting version of the meta sites? Or some other mobile friendly alternative?
wiggum thread summary wanted
I'm vaguely interested in the Ralph Wiggum thread but at 350+ comments I'm afraid to enter. Please summarize the general drift of it, including excerpts and/or links to any particularly entertaining portions. Thank you.
Login problems
When I tried to login to AskMe from University today, I was logged in as normal and pushed to the Metafilter front page. Whenever I tried to get back to AskMe I would be logged out again. Was this a short term bug or an anti-University design feature? Can we be directed to the page we are trying to login from?
June 10
asking for programming help
I am finishing work on a short python program for my master's thesis. I am a newbie at python, and would like to ask for help optimizing the program in AskMe, by posting the actual script and having people with more experience give it a look. 2 questions:
1) does this sound too do-my-homework-ish?
2) the program is about 130 lines, would it be kosher to post the whole thing inside the question (not on the front page, obviously)? Or should I just link to the .py file on a server?
June 9
Two for two
MeFi Poker, June 10th 9pm Eastern
In a little under 24 hours cards will be hitting felt at the Third Annual Metafilter Poker Tournament. Do you have what it takes to match wits with MeFi's card sharks? (Shocking details inside!)
livejournal to emulate mefi flagging system?
As a follow up to this post about livejournal's recent suspension of several hundred user accounts, in his latest update on the situation SixApart CEO Barak Berkowitz name checked metafilter citing us as a good example of community policing.
We know we can learn a lot from other communities that use a combination of reputation software and human judgment to gauge community opinion, and we are now actively exploring how we can let the community "vote" on what is acceptable content in order to create greater consistency.
Use of brackets?
I always click on "N favorites" rather than "+" to add a favorite, because I'm tripped up by the two links in one set of brackets. Would it be obscenely contentious to request that we alter this: [2 favorites +] [!] to this: [2 favorites] [+] [!] Thanks!
June 8
Third Time's A Charm For Hero?
Hero Joy Nightingale: we posted on the blue about her, I posted on the green about her, but she seems to have left no trace for years...anyone want to help find out what happened?
No
No. Can we have some standards and not participate in this crap?
I'd also like to ask for a pre-emptive strike on any NewsFilter post about the latest missing and found dead rich white girl they're talking about now.
A [more inside] feature for the blue?
Is it feasible to have a proper [more inside] feature for the blue? It would be nice if there was a trivial way for the gods to save space without having to delete otherwise worthy threads such as this.
Phoenix, finalized
BUMP: Phoenix Meetup. Tuesday, June 12, Los Dos Molinos at 7pm. Come and help me celebrate my birthday early!
Huh?
Was my FPP just deleted before it even posted, or is there some kind of queue now of which I'm not aware?
I'm not complaining per se, but I'm kinda having a WTF? moment.
To see things the way I do, you have to strip out the context entirely.
AmberV's posts in this thread are a fascinating account of what it's like to hold a conversation as a person with Asperger's.
[this is good]
Thoughtful, kind, smart, funny, and all 'round nice guy - in honor of his 500th post, I nominate homunculus as good MeFi citizen of the month!
Why bother with best answers if this is what they're used for?
Marking the best answer in Ask Metafilter really doesn't mean anything, huh?
An Alarming Trend
June 7
Best answer not highlighted?
This question is listed as having a best answer, but no answer is highlighted.
Cut short in its prime.
This AskMe has been inappropriately curtailed. The question is not a simple maths question, it is more complex as nuclear capacity is hydrocarbon dependent and the question is predicated on terminating hydrocarbon use. My post late in the thread raises this issue, and at least one (sensible) reply to it has been deleted.
June 6
Does Meta Filter support OpenID?
Does Meta Filter support OpenID?...and can I convert my existing account for Metafilter into an Open ID one and still keep my account history?
FPPt
Display the tags of a post as an option, below the post text on the front page for logged in users?
My Friend's Dull Blog
This is a one-link post to a photo-blog consisting of a painful flash interface, 32 (uninteresting) pictures of a guy's trip to japan and some exceedingly lame attempts at humorous commentary. Surprise! It's the poster's friend's blog! What's the policy on almost-self-links?
Follow up to "Vienna phonebook thread"
FYI: Remember the "Vienna phonebook thread"? The archival collection we used to find all that information is (finally) being opened to the public with a presentation tomorrow afternoon here at the Holocaust Museum in Washington.
Yet another London meet-up
London meet-ups, eh? There sure are a lot of them about at the moment, but on the off-chance that any of you are not already suffering from 'meet-up fatigue', there's yet another one planned for Monday, June 11. It's a result of this AskMe thread, and is your chance to welcome lackutrol to these shores. The venue will be the excellent Jerusalem Tavern, from around 5.30-6.00 onwards.
Is this really necessary?
I'm confused on the etiquette rules regarding when it's okay to push a thread off into lunacy. I was hoping that the pirates thread could be interesting (although the OP was a bit lacking), but it instantly turned into a useless flamefest. Is it too late to delete all the pirate songs and idiocy? Can we maybe agree on a brief moratorium to let threads develop before we turn them into Thomas Pynchon novels?
June 5
The scourge that is WebMarshal
Our employer gives us an allocated amount of personal browsing time every day, which is filtered by WebMarshall. Metafilter is normally my prefered surfing choice, but WM must have picked up an excessive number of references to s-ex, pr0n, and other filth on the blue, (and also the Human Relations category of AskMefi kicks up the "Blocked: Pr0nography" page as well.
Normally I'd just http://ip.address/ to work around that, but with metafilter that just redirects back to www.metafilter.com
Lynx via telnet/ssh is painful at best, especially for image heavy links.
Any functional suggestions? (asking the sysadmin to unblock a site flagged as pr0n is just tempting fate).
DNS/domain work arounds?
I'm prepared for all the "get back to work!" comments on this post too...
It seems that even mild references to human anatomy send WebMarshal into a furious rampage blocking even some news sites. :-(
Wasn't there a post about dry ice and ethenol equating to instantaneous drunkeness sometime in the last six months?
I recently got drunk with: a former professor and a chemistry major and claimed that: dry ice + ethanol === near instantaneous intoxication. Now that I'm mostly sober my Google fu fails to reveal evidence (in youtube + MeFi post form) to substantiate my claim. I'm 98.23% certain that I saw/learned this factoid on MeFi. Could some kind soul please help me? Confirm, deny, deride -- at the very least inform -- me. Just point, if so kind you would be, in the direction of the link - y. :-)
Thanks.
London Meetup
Following up on tonight's goodness, let's do a London meetup with a bit more notice. (more inside)
Site Stats
Is there an official stats page?
Jessamyn in Ann Arbor, MI, June 8
Jessamyn in Ann Arbor, MI, this Friday, June 8, at the Michigan Union. Event sponsored by the U-M Library, MLibrary 2.0: The Future is Now, Peter Morville of 'polar bear book' fame will also be speaking. Please contact the U-M Library about registering for this event if you are not already a U-M member. See you there!
"Flag it and move on!" "I can't!" "The override, where's the override?!?!?"
Problem A: A Metafilter Jobs post breaks the guidelines, IMO.
Problem B: I get a Cold Fusion error when flagging it as breaking the guidelines.
Craig Thomas (R-WY) to serve as Zombie Senator
Though his death was noted yesterday in the blue, the last paragraph of today's NYT obituary suggests that his role as Senator may not be over:
"When Senator Johnson fell ill last year, there was speculation that the Democrats could lose the two-vote margin by which they had just won control of the Senate a month earlier. But he is preparing to return to the Senate soon."
LOLMeFi
June 4
Young and able, but indeflaggable
Love the new ajax flagging and looking forward to seeing it on the other sites. I especially like that it shows that you have flagged something, and would like to see an option to remove said flag in case of a mistake, or regretting a knee-jerk reaction.
My Favorites tab in My Activity?
Can we please have a My Favorites tab in My Activity? One that would work just like the My Comments tab in showing the last few comments on each thread, but do this for our favorite threads rather than threads we commented in?
Is this sweet or what? Well? Is it?
This is the cutest AskMe question and final answer in a while. Or, it's the saddest. I can't decide. Or maybe it's the result of split personality.
Similar to a tragic wading pool accident.
Not a complaint, really, because it certainly doesn't bother me—but is there any compelling reason that the sidebar item isn't “most goldfish that die drown in their own urine?” rather than including an eyebrow-raising word that will remain on the front page for a long time?
It was here a second ago...
Is there a method for tracking down deleted threads with the current URL format without greasemonkey... (no DLs for me at work) or with it?
And why was the De Anza College Sexual Assault FPP deleted? It seemed alright to me. If the answer to my first question is "No," can someone just tell me the URL?
I don't buy it
London Meetup, 5 June
Late-notice London meetup: Tuesday 5 June, 4pm onwards, The Salisbury, St Martin's Lane
Uptime is hugely improved
Uptime and performance have been awesome for me lately. In particular the days of long downtimes when the admins are asleep seem to be over. On behalf of UK mefites, thanks.
June 3
Ponyfilter
Can the meetup listings in the sidebar be kept up for a few days afterwards so we can more easily find the pictures which were taken? Or should there be a separate category for this?
Spell Checker!
Did I miss something? I have been traveling quite a bit recently and not on MetaFilter too much. Is this spell checker new tonight?
Your Favorite Band/Album/Film/Book/Techie thing Sucks Filter
#1 Said.
Can we come to some consensus with MetaReviews and get something rolling? I'm not trying to be a pesterbuggy, especially in light of all of the cool new things going on here, but a nice MetaReviews/Recommends would be teh awesome!
(I'm posting this because I watched a film today that would probably be the first film that I would actually write about in more than a decade.)
Self Linking in the Green?
Is there a policy about possibly slipping self-links in via AskMe instead of the blue? For an example, see this post
wanna come over and watch a movie?
I download what I imagine might be legally construed as "copyrighted material" all thie time. But I'm actually upset with this post because I know some people that worked on US v. John Lennon. (Double standard, I know.) So are there any guidelines about posting full-length, copyrighted movies? Is this post this even in good taste? Where's the context? Does it have any intent other than to illegally distribute a movie? Is this even a problem?
June 2
AskMeFi Deprivation
Why doesn't my question show up directly at ask.metafilter.com? Did they change their policy? How do I get my question to show up at the main site.
Shirt Swap?
My MetaFilter shirt just arrived and boy is an American "large" ever big compared to my Canadian frame. Does anyone have a "medium" that's too tight for them that they'd like to swap?
In our profiles, what are the conventions and expectations for "Links to" and "Linked by"?
I've been wondering about the conventions and expectations for "Links to" and "Linked by" in our profiles. So far I've been "linked by" one person, who I don't know in real life but who I'm quite happy to be associated with based on what I've seen of their contributions.
If a person ever spontaneously linked to me and I wasn't into it for some reason, would there be a way to point this out to them (if they didn't have contact info)? Or would that be irrelevant because linking is really just more of a global "favorite" button, without any connotation of "A likes B, therefore we can assume B likes A"?
June 1
Grameen Foundation posts a job
Gsteff posted a position at the Grameen Foundation on mefi jobs. I think that's cool. Bonus: It's to write open source software.
Thou shalt spell it "pheonix"
PHOENIX! Sometime in the evening, between June 11th and 14th. Probably that Monday or Tuesday, because I'd like to meet mullacc and I'm pretty sure he's leaving town mid-week. What say you, kings of sun, lovers of ale, revelers without abandon?
dating.metafilter.com
This thread seems to be crying out for dating.metafilter.com!
I'm Sorry
interrobang is being a real asshole today.