Comments on: Do as we say, not as we do.

Do as we say, not as we do.

solistrato — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 11:45:26 -0800

By: Mo Nickels

Mo Nickels — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 11:58:31 -0800

Another link with no supporting information. How much time does it take to write, "Microsoft may have been cracked again"?

By: howa2396

howa2396 — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 12:27:10 -0800

probably about the same amount of time it takes to click the link and decided if its something you are interested in or not.

By: daveadams

daveadams — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 12:39:36 -0800

I agree with Mo. The cute headline is nice, but please sum it up after. In any case, I think this article points out that keeping up with Microsoft's security patches is rather difficult, especially if you've got a lot of web servers, as Microsoft undoubtedly does. I wish I wish that MS would come up with a tool that would, if nothing else, parse their security bulletins and provide a nice UI for listing what patches are available, what they do, what you have installed, etc, etc. It shouldn't be difficult, but they've never done it. Does anyone know of such a tool? Preferably one that can keep up with multiple servers from a workstation (yet still be available anywhere). It would be doubly cool to be able to schedule patch updates for late at night... Maybe I need to write this myself... hmmm...

By: solistrato

solistrato — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 12:55:43 -0800

I agree with Mo. The cute headline is nice, but please sum it up after. No.

By: dhartung

dhartung — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 13:14:46 -0800

solistrato, I imagine you're one of those drivers who never uses his turn signals.

By: jeremy

jeremy — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 13:17:46 -0800

hm. all i did was click the link to the real news story that actually did have information that supported the initial headline. a lot of it. so what's the problem?

By: rich

rich — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 13:43:58 -0800

Instead of discussing how informative it is to know that you need to yet again patch Microsoft software lest be the victim of yet another security hole, MeFiers once again show surprising idiocy by decrying the style people wish to deliver the news when it does match their expectations of how someone should conform to their personal preferences. Mostly, I figure, because it's solistrato.

By: pnevares

pnevares — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 13:56:51 -0800

Mostly, I figure, because it's solistrato. Well if you click on solistrato's user info, there was a period of descriptive headings that switched into what we've seen as of late. But that's just what I see from a cursory glance. :)

By: bradlands

bradlands — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 14:10:08 -0800

[!-- BEGIN belongs in MetaTalk --] This is strictly a personal preference, owing to how I read and use MeFi and other weblogs, but I believe linktext should be either entirely self-explanatory or accompanied by some sort of illuminating comment. For me, this insures the post will be useful to some degree, even if the originally linked page goes 404 or is later amended with new information. For example: I could simply post "Yay!" or I could post "Yay! Comedy Central will be rerunning the ill-fated SportsNight starting in December. And they're not the only network picking up white elephants." The second instance conveys my enthusiasm, enough information to determine whether I want to click for more, and contains the gist of the story should the original link go away. FWIW. YMMV. TTFN. [!-- END belongs in MetaTalk --]

By: daveadams

daveadams — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 14:29:08 -0800

[WARNING Metatalkish stuff ] MeFiers once again show surprising idiocy by decrying the style people wish to deliver the news when it does match their expectations of how someone should conform to their personal preferences. "Idiocy"?? Is it really necessary to insult people? Or am I showing my idiocy by decrying the style you wish to deliver the information that you think we're idiots? It's not really about personal preferences so much as, "What is your goal in posting on MetaFilter?" If your goal is to be clever and to hide the punchline of your joke behind an indefinite period of wait such that many users will not bother to discover your wit, solistrato has provided a good example. If your goal is to actually get people to click-through to the article and perhaps discuss it's contents, rather than the style of your post, then in my opinion, the best way to do that is to sum up the content of your link. A side effect of this style of posting is to lessen the chance of double posts--most instances of which have occurred due to the clever posting like this link. Another side effect is that people will know immediately whether or not they are interested in the link. Sure it only takes a few seconds to check a link, but I imagine a lot of good discussion never happens because of "clever" headlines

By: Mo Nickels

Mo Nickels — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 14:40:29 -0800

First, I'm in France on a slow dial-up connection. Sometimes (depending whether I can get into AOL or not) I pay by the minute for connect time. So, you're helping rip me off. (AOL is doing the rest). Second, it's not because it's solistrato. Who the hell's solistrato? I don't know you people. Maybe we've traded outside email or I met you once or twice as part of a larger group of webloggers in New York, but I don't care who the post is by. Third, limited-information posts are doomed to be repeated: they don't turn up on Metafilter searches as having been posted before. There's simply not enough data there to index. Fourth, I'm here for information, not intrigue. My asking for link explanation is no more a demand for behavior modification than posters requiring me to click on a link for more information. One method is passive, the other is active. One is approved by consensus, the other is not. The Wired links are the ones that bother me the most: I can't even judge by a rollover and a quick look at the URL in the status bar what the article is about. How's this for expectations of how people should conform to my personal preferences: Those of you who keep weblogs that include a zillion no-explanation, one-word posts would probably find your traffic greatly improved (if you care about it, and I'm not saying you should), if you adopted a more information-driven approach there, as well.

By: solistrato

solistrato — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 16:48:21 -0800

What? What's going on? Rich, cut that out. Everyone here loves me. You're ruining my rep, man. ;) Seriously, no need to insult people. As for linky stuff: it was just so appropriate. And so compact. So perfect. And now it's ruined. Now I shall have to turn once again to Demon Alcohol to save any semblance of face. And I am a CHRONIC signal user.

By: skallas

skallas — Mon, 06 Nov 2000 17:40:33 -0800

I think it boils down to "look how clever I am" and how easily it is to exploit curiousity or how I don't want to miss out on an article just because solistrato can't follow simple recommendations. I would have avoided another MS security article, btw. Thanks for wasting my time.

By: solistrato

solistrato — Tue, 07 Nov 2000 12:05:31 -0800

Aren't you all taking this a wee bit too seriously? God forbid some levity should pass through here. And Skallas, you're absolutely right. I owe you the 15 seconds it took you to see it was an MS security article and hit the back button. Feel free to redeem them at any time.

By: rich

rich — Tue, 07 Nov 2000 13:34:57 -0800

My point in the 'idiocy' was not one aimed at any particular person, but the tendency of these threads to become this petty arguing and tit for tat instead of about the link that spawned it. Sheesh.. and everyone gets too serious.