MeTa post: The longest boat

I would consider myself one of the people wandering around blindly in that thread, not aware that I needed to actually get into the longboat. I'd have been stuck on the beach with all the unpublished kittens or on the sinking ship with the disemvoweled (impossible to walk if you're disemvoweled, very sad) - if not for the kindness of the other viking MeFites.
Wait, they were vikings? I totally missed out on having one of the cool hats with horns. Damn.
(Yes, I know real... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 3:41 PM on July 31, 2008

MeFi post: The Waiter has hung up his apron.

Thanks to this post, and then reading on the linked blog, I've now learned the meaning of in the weeds. For which I must love the post.

No matter what blogs may say of waiters sharing tips with bus boys I have the sense that they and the kitchen staff don't see any of that tip money in most situations. Not sure I know a rememdy for that - unless we all ask to go into the kitchen at every eating establishment and tip that way. And let's not forget the people doing the... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:25 PM on July 31, 2008

MeFi post: Boing Boing Finds 21st Century Trotsky?

Apparently commenter #115 also saw the piles of shit:

"I get the impression that the cause of this editing was something personal ("piles of shit lying around") and that's fine."
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:14 PM on July 1, 2008

AmbroseChapel:
"Clearly, the whole thing smacks of sexual/interpersonal conflict. And it's obviously nothing to do with Cory, who I'd imagine knew nothing about it and was very surprised to find out."

But he would have known about the deletion policy if it's true that this has happened over the past year with the ok of all the other bloggers on Boing Boing. Right? Just probably no clue about the fact that it would all blow up... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 2:38 AM on July 2, 2008

One of the articles linked earlier called all of this schadenfreude.
I say no - I have no emotional investment for or against any of the BB crew - I'm just watching this with amazement over how badly this is being handled and just can't grasp that none of them could/can figure out that there are better ways to manage this.

ed: "BB and its defenders see no delineation between what is amateur and professional.
But you simply cannot... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 12:57 PM on July 2, 2008

Speaking of Wikipedia they're also debating on the Boing Boing page how to post the info of ...this whole "whatever happened" BB/VB/XJ thing. (I don't even know what to call it anymore. Strange that no one's tacked a -gate onto it, but then the coverup comparison's a stretch.)
I always enjoy reading sourcing arguments.
Note: I have never edited or even gotten an account at Wikipedia. I'm in the minority in that? I never know.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 2:54 PM on July 2, 2008

elfgirl: "What the hell is it with people constantly throwing the 'boyzone' moniker at MeFi? I've been around here for a long time and I've never felt particularly outnumbered. In fact, one of the things I've loved about this place was that it had a fair amount of women contributors.?"

If someone had thrown that (the Valleywag boyzone claim) out a few years ago maybe it would have made more sense to me. I can remember when I lurked back then... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 4:04 PM on July 2, 2008

Dammit, what Artw said, didn't hit preview often enough!
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 4:07 PM on July 2, 2008

Xeni in BB comments: "That's kind of unfair, and I think you're kind of missing the point. The posts were unpublished about a year ago, but nobody noticed. People ping us all the time about old posts they're interested in -- links that have gone out of date, new additions to stories, corrections or clarifications -- I don't think I ever received one piece of email or one web submission about a single one of these posts, in all that time.

So, until this... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 1:12 AM on July 3, 2008

Xeni at LATimesBlog: "Regarding the decision to remove:

XJ: My biological father who died when I was a kid was a painter and a print maker. He went through different phases in his creative work. A lot of what he did was paint very beautiful photorealistic portraits of nude women. Sometimes he went off into experimental territory that he was embarrassed about... sometimes he would just grab batches of the stuff that was crappy as years went on, and go to... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 2:32 PM on July 3, 2008

Of course the employer bit may be why a lot of this has been unpublished, huh?
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 2:34 PM on July 3, 2008

I would love to come in and harumph about how we could really do without a lot of this noise...but earlier I mentioned Hitler Kittens, so I really can't start with the "too silly, too silly" business.

But lay off the crap about Xeni. As much as she's made it all about her - let's not make any personal attacks. And by that I mean any comparisons, metaphors, similies, etc. etc. that would demean her or her character. I think we already have enough material to... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 4:02 AM on July 4, 2008

Seth Finkelstein"Update: TNH's "strains of human evil" comment has now been disemvoweled, as well as a few other comments by her."

Oh great, how soon until we have the before after screenshots/quotes posted somewhere?
Just when you think it's over...

At this point I'd really like to recommend the RSS feed, load time is insane
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 6:22 PM on July 4, 2008

Um, if you think the boyzone misogynistic (which is what those of us can spell call it, boyzone is TigerBeatspeak - /snark but come ON people learn to use the damn dictionary.com, I know I have to but that doesn't mean I'm the only one capable, and my annoyance here is really at Valleyway, bah) call would only be for the word banshee - you've missed some more overt comments. Which were already called out as uncalled for so...yes, it's a lot to read...but skim up a bit more. Having trouble... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 9:49 PM on July 5, 2008

WHY WHY WHY do I keep mistyping it Valleyway???? ValleyWAG, argh!
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 9:50 PM on July 5, 2008

Dammit I meant to spellcheck ineffectual. I am for the lose tonight...
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 9:54 PM on July 5, 2008

On the NY Times article - I'm not sure they gave enough context for the reader who wouldn't have any idea of the site to make a true assessment of what's going on. I mean, to me if Boing Boing had continued to be just a goofy collection of links, this mess wouldn't make an impact - it was the addition of Doctorow's posts on media, censorship, etc. that made this a different issue entirely for me. Because it gave me the expectation that Boing Boing was setting itself up as more than just a goofy... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 5:00 PM on July 7, 2008

Note: am NOT a Doctorow fangrl. But I do think he had highlighted some important issues and news items. In the past.
Also cortex is on the money about science reporting. Always hard to find a trusted resource there.
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 5:05 PM on July 7, 2008

"Big hat, no cattle."

Yeah I was hoping that something more would be posted today, but yes, his silence speaks volumes.
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 8:28 PM on July 7, 2008

Hmmm. What could I expect Doctorow to say at this point? (Oddly I still call him by his last name, because I don't know the guy - while at this point I now seem to call Xeni by her first name, which makes no sense at all.) I think that we've heard so much from and about Xeni - and from the links just shared she's still bouncing about in the comments, making unhelpful "it's all really a joke now, isn't it?" asides - that Doctorow can now just bow out and pretend not to have any... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:56 PM on July 8, 2008

dersins: "Oh, didn't you know? She likes to imply that she didn't make it up. See the typically (for wikipedia) laughable talk pages (1, 2, 3 )for her wiki entry for some background."

Ok, it's probably very nerdcore of me, but I do love a wikipedia talk page if there's snark involved. Those links were much fun.

jessamyn: "Sorry, I swear I will shut up after this, but my sister sent me that same article... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 1:20 AM on July 9, 2008

About that article (Boing Boing Fends Off Censorship Charges, Information Week, Posted by Mitch Wagner, Jul 9, 2008 01:18 AM) Seth Finkelstein commented on - to be fair Wagner gets what happened:

"... Bloggers look to their blogs as personal playgrounds where they can do whatever they want. But they also want to be taken seriously as influential voices on the national scene. And it's tough to reconcile those two principles. When you have only a few readers,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:07 PM on July 9, 2008

"There's a reason I compared it to boot camp rather than college. My understanding is that we're not talking about 12 hour days at Clarion, we're talking about 18+ hour days."

But the point here is - yes, Doctorow's busy - but he still has time to post on Boing Boing.
I'm pretty sure Doctorow could set aside time in his schedule to compose a heartfelt paragraph. That's all it'd take. He's teaching the class, not taking it, right?... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:46 AM on July 10, 2008

And again, for anyone still wondering why we bother to take these folks seriously - because they still want to make semi serious critiques against other media:

Iran: You Suck At Photoshop. July 10, 2008 10:29 AM

"Or perhaps the headline of this post should read, "American media: you suck at fact-checking."

Iran's state-run media agency has been accused before of having digitally manipulated images... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 1:01 PM on July 10, 2008

The Wikipedia entry has added a few more sentences to its Violet Blue section.
And the talk sections's gotten a bit longer. And VB's boyfriend has added a comment in there.

Nothing terribly interesting really, but felt I should pop back and do my part to help you brave souls still toiling away at the end of this thread.
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:31 PM on July 11, 2008

From Violet Blue's blog that CCBC just linked:

"Later, at my publisher’s office, I got a big butch hug. "You know you can’t have a dyke romance without a little dyke drama. You’ve been initiated." She also congratulated me on having the world’s biggest text message breakup."

This reminds me of a lesbian friend of mine trying to explain what it was like dating in a very small population lesbian community.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 11:15 AM on July 12, 2008

languagehat: "Thanks for the CJR piece, batgrl—I hadn't seen it either."

I only found that thanks to Seth Finkelstein's heads up about VB's blog post summing up her feelings about the whole thing - she has lots of links there. I'm still wandering in and out of some of them. I liked this blog's explanation and reaction to disemvoweling. Also gives link to re-emvowelling such comments. This whole concept is still odd to me.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 2:53 PM on July 12, 2008

No wonder the blog seemed familiar - cortex linked the will shetterly post already, duh....
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 2:55 PM on July 12, 2008

I'm actually liking the Neatorama and Ectoplasmosis links.
Sorry Boing Boing, you are indeed replacable. Except I was spending more time reading MeFi than BB anyhow.

And I'd have thought we'd talked this thread all out - and then I looked at all of Seth Finkelstein's links...now I'm wondering if the unpublishing is the norm and we're all just late to the "wake up an smell the coffee" reality party. I wonder what we'd find if we followed the site for... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 12:03 AM on July 13, 2008

"As I noted earlier, batgrlHG, this is the middle of the thread."

Oh yes, yes you did, my bad. It's just getting easy to get my bearings confused - I'm going to need a map I think. Just let me know where we're setting up the bivouac, and I promise I'll try and keep up!

I'm sending out for sandwiches. Getting a variety: egg salad, turkey, ham, etc. Or should I just say the hell with it and send for pizza instead?
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 1:08 AM on July 13, 2008

Wow, I look away a few days and something actually happens! Re: the BB lessons learned post - struck me as odd that Xeni wrote the entire post, going from "I" then shifted into "we":

"We're sorry we didn't communicate more quickly and clearly. We delayed posting in part because I (and we) were trying to avoid something I feared would become a petty, personal online fight that would violate the privacy of parties involved.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 5:58 PM on July 18, 2008

"YouTube: Violet Blue reads comments from this thread"

That was kind of fun. And yes, the fact that this thread has now oozed from text into video means its morphing into some bizarre lifeform, completely out of our control.
Cool.

And remember - if you want to link and discuss any comments from Boing Boing? Or text in their posts? Copy the whole dang thing, or it may all go away. I really loved the part... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 9:37 PM on July 20, 2008

Wait no, Takuan is the moderator and takeshi just another poster. ...Right? See, BB, this is why it helps to have a Staff page, or an About page... Is there anything like that I'm missing? I'm looking on their main page and find no links... I can find out about Mark, Cory, David, Xeni, and John, and links to all of their works - but now, since I now get the Voice of Boing Boing from both posts and wedged inbetween comments, it makes things a tad confusing not to know who has authority in there...... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 9:51 PM on July 20, 2008

CCBC: "Got that? The semi-mod calls someone a worm and aims a caricature at him and that someone is then called inflammatory and banned. BTW, Shetterley was disemvowelled by Avram, not Teresa, Xeni, or Antious. BB is crawling with people who have mod privileges."

Geez, thank goodness, so I'm not the only one to become confused as to who's a moderator. Apparently it's not just one or two folk, it really is Moderation By Mob? Kind of... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 3:56 PM on July 21, 2008

For those wondering what the cortex and Takuan comments refer to - start in the BB moderation thread about here and read down.
Unless of course the comments disappear for some reason.
Someone's saving the page content, right?
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 4:27 PM on July 21, 2008

Here's what's REALLY brilliant about the PR piece that waraw linked up there - the article is about two PR moments. The first example was brought to the attention of the masses by Boing Boing - and Ford, the company in question that was getting bad press, stepped in to resolve the matter. In the second instance - well, that's the Boing Boing instance.

Attention all PR, Mass Comm, Media History, etc. instructors and other interested educators - that PR News story is... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by batgrlHG at 8:20 PM on July 21, 2008

Ask post: Is my girlfriend too needy, or is this normal for some people?

People going through the PhD gauntlet often go through mood swings, depression, irrationality, weight loss and gain, etc. etc. It can be a really weird, stressful time. Sometimes the work takes so much time and energy that students just don't socialize much, even with other students. (I remember students I knew would hang out and discuss the lack of social life ad nauseum - in the computer lab, while working. And that was as social as we got much of the time. For months.) Unfortunately if she... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by batgrlHG at 11:40 PM on July 12, 2008

Ask post: Do women sing about cars?

I just love that I'm not the only one who's fond of Elastica's Car Song. Must now go listen again...
posted to Ask Metafilter by batgrlHG at 11:04 PM on July 12, 2008

MeTa post: "Wow, look at the Boobies!"

Text of the post in question: "Fake or Not? The site will show you ten pictures of boobies, a pair at a time. You must determine whether or not they are augmented. Wes Cherry, creator of Solitaire for Windows, aptly cites it as one of his three favorite websites"

Where are we finding the sexism here? Sorry, I refuse to use the word boyzone, not only is that the name of a band it also belittles the concept that we could ever call out... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 3:39 PM on July 10, 2008

Oh and I didn't even look into whether the linked sites are sexist/misogynist. That's a whole different kettle of fish if we're to say that no one can link to anything objectionable elsewhere. How are we supposed to critique anything if we can't cite the stuff?
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 3:41 PM on July 10, 2008

onlyconnect: "just beneath the surfact there is always some more animal urge that they don't think it's worth it to control where judging naked breasts is somehow appropriate."

Many things go on in the minds of human beings when they assess others visually and get that first impression. And many of those things dwell of the physical aspects of the person in front of them. They might be looking at other parts of the body rather than the chest... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 4:17 PM on July 10, 2008

And sorry, I didn't mean to imply onlyconnect wanted to censor - only realized that after I hit post - I was trying to say that I don't censor my friends, even if I don't act in the same manner.
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 4:19 PM on July 10, 2008

BTW I do want to hop in and fully support the OP's desire to ask a question on this subject. Never hurts. And could possibly make decent fodder for academic research, should anyone out there be so inclined.

"A buncha math dorks gibbering about algebra dosen't allow the non-mathematically inclined much conversationally leeway either"

Wow, there are others that feel marginalized by the uber maths crowd?! I'm not alone?... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 5:18 PM on July 10, 2008

Afroblanco's link to St Carlin on youtube - nice, I always liked that one. Here, let me quote a relevant bit:
"...but when it comes to changing the language they make some good points because we do think in language. So the quality of our thoughts and ideas can only be as good as the quality of our language. So maybe some of this patriachal shit oughta go away... But they take it too far, they take themselves too seriously, they exaggerate. They want me to call the... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 2:31 AM on July 11, 2008

Peacay - I've actually not been away. I lurked a long time before I actually got an account here. I still do. Sometimes by the time I reach the end of a thread I haven't much to say that hasn't already been said more articulately or humorously. Then other times I post things against my better judgment, and ramble on too much. If you're trying to say I need to go read your links and be quiet, I can certainly do so.

And yes, compared to the somewhat unwelcoming atmosphere... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 3:33 AM on July 11, 2008

Ask post: "Our love is like Jesus, but worse/Though we sealed the tomb up where we laid its body, it rises"

It sounds like you've already gone through the hardest part - accepting what's happened and that it's over. Keep telling yourself that this is the rough part - and that someday you'll be able to look back on it, that this will pass. It will never be completely over in some ways - pain might linger - but it will hurt a bit less.

As far as day to day - keep busy, do little things you enjoy. It's a great time to focus on anything creative - if you're into a form or arts,... [more]
posted to Ask Metafilter by batgrlHG at 4:32 PM on July 2, 2008

MeTa post: Metafilter - lessons learned from the BB problem?

languagehat "Sorry, but having made this (unnecessary) post..."

Actually it's turned out to be a very interesting read. Plus I hadn't read that FAQ in ages and it's changed a lot - much time has been spent on it. Comments here have answered some things I was wondering about, and again makes me think that moderating is a tricky job.

Must add that I have LOVED having an RSS feed, especially after that mega thread went... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 2:10 PM on July 2, 2008

"Bonus points for the "wishing into the cornfield"
do I recall correctly that this is a reference to a really incredible Ray Bradbury story?

I was thinking it was the Twilight Zone episode myself, but then I'm a tv junky.

Also a great idea for the next podcast would be to have the hosts sing along with this.
I am SO not volunteering - but I do love the idea. Or you can go with the later JC... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 2:30 PM on July 2, 2008

"It’s a Good Life"is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. It is based on a short story of the same name by Jerome Bixby....and then:
"It's a Good Life" is a short story by Jerome Bixby, written in 1953. In 1970 it was voted by the Science Fiction Writers of America as one of the 20 finest science fiction stories ever written. The story was first published in Star Science Fiction Stories No.2.

Maybe you... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 3:17 PM on July 2, 2008

"1,259 insults on one page

"I'd forgotten why I love-hated Metafilter: It's a boyzone of spiteful, pseudonymous insult comics, but many are snappy with the English language. 'Instead of calling it what it is, they're going to clown us with semantics.'""

As a female who's been here long enough to remember when this was MUCH more of a site full of guys that didn't always realize when they were offending women... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by batgrlHG at 3:39 PM on July 2, 2008

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