I think this is going to be the one that survives.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 11:40 PM on February 22, 2008

This bookmarklet generator allows you to search your local library for any book you find on Amazon. It's just one at a time, not a whole list, but pretty close to the functionality you describe.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 10:50 PM on December 20, 2007

4R15T0TL3_15_4_B46455

Bagass?
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 4:49 PM on November 29, 2007

So it's not chatfilter if you have an ulterior motive for asking the question?
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 7:21 PM on February 9, 2007

Boycott these assholes. There is only one true Weblog Awards.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 10:32 AM on December 7, 2006

It happens to me all the time, frykitty -- I'll go Googling after something I vaguely recall having read about, and sure enough, there it is on my blog.

At first I thought it must be a new article on the phenomenon, because I remembered reading it way longer ago than just two years. Nope: the article itself is from 1997. I wonder how the mythology has evolved in the intervening decade?

Clive Barker bought film rights to the story a while back,... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 7:38 AM on November 2, 2006

There are times when I wish for a "did you even read the entire question?" or "that isn't the question I asked" flag.

Either or both of these would be immensely helpful.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:22 AM on September 11, 2006

I think what was meant was that the RSS feed doesn't show the fact that a thread has had an answer marked best. Such a thread is still available through the feed.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 2:29 PM on August 11, 2006

The most lo-impact (annoyance-wise) way to do it otherwise is to have a bit of text, perhaps by the "there have been x links" part at the top, that notes that the user is "wanted" in certain threads. Maybe the actual threads in question could be listed on your user page, with the thing on the front page just letting you know you're wanted.

This is more along the lines of what I had in mind. Just so that the next time they logged in,... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:13 PM on August 8, 2006

I don't want to get email about threads, or send email about threads. I just want, when I come to this site, something on the page that says "Hey, somebody thought you should check out this thread." Recommendations, rather than obligations.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 4:02 PM on August 8, 2006

It would be great if we could flag a comment as "does not attempt to answer the question" to help with this. (For that matter, "attempts to answer a question other than the one that was asked" seems more useful every day.)
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 10:36 PM on June 28, 2006

It already exists, it's called "Noise".

The flag interface is an opportunity to clearly communicate exactly what kinds of behavior are discouraged. A flag like "does not attempt to answer the question" would communicate this.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 1:39 PM on June 29, 2006

As would NOISE, DERAIL, or IT BREAKS THE GUIDELINES.

Surely you can see that there is more, and more useful, information contained in "does not attempt to answer the question" than is contained in any of the above phrases.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:14 PM on June 29, 2006

It's an opportunity to be more precise with the users about exactly which behaviors are discouraged (i.e, considered flag-worthy), which is what people here are advocating for.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 9:03 PM on June 29, 2006

But who was the user that said it first?
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:11 AM on June 17, 2006

"On the web" is not "of the web". Linking directly to a multi-megabyte platform-specific local executable is hardly a good way to foster discussion.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:55 AM on May 1, 2006

Subject: metafilter
From: Matthew Haughey
Date: July 15, 1999 9:41:55 AM PDT
To: Jesse James Garrett

Jesse,

Creating the collaborative weblog thing I've been working took longer than I
thought, but it's getting closer to completion. If you would be so kind, would
you mind testing it out and letting me know what you think about it?

go to http://www.metafilter.... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:04 PM on April 24, 2006

What stav said -- MeTa is not for "callouts", it's for course corrections, and a thread like this one fits the bill precisely.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 7:03 PM on March 13, 2006

Not until you learn how punctuation works in the English language.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 2:16 PM on February 14, 2006

There are a ton of questions that could be added to the relevant wiki page.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 11:40 AM on February 1, 2006

It's also worth noting that by 1980, their career was more or less over.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:05 PM on January 16, 2006

your point being?

Just pointing out that the characterization "annoying 1980s prog-rock band" is wrong in almost every way. Except possibly for "annoying", but I'd say that's the fault of classic-rock radio programmers, not the band.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:09 PM on January 16, 2006

As I was walking home this evening, a little girl was riding her bike in the middle of the street. She still had the training wheels on as she wobbled and struggled to peddle. It reminded me of when I was little and how badly I wanted a bicycle but couldn't get one. My parents wouldn't let me have a bike until I was 12; my mom was too afraid I'd hurt myself. I'd pass the bike section in the store and just look, having given up asking my parents about it long ago. I eventually did get one after... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 2:10 PM on December 22, 2005

(Now if only del.icio.us was up so I could bookmark it...)

Somebody should come up with a way to store bookmarks on your local machine. Bonus points if you could actually integrate it into the browser, with something like a menu command or a keystroke.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 9:42 AM on December 19, 2005

Clearly, the solution to every closed thread is to start a new one. Do it enough times and eventually they'll have to give in!
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 1:44 PM on August 31, 2005

If you were supposed to wait longer than a week, the posting restriction would last longer than a week.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 1:09 PM on August 10, 2005

watching Barbara Walters interview Stone Phillips.

I have no idea what that means.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 3:20 PM on June 22, 2005

the A-list congratulating the A-list on being so A-list.

I don't see anything in this interview that matches this characterization.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 4:37 PM on June 22, 2005

If you think I've been dishonest (or even just wrong) please go ahead and say so.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:02 PM on June 23, 2005

There's no 1000 like the first 1000. And we don't need a MeTa thread to prove it.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 1:12 PM on June 3, 2005

I think the problem was that everybody who knew about the site in 1999 already had a blog, so the incentive to come here to post something that would only be read by the exact same people who would read it on your own site was, well, pretty small. Also, the whole "blog-with-comments" idea was pretty new and took some adjustment.

was the first big influx 9/11?

My recollection is that people other than Matt's friends... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 6:30 PM on May 2, 2005

*sigh* Maybe someday Matt will finally clear out those dummy accounts from the beta test, and I can assume my rightful user number. Then I'll get some respect around here! Or, wait, probably not.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 4:30 PM on December 15, 2004

But there should be no pressure to point to the original if there is a better alternative, that would be like telling someone they should use GNU Emacs instead of XEmacs because it's the original.

The difference is that nobody's trying to sell copies of XEmacs. Just because Wikipedia's terms of use allow some parasite to come along and make money off the project without contributing anything doesn't mean we have to support such behavior.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 10:37 AM on October 24, 2004

Now this is something I just don't get.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:29 PM on July 1, 2004

Top-level cats are already done. The only piece that needs to be worked out is how keyword navigation will work.

And then, uh, implementation.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:12 PM on June 3, 2004

I'm not entirely sure using meta threads for follow-ups that don't warrant an entire MeFi thread is a good idea.

I would go so far as to say that I am entirely sure that it's a bad idea.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:20 AM on April 23, 2004

I hardly see how speaking out against racism is a pissing match

Emphatic agreement. The culture of hate wins when any suggestion that such ideas are poisonous is cast as either some sort of personality conflict or a mere difference in political perspective.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:01 PM on April 11, 2004

And therefore, was (~was) means Was (Not Was)?

Anyway, everybody knows the symbol for negation is !
Determining the meaning of the band name !!! is left as an exercise for the reader.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 3:11 PM on March 16, 2004

It's okay to shit all over the front page as long as it's Friday.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 10:21 AM on October 3, 2003

I didn't think it was possible, but you've made Fark look like a paragon of wit and sophistication. Congratulations soyjoy!
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 12:37 PM on October 3, 2003

And here I thought MetaFilter had gone all mainstream.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 11:32 AM on August 26, 2003

It's a rare thread that lives more than 24 hours. I'd wager a little of waxy's statistical magic could provide a definitive answer.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 4:53 PM on June 19, 2003

I mean that the interval between the timestamp on the post and the timestamp on the last comment in the thread is likely to be less than 24 hours.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:14 PM on June 19, 2003

My further assumption is that the lifespan of the comment thread is roughly equivalent to the lifespan of the community's interest in the thread.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:15 PM on June 19, 2003

I agree with kirkaracha. There is a long and well-established tradition of discouraging weblogger "inside baseball" posts on MetaFilter. Blogroots is where this stuff belongs.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 4:30 PM on April 24, 2003

Much easier to just add a quick "On preview: what Hildago said." or "On preview: this obviously wouldn't work in the rabid wombats situation" than to rewrite your long comment.

Of course. Because, as we all know, what's easiest for the commenter is therefore what's best for Metafilter.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:31 PM on February 4, 2003

And God knows we wouldn't want to suggest any standards that might promote thoughtful participation.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 5:33 PM on February 4, 2003

i do have a question, does this mean all other non-AIDS related topics will be deleted?

One hopes it would not come to that.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 8:07 AM on November 28, 2002

MetaFilter is not Usenet. If you don't have a link, don't post. Why is that so incredibly hard to comprehend?
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 8:51 AM on October 21, 2002

I support any measures that may discourage the scourge of [more inside]. These include, but are not limited to, the public humiliation of those who engage in such behavior and can't even get it right.

Unless you're The Haughey, Metafilter isn't your personal soapbox. Publish your diatribes and dissertations somewhere else. I hear Blog*Spot accounts are free.
posted to MetaTalk by jjg at 1:41 PM on October 6, 2002