edgeways: "alternatively my friend's 3 year old kid just blows my mind, he can name off all the common birds in this area by their calls, and has an ever increasing grasp of most of the plants at his eye level."

Ah, so the problem isn't a total lack of natural knowledge. The problem is an increase in the concentration of natural knowledge. It's commonly known that one tenth of one percent of the world's population are... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:27 PM on August 1, 2008

loquacious: "Oh, this isn't going to go well. A single link to a BongBong thread?"

From 11 days ago, no less. BB editors come and are unpublished in that period of time.
It's a slooow day on the tubes.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 8:13 AM on July 26, 2008

I'm pretty sure the only thing this will do is increase Google's already-massive collection of spam.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 7:21 AM on July 23, 2008

I work for a company that's just launched a very similar site (which I'm not linking to because it's currently in a soft launch and I don't think we could handle the potential influx of MeFites). With that and our iPhone site, we've had the same problem that I've noticed in about half of the comments in this thread: everyone automatically thinks "zomg this is piracy!" We have contracts with hundreds of publishers, and it's all completely legal. I don't doubt that mygazines.com is... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:41 AM on July 22, 2008

The phrase "flip-flop" and all reasonable synonyms thereof should be entirely banned from political discourse. To imply that it's wrong to change your mind when circumstances change is offensive. In fact, one could easily argue that an inability (or unwillingness) to do so is the root of all of the current administration's failings.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:50 AM on July 21, 2008

Kirth Gerson: "That's not what you said in 2005."

Shit, they have to get rid of that user search thing. I was offensive back in 2005, apparently.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:10 AM on July 21, 2008

I used to be wrong, now I'm right. It's a shame that most people will never know the liberation of that flip-flop.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:01 PM on July 21, 2008

Hm, I see some changes were made to adapt the storyline for the Really Small Screen. For example, the kryptonite ring that Superman gave Batman wasn't used in Dark Knight Returns. In fact, since DKR occurred in an alternate future of Silver Age DC, there was no ring to use. Also, Lois and Jimmy were no where to be found in the storyline, not to mention the battle. Were they even alive?

Worst. Adaptation. Evar.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:18 AM on July 18, 2008

Eusociality - its what bees, ants, and all those other insects that divide into workers, drones, and queens do.

Weird, Eusociality isn't named after Europe -- nor the reverse. Strange, but true!
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:25 AM on July 17, 2008

Is the name of the story "The Eagle Has Landed" as in the text, or "The Eagle Had Landed" as in the page title?
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:07 AM on July 10, 2008

yoink: "When Gore had appointed moderate liberals to the Supreme Court (just sit back and dream on who, believably, would take Roberts and Alito's places, and what that would have mean for American jurisprudence in the coming decades), but didn't appoint absolutely down-the-line hard-core social activists, we would similarly have seen Metafilter chock full of indignant outbursts about betrayal and the complete indistinguishability of the Republicans and the Democratic party.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:46 AM on July 10, 2008

yoink: "So, you're saying that it made no difference at all having Bush as president for the last seven years rather than Gore? Really?"

No. You really think all complaints are equivalent?
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:26 PM on July 10, 2008

"To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies." -- from a statement released by Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton, October 2007.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 6:41 AM on July 14, 2008

Greg Nog: "Hands up, who immediately thought of Total Recall?"

Those weren't alien jugs, they were mutant jugs. Those with hands up, you all fail at nerd.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 2:23 PM on June 30, 2008

not_on_display: "This OK GO thing is getting out of hand."

You mean indie-produced music videos on Internet web sharing sites? If it's the democratization of music videos that you think is a bad thing, I'm pretty sure that this video, when compared to the two OK Go videos, shows that the sub-sub-genre is improving to the point where some remarkably impressive things can be done on a shoestring budget. And I think everyone (besides those... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:03 AM on June 26, 2008

Er, I mean $150,000.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:04 AM on June 26, 2008

FOURTH EDITION?!? *froths*
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:03 AM on June 25, 2008

In my experience, restaurants already provide a chemical "that facilitates social contact between people." It's called alcohol.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 6:56 AM on June 24, 2008

damn dirty ape: "Think of all the random people in a restaurant. Children, infants, sick people ..."

*Sprays damn dirty ape* There, there. There, there.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 7:50 AM on June 24, 2008

loquacious: "And this is why baseball is pretty much unwatchable these days. A bunch of duffers treating it like a serious game of golf. It's stickball, you noobs. It's supposed to be an action sport, not a genteel game of billiards."

Weird. Baseball, an action game? Billiards, a genteel game? "Duffer" used to describe a person not playing golf? Your entire comment seems to be purposely designed to be entirely wrong.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:10 AM on June 20, 2008

A party never has enough ice.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 5:00 AM on June 20, 2008

Two planets, one cup.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 5:19 AM on June 20, 2008

In Brighton, my friend Esme Jones, 38, who has just had a baby, spent a precious night out with her husband, a film editor, and said she kept nagging him to talk. "If I'd been with you or another girlfriend, even if we'd seen each other earlier in the day, we'd have been gabbling away 19 to the dozen."

I've just discovered that some women think men are boring because they think nagging is an effective way to encourage dialogue.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 7:47 AM on June 19, 2008

bitmage: "Dangit. Searched on Coco Wang and earthquake strips. Sorry about that."

You did? I just searched for Coco Wang, and only one thing came up, the previous post.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 7:42 AM on June 19, 2008

spock: "As you might expect from something expected to set a World Record for number of downloads today, he Mozilla sites are currently getting crushed, apparently."

Which is why this very moment was the ideal time for you to make an FPP, right?
Also, it's 3.0.0.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:01 AM on June 17, 2008

new address bar = mega-pro
DU = heretic
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:09 AM on June 17, 2008

mikesch: "Oldbar (apparently hosted on the same Commodore PET that the main Mozilla page is hosted on) gets at least some of the FF2 functionality back into the location bar. While I otherwise like FF3, I really hate what they did with the "awesomebar." In 20 minutes of using the "awesomebar", it never once guessed correctly about where I wanted to go."

It learns from your use. Maybe you could also learn to use it? Just... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:33 AM on June 17, 2008

543DoublePlay: "Because maybe they should have anticipated jillions of simultaneous clicks after challenging everybody to "beat the world download record""

That's understandable. I can understand that. That's rational. *breathes*
I've been on the other side of one too many disastrous release days, I think.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:43 AM on June 17, 2008

Crazy Mac zealots have standards have to rationalize that their OS is Right because they're stuck with it. Linux users who are grateful for what the free software community can be bothered to give them end up stuck in the shitpile that is the Linux desktop environment mishmash have options.

FTFY.
This is going down a bad path.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:49 AM on June 17, 2008

Firefox 2.0.0.0.0.14, now with even more zeroes.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:55 AM on June 17, 2008

I just typed "mefi firefox" into the awesomebar to get back to this thread fast.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:00 PM on June 17, 2008

mikesch: I find it surprising that "a couple hours late" is equivalent to "bumbled the release to no end". I would reserve that epithet for releasing a piece of software that deletes your files and downloads child porn. I do recognize that this release has been delayed and the not-released-when-I-woke-up was a strange thing. You'd think midnight GMT or some such would have been the plan.

sveskemus: "(Please don't turn this into a Mac... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:09 PM on June 17, 2008

In other news, it looks like it's finally up and ready for record-making.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:14 PM on June 17, 2008

furtive: "Mozilla.com still links to Firefox 2"

Looks like it's Firefox 3 to me. Might be a local cache issue? Are you behind a proxy?
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:36 PM on June 17, 2008

Blazecock Pileon: "Shouldn't have worn that dress."

If you do something in public view, you shouldn't get upset when the public views it*. It's not a matter of blaming the victims for encouraging the crime. It's not like leaving your door unlocked and getting something stolen. It's more like leaving your door open and getting outraged when someone looks at your stuff.

I think this specific case... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:57 AM on June 12, 2008

DU: "What's the legal definition of "partially nude"?"

The General Laws of Massachusetts, Chapter 272 §104:
(a) As used in this section, the following words shall have the following meanings:
"Electronically surveils" or "electronically surveilled", to view, obtain or record a person’s visual image by the use or aid of a camera, cellular or other wireless communication device,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:20 AM on June 12, 2008

"In the first official admission that the universal prevention strategy promoted by the major Aids organisations may have been misdirected..."

Or, you know, maybe it worked.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 8:49 AM on June 12, 2008

TheOnlyCoolTim: "Grow the fuck up."

By this logic, goatse.cx is totally acceptible SFW material, and anyone who is grossed out by it should grow the fuck up. It's just a bloody picture inside a human's totally natural orifice.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 12:29 PM on June 4, 2008

flapjax at midnite: "Yeah? A recheck shows them all still opening just fine for me."

The pop-in version of the first link is busted, for some unidentifiable reason.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 8:15 AM on June 4, 2008

Also related: (MeFi's own) Adam Savage on the Lost Season 4 finale
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:16 AM on June 2, 2008

Cf. RFC-1149: "A Standard for the Transmission of IP Datagrams on Avian Carriers" and a real life implementation.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 9:12 AM on June 2, 2008

dr;tl
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 6:18 AM on May 30, 2008

This post is better than the last one. Flash Monday, cmon. (2,466,147 on my first try.)
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 3:32 PM on May 29, 2008

Are they going to ask Bud to do the same?
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 11:40 AM on May 29, 2008

They hiatified after Pinkerton in 1997, came back respectably with the green album in 2000 and Maladroit in 2002, were replaced by replicants on Make Believe in 2005, were hunted down by Deckard (himself possibly a replicant), and if this song and Rivers's ironic mustache are any indication, appear to be making a run at a comeback in June with the red album.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 10:59 AM on May 23, 2008

BrotherCaine: "It looks like they've only caught the last 3 to 4 years of video memes, so it's a pretty small subset of "Ever". Still cool though."

If there was video on the internet before March 2002 (i.e. the release of Flash 6 and FLV), let us never speak of it again.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 2:25 PM on May 23, 2008

I just downloaded the widely-available torrent of the red album (FOR EVALUATION PURPOSES ONLY, I ASSURE YOU). One-quarter of the way through it, I can guarantee that Pork and Beans's lack of experimentation is an aberration, not the norm for this album. It's not a stretch at all to believe what puke & cry said about the single.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 8:12 AM on May 27, 2008

I'm pretty sure it's a good thing. After two listens, I've decided it's a big step up from Make Believe. Is it the blue album? No, (a-doy). Will it hold up to repeat listens? Can't say. Will I pay cold, hard cash for it? My wallet's already in the freezer.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 9:42 AM on May 27, 2008

My Something came today. It's a somewhat standard looking canvas laptop bag. Coincidentally, I dug my old (Pentium III 300MHz) laptop out of the closet this week, and couldn't find my old bag (I bet a certain someone brought it to Goodwill). My only complaint is that it's navy blue.

A co-worker of mine got a Something, too, and it's much smaller (maybe the size of a softball, but lighter). He's out today and Monday's a holiday, so it won't... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 9:11 AM on May 23, 2008

Part of me wonders how much of this is unintentional sexism. The other part of me says "No, sexist would be the other way around." Both parts are sad scared that Twitter actually thinks it's a legally safer thing to do to leave this harassment up. I hope they find lawyers with more than one third of a brain cell before something bad happens.
posted to MetaFilter by Plutor at 2:45 PM on May 22, 2008