People write inflammatory comments because they want attention. It works really well.

My suggestion: implement an "ignore this" button, to be presented along with the current favoriting/flagging interface. When clicked, the text would change from "ignore this" to "you are ignoring this comment".

This would provide some positive feedback for making the choice to not encourage trollish comments. There could even be... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:26 PM on February 12, 2008

I've suggested this before in previous discussions of opaque posts, but I've since accepted the fact that I'm sometimes going to miss good stuff because I don't click into posts that don't look interesting from the front page. If it was really good, there's always a chance I'll pick it up on one of my occasional visits to the popular tab, or it might make the podcast.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:58 AM on February 4, 2008

Also, it's perhaps insufferable of me to say this but you could make a point of seeing every annoyingly mysterious post as a reminder that you don't need to know everything. That's certainly something I could stand to be reminded of more often.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 5:03 AM on February 4, 2008

Very nice, but I can't follow links in posts right now - just get a little animated "sparkle" over the link text when I try to click them. This is on an iPhone/1.1.3.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 3:06 AM on January 25, 2008

Maybe it would be an idea to have a rule that obit posts have to wait until at least a week after the death. There would be a much better chance of having a decent discussion about that person's life and career, and the inevitable but probably lesser amount of snark would be a lot easier to take.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 8:40 AM on January 23, 2008

I prefer to think that most people here, when given something interesting to talk about, will do so in an intelligent and respectful way.

Depending on who you are, Ledger's death is a heartbreaking tragedy, titillating gossip, or an over-reported irrelevance. I don't think any amount of good linkage could have saved the thread from ugly clashes between these viewpoints, which all seem to be quite strongly held. As above though, I think a bit of... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 8:55 AM on January 23, 2008

I'm not saying it can't be done, but it's not realistically speaking something that can be just done like that without some serious disruption of moderation and posting norms.

I can appreciate that it's a big change. Technically I think some kind of message along the lines of "n posts containing at least one of your tags were deleted in the last week for the reasons given below. Please check that none of these apply before you click... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 9:57 AM on January 23, 2008

It wouldn't be that hard to check for an empty link, though, would it? Certainly no harder than checking for double posts.

Yeah, I think stripping out would be problematic, but just giving the user a warning along the lines of "one of your links appears to point to Metafilter" would be worth doing and would really just be another test and error condition in a routine that's there already.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:23 AM on January 22, 2008

Hasn't affected me, although I do have a very common name. I wish I had a different handle though, explaining to future employers why I chose a name that means "goofing off while pretending to be working at home" could be awkward.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 3:15 AM on January 15, 2008

I don't have any problem with educated guesses in AskMe, but they need to be identifiable as such. Having said that, I like having SCDB around, and have never really understood all the animosity towards him, especially given the condescension and bad-temperedness that some other people seem to get away with.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:24 AM on January 11, 2008

I wouldn't be at all surprised if heavy Metafilter users are more likely to be using Firefox, in which case the proportion of users using IE is likely to still be higher, if my understanding of how these figures are collected is correct. Anyone?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:03 AM on December 7, 2007

I don't have too much to contribute, but I want to say that I think this discussion is worth having, and I hope that Metafilter continues to try to do better than the rest of the web when it comes to pervasive casual sexism.

Also I've read this whole thread, and I didn't notice any shrillness or man-hatingness on the part of the female contributors.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:29 AM on December 6, 2007

Why should I get a professional diagnosis?

It seems to me like the relatively modest investment it would take to get a professional opinion would easily be paid back by a lifetime of not having to deal with the extremely common (and not entirely unjustified) prejudice against self-diagnosers. Why not do it?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 5:49 PM on November 29, 2007

I know you're frustrated, but if I never hear "fuck off" from another user (and trust me, I hear it usually a few times a week and it stings every last time) for returning snark with snark, that's okay with me.

I appreciate that it's not possible to prevent every single instance of the admins being verbally abused, but surely we can do better than "a few times a week" for jessamyn alone? Maybe it's time for a stronger and/or more visible policy on this?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 9:04 AM on November 29, 2007

A better pledge would be to completely ignore comments that are rudely expressed (other than possible flagging if appropriate). The effect would be like that stealth banning thing they do on some boards where the banned person's posts are visible to them but invisible to everyone else.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 7:17 AM on November 27, 2007

1.) Exactly how many pounds of ladybugs can I buy for $20?

From this, it looks like $16.50 gets you a pint of them, and according to this, that has a shipping weight of 1 lb. In case anyone else was wondering.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:01 PM on November 26, 2007

Oh,

Because the thing I am sending has a cash value of $25.

Suspiciously, this is the exact price of a quart of ladybugs.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:03 PM on November 26, 2007

I suggest that the current notice below the comment box be expanded with something like: "Please remember that Metafilter is a diverse and inclusive community". This would act as a relatively gentle reminder against insensitive comments and also to send a message that if someone's feeling alienated on the basis of race, sex, sexual orientation, etc. they can expect support from the rest of the membership.

Also, while I appreciate that not everything can be... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 5:56 AM on November 25, 2007

An Apple Premium Retail Store just opened in my town, trading under the name "Stormfront". I'm sure it's entirely innocent, but it's hard not to feel a bit weird about them.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:56 PM on November 19, 2007

I think the concept of a title for a question is inherently a bit confusing. I agree with timeistight's suggestion to get rid of the title field altogether, although I would suggest truncating the front page question text to make the page title if necessary rather than reducing the length of that field.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 8:53 AM on November 12, 2007

If we're going to have something on the front page to make it clear what posts are about, I would rather have the tags.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 9:18 AM on August 1, 2007

symbolic.metafilter.com

Every post and comment consists of one or more textless images*. Unique icons are used instead of usernames. We could live without dates and times, but I guess a picture of an clock could be used to indicate time if deemed absolutely necessary. Background is black.

Does anyone know of a website like this?

*Images with text would be deleted, as would those things where you get a phrase by... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 7:36 AM on July 30, 2007

teleskiving: please make it, I want to join very much. I would only suggest that the morans who insist on spamming goatse, LOLcat, etc, get shown the door very fast.

It would need really tough moderation, maybe even admin approval for contributions from new IPs. I don't have nearly enough time right now but I would be thrilled if someone made it happen.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:10 PM on July 30, 2007

I read all the way down here to see if anyone else explained the Zoidberg thing. It's a great line in the show, but it doesn't seem like much of a joke if you haven't seen it.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:27 PM on July 29, 2007

...he's making a statement that just because a post has a ton of links, it doesn't actually make it worthwhile if the subject matter has no redeeming value to begin with

Yeah, if I wanted to make a post satirizing EssayFilter, this is pretty much exactly what it would look like. My problem is actually not the particular subject matter though, it's that the linked material has obviously been a secondary consideration in putting together the post.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 12:08 PM on July 25, 2007

I also miss Suck, but not as much as I miss Breakup Girl. That site was the highlight of Monday mornings.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 3:24 PM on July 15, 2007

Unless I have a particularly strong interest in the subject, I am personally more likely to read the post if there are only one or two links. Ask yourself what the best thing in your post is, link to that from the front page, and then use your first comment for the other stuff.

Plenty of people here will disagree, but in my opinion a Metafilter post is only ever as good as its best link, and padding only makes it weaker.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:22 AM on July 4, 2007

Call me stupid, but couldn't this be done in an AJAXy way that would avoid the DB lookups unless people actually used the feature?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:40 PM on June 13, 2007

That gives me an idea for another feature request: a list of already rejected feature requests

Would the ability to add favorites from "Recent Activity" be on that list? And maybe flagging as well?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 2:45 PM on June 13, 2007

I support the deletion, not because the comment brings up old stuff but because of the dickishness.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:52 AM on June 13, 2007

Senator Johnson is not dead. Senator Thomas is.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 3:50 AM on June 5, 2007

Out of curiosity, how much of this is to do with the addition of Windows Server Monitor?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 6:25 AM on June 4, 2007

I don't think there's any intention here to game AskMe but the self-link should probably be taken off the front page. After that it would probably just about fall on the right side of the line.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:39 AM on June 3, 2007

Count me in as more likely to click on a single link. If I had my way each post would only get one link on the first page and any others would have to appear in the [more inside] (which, know, doesn't formally exist at the moment). People could still write essays, but I think having to single out the best link would make people focus a bit harder on the quality of the linked material rather than the general interestingness of the topic.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 1:02 AM on May 24, 2007

Is this a reasonable place to ask if we could have the ability to add favorites in the "Recent activity" page?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 12:46 AM on May 24, 2007

Wikipedia:

An image macro, also known as a thread bomb, is a picture with text superimposed, typically through the use of graphics software such as GIMP, Adobe Photoshop, or Microsoft Paint. The name image macro originates from the Something Awful Forums[citation needed], where for a time the use of a preset "macro" text would insert into the post a corresponding image.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:06 AM on May 18, 2007

is it like a word processing macro in the sense that you're stamping a set block of text onto an array of images

Well, if the Wikipedia article is correct, they used to be called macros because they were inserted into a post using a preset piece of text which was automatically expanded into the image.

In other words, the name "macro" is nothing to do with the fact that the pictures have text on except for the fact... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 5:08 AM on May 18, 2007

I would have missed these, thanks for highlighting them here.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 9:49 AM on May 13, 2007

It would be more fun if favorites from users that have a lot of favorites counted more. You know, like Google.

I'm still going to say no, though.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 10:19 AM on May 7, 2007

I'm not so sure that an author responding in-thread could ever get old.

I agree with this sentiment. Kirth Gerson, thanks for highlighting this here.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 7:22 AM on May 5, 2007

Possibly the poster is embarrassed about their germophobia or weak knowledge of science. Or more likely, they're Amish and the mold is growing because the microwave is concealed in a damp basement.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 7:32 AM on May 3, 2007

So is this "You know who else" meme a Monty Python thing?

I'm probably missing a joke here, but it's a Colbert thing, right?
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 3:55 PM on May 3, 2007

I thought it was a great answer, and then I saw that there was a whole lot more. Really good stuff.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 3:01 PM on May 3, 2007

breezeway, however long it has been I hope you're not dealing with this alone right now. Please call someone who loves you. I hope I'm not out of order in saying this.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:46 PM on April 29, 2007

John Scalzi is here.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:25 AM on April 19, 2007

Dan Savage answers people's personal questions for money, I would be surprised to find him doing the same thing for fun, and the handle feels wrong (yes, I know he uses the phrase in his column a lot).

On the same sort of subject though, I wonder how many well-known people find themselves reading discussions about their latest project here, consider commenting, but then can't be bothered with the account creation process. Some kind of "Are you the subject of this... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 1:35 AM on April 14, 2007

Q: I have bad gas and sometimes it escapes noisily without me wanting it to. Does anyone know any funny jokes I can make to lighten the mood when this happens that aren't tired old cliches?

Declare "Speak up, Brown - you're through!"

It probably won't be long before that becomes a tired old cliche though.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 12:47 PM on April 5, 2007

I haven't seen Unforgiven, but I really want to now.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 8:06 AM on April 4, 2007

I wish the guy no harm (if anything, I find his honesty refreshing), but I can't say I'm sorry to see his money returned and his account banned. He'll just move on to the next website, having lost nothing but the ability to advertise on Metafilter, which is not allowed here anyway and was clearly the only reason he got an account.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 8:55 AM on April 4, 2007

Hey you know, America treated Native Americans real badly

If the poster had actually written that instead of "White Americans are still whitewashing their past treatment of native Americans", the thread would have gone better.
posted to MetaTalk by teleskiving at 4:09 AM on April 4, 2007