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PLEASE NOTE THAT I AM A COMIC SHOP OWNER AND THEREFORE HAVE HUGE BIASES ABOUT COMIC BOOK RELATED FPPS!

I realize that I have enormous bias as a comic shop owner of 22 years to comment on comic books and the comic book industry, but I just wanted to pop in here and throw some statistics out to everyone (that I fully realize only apply to my shops.) Do with these statistics what you will.

Our customer base is

76% Male,... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Ron Thanagar at 1:32 PM on February 21, 2010

I'm going to start banning people for that "this thread is closed to new comments" stuff, fair warning. I have a whole new type of ban too. I'm sort of excited about it.
posted to MetaTalk by jessamyn at 5:44 PM on February 21, 2010

Attention, citizens of the internet: that clown car joke you're thinking about making? The one about vaginas? Other people made it already. Sort of stupid, unlikeable people, people you avoid getting stuck in conversations with because you come away from them feeling awkward and embarrassed just by association. Those people are really proud of that joke, because it gives 'em a great chance to (a) be totally witty and shit and also (b) mention vaginas.

You're... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by cortex at 8:55 AM on February 21, 2010

Metafilter, please grow a spine.

Grow a hide. Shit gets deleted all the time.

It's not really the sort of post you should be this emotionally invested in defending. It's a rather tragic snuff video. The first time I saw it I nearly threw up.

Just because people die all the time doesn't mean I want to go hang out in the cancer ward being a poison eater.
posted to MetaTalk by loquacious at 7:13 PM on February 17, 2010

Related, there's an orange Volvo that drives around Ballard (the traditionally Scanda-hoovian neighborhood of Seattle) with a Swedish flag painted on the roof called the General Leif.
posted to MetaFilter by Slarty Bartfast at 2:29 PM on February 17, 2010

Just after Christmas, my wife's 91 year old grandmother (who was living in an assisted living facility, doing pretty well) had difficulty standing up from her chair. The nurse on duty noted very high blood pressure and called us (we're the responsible family for her care). We instructed them to take her to the small hospital (a block away). I arrived shortly afterwards, she was alert, scared, and embarrassed to be there, she hated being a burden on anyone.

I sat with... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by HuronBob at 9:16 AM on February 16, 2010

I'd like it if people could stop getting their posts deleted tonight. I'm trying to watch tv.
posted to MetaTalk by puke & cry at 10:33 PM on October 23, 2008

Ran a quick query and here's the Top 20 along with the number of characters in the question: Why have kids? (14)Is Weezer emo? (14)Do birds fart? (14)Can cats cough? (15)What do you TiVo? (17)Is death the end? (17)Pocket PC or Palm? (18)Is Matt Drudge gay? (19)How old is Web 2.0? (19)How do psychics work? (21)Why are matches free? (21)Do cats get hayfever? (21)How can I become cool? (22)Picasa or Flickr? Why? (22)Condom recommendations? (23)Good DVD-only recorder? (23)Best caipirinha recipe? (23)... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by pb at 8:37 PM on February 16, 2010

The Challenger explosion was the defining tragedy of my childhood. The Berlin Wall coming down was the defining triumph.
posted to MetaFilter by sciurus at 11:07 AM on February 5, 2010

More like a brief history of Western Europe and USA with the timeline stretched back...

But yeah, liberal guilt aside, that was well executed

CRITICAL HIT!
posted to MetaFilter by Throw away your common sense and get an afro! at 7:59 PM on February 11, 2010

I hope no one minds if I share a short anecdote. This question is awesome and I'm sort of hoping people might share some good survival stories - 'cause you can't really learn what to do in case of a bear attack from a book quite like you can from someone who has been attacked by a bear.

As a preface, I'm an Eagle Scout, something I'm conflicted about, but one thing I did get a lot of from the Scouts was wilderness survival. Case in point:*

I... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Lutoslawski at 9:28 PM on February 11, 2010 marked best answer

Yeah, but only if she's five-three.
posted to MetaFilter by Jimbob at 9:56 PM on February 10, 2010

Be honest, you didn't actually read the whole thing, did you? Or could you explain why specifically you think the methodology was flawed?

Yeah, I did actually read the whole thing. The most interesting part, for me, was the finding (with particularly low p-values) of the different brain centres activated, depending on whether the WHR was "optimal" or whatever-the-hell-it-was-pre-surgery, plus the finding that BMI had little to do with it.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by UbuRoivas at 10:47 PM on February 10, 2010

The unedited copy on the Fox News site ran REALLY SLOWLY for me.

So, I watched it on YouTube instead.

Part 1, Part2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by marsha56 at 11:07 PM on February 5, 2010

I'm not going to watch it because it's late. So can someone fill me in? Were the culture wars settled there? Can I turn on the TV tomorrow and not expect to see the soft capitalists to be arguing minutiae with the more rigid capitalists?
posted to MetaFilter by Mayor Curley at 10:52 PM on February 5, 2010

Civilization costs money. How this continues to elude some is beyond me.
posted to MetaFilter by trondant at 11:23 PM on February 1, 2010

Actually, Mario makes for a poor revolutionary vanguard. Throughout the levels of the original game he blindly runs to and fro, doing the work of the nobility (the Princess and Bowser), while clearly being manipulated by them to give up his labour for free, believing that he lives in times of 'exceptional circumstances' or 'great terrorist threat'. He never stops to question the methodology of his supposedly socialist service, doesn't take issue with the fact that the masses are not only not... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Dysk at 2:59 AM on January 31, 2010

Effigy2000: "Oh heck. Now I feel I need to be part of the crowd (ironic given my first comment in this thread, no?). Fishbike, if you're up to it, please do my data too"

No problem, actually this is good. First it confirms my suspicions that for these stats to be fairly complete, it takes about 1000 favorites given and received (which you have, so these look good). Second, I don't think we've seen anybody favorite 40% of another users... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by FishBike at 6:45 AM on January 30, 2010

Pee-wee shows his new Apple iPad to the Playhouse Gang.
posted to MetaFilter by mazola at 6:49 AM on January 29, 2010

This thread is now about misattributing quotes to people.

That's what she said.
posted to MetaTalk by cortex at 10:39 AM on January 28, 2010

Bunch Of Phonies Mourn J.D. Salinger
posted to MetaFilter by brundlefly at 4:06 PM on January 28, 2010

I felt a great disturbance in the TwitterVerse, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out "meh," and were suddenly disappointed.
posted to MetaFilter by shmegegge at 11:07 AM on January 27, 2010

Not wired. Less space than a PADD. Lame.
posted to MetaFilter by niles at 11:07 AM on January 27, 2010

The next iteration will be called the iPad Max. Or more appropriately, the Max iPad.
posted to MetaFilter by Christ, what an asshole at 11:07 AM on January 27, 2010

Oh I hadn't heard about this.
posted to MetaFilter by shakespeherian at 11:04 AM on January 27, 2010

The most trusted network is also the network whose target audience has the lowest level of critical thinking skills.

Makes sense.
posted to MetaFilter by xthlc at 8:23 PM on January 26, 2010

Here you go:



(I wish I could embed the Google Analytics map of the world, you can mouse over every country and get a result for now many visitors came from that specific country)
posted to MetaTalk by mathowie at 11:22 AM on January 26, 2010

I can't really take sides on this until I know which edition he was playing.
posted to MetaFilter by Mister_A at 8:38 AM on January 26, 2010

Isn't it up to the poster to provide at least some context?

Yep. But some don't and the posts are okay [I'm thinking of tellurian's post from the other day where a lot of people were like "why did you link to this?" but a lot of people seemed to find it interesting and by the time I saw it in the flag queue there was some discussion going]. I guess there's sort of a pluses and minuses sort of thing going on. To oversimplify for a sec....... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jessamyn at 7:43 AM on January 24, 2010

Effigy2000, the Snopes post has the photos, which aren't bogus as such, just not belonging to the backstory of an undiscovered Brownie camera.
posted to MetaTalk by Horace Rumpole at 7:21 PM on January 21, 2010

They're at the Snopes link, Effigy2000. Though I think the blog post just had a subset of the images there.
posted to MetaTalk by not that girl at 7:19 PM on January 21, 2010

billysumday: "No, I'm talking about Metafilter in general in the past six months or so. I feel like posts scroll off the front page faster - a side-effect of more members posting more FPPs, I'm guessing."

This is demonstrably untrue.

So far in Jan 2010, the average post has spent 42.7 hours on the front page. For 2009, it varied between 41.1 (July) and 48.3 (September). I don't see any seasonal trends. It hasn't been... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Plutor at 8:17 AM on January 18, 2010

A sufficiently large asteroid will wipe out all complex life on Earth. They even have a name for this: an Extinction Level Event. It's been talked about enough that they even abbreviate it to ELE.

Short of an ELE, if you'd like a reasonably accurate, 1980s-style look at the possible consequences of a major strike, read the 1980s novel Lucifer's Hammer.

They'll be able to tell as long as a couple of years out that we might get hit, but if... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Malor at 6:56 AM on August 31, 2007

Dear Skynet,

If you have flying robots looking for people, those robots should have guns, that way if they ever happen to identify someone important, say Kyle Reese, they can kill him on the spot.

If you ever happen to capture Kyle Reese, you should probably kill him on the spot, not throw him in a cell.

If one of the Terminators ever happens to get within arms reach of John Connor, it should grab and... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Brandon Blatcher at 3:21 PM on May 26, 2009

and created the abomination that is Terminator 3.

I guess I'm the only one who liked T3 For the unmitigated goofiness. It should have been limited to drive-in screenings.

Ahhhh, Twelve Monkeys.

I have a friend who is a time traveler. I'm only kind of kidding. He can speak Latin, he's a stone-mason, an oil painter, and an Art Restorationer, but he can't deal with bank accounts or credit cards or... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by The Whelk at 6:08 PM on May 24, 2009

I was just on a jury. I had to leave so I did not get to make the decision, but it was definitely an experience that made me wary of the process. Here are some of my thoughts, I hope they help you. This is just my experience, I do not mean to offend anyone.

My case was a murder trial. The jury selection perplexed me. It seemed that the lawyers went for the less educated. I don't know why they did this because the case had a lot of technical... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by scazza at 3:47 PM on February 25, 2009 marked best answer

I didn't enter that thread because the very topic was idiotic and only idiocy would come of it.

But your comments aren't doing you any favors because you are not willing to examine the biases of your own thoughts.

Once I was walking past a 7-Eleven on halloween and a bunch of black kids were stealing candy. I could have thought, "They sure are giving blacks a bad name..." but I didn't. You know why? Because it's a stupid thing to say... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by You Should See the Other Guy at 11:14 AM on January 4, 2010

The memory that holds the saves on GBA carts requires power. If the battery is dead or the contact comes loose, you'll lose the saves.

The GBA port of Super Mario World came out in 2002, I think, which means the cart you have may be seven or eight years old at this point.

However, it's also possible you have a bootleg cart. A lot of bootleg GBA carts got onto the market thru eBay and the like, and they tend to be of a decidedly inferior quality... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Target Practice at 7:57 PM on January 5, 2010 marked best answer

This seems like an odd post for the gray.
posted to MetaTalk by JanetLand at 5:40 AM on January 1, 2010

thread 71507 (DELETED) comments=1 favorites=22 t-number=22
thread 86695 comments=99 favorites=825 t-number=8.33333333333333
thread 82929 comments=46 favorites=368 t-number=8
thread 74818 comments=53 favorites=422 t-number=7.9622641509434
thread 73480 comments=72 favorites=559 t-number=7.76388888888889
thread 85667 comments=845 favorites=6293 t-number=7.44733727810651
thread 61699 comments=131 favorites=964 t-number=7.... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Rhomboid at 11:03 AM on December 28, 2009

"This is a story about four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody and Nobody.

There was an important job to be done and Everybody was sure that Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that, because it was Everybody's job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody wouldn't do it.

It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have done."
posted to MetaTalk by iamkimiam at 2:53 PM on December 27, 2009

If you feel like playing with some HTML, one thing I've seen done occasionally is using <ABBR> or <ACRONYM> tags with the title attribute to put spoilers in the mouseover title. If you type:

<abbr title="Rosebud was his sled.">Mouseover for spoilers.</abbr>
<acronym title="Darth Vader is Luke's father.">Mouseover for more spoilers.</acronym>

you... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Upton O'Good at 7:31 PM on December 25, 2009

Young Chuck moved to Texas and bought a pony from a farmer for $100. The farmer agreed to deliver the pony the next day. The next day the farmer drove up and said, 'Sorry Chuck, but I have some bad news, the pony died.'

Chuck replied, 'Well, then just give me my money back.'

The farmer said, 'Can't do that. I went and spent it already.'

Chuck said, 'OK, then, just bring me the dead pony.... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by netbros at 4:20 PM on December 25, 2009

Our take, whenever this has come up before, basically boils down to this:

- Metafilter is a generalist site, not dedicated specifically or primarly to spoiler-sensitive discussion of narrative works, so building in a UI feature specifically for the purpose of spoiler management seems like overkill;

- It's polite for folks to be mindful of spoilers when discussing something relatively recent and to avoid spoiling... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by cortex at 4:09 PM on December 25, 2009

My mom grew up in the Great Depression. She remembers the New Deal, the McCarthy era, the Civil Rights struggle, the Vietnam protests. When I start complaining about how bitter political rhetoric is nowadays, she just rolls her eyes and says, "They always talk like that."

Yeah, it's bad. One of our main political parties is in the middle of a major shake-up. But it's been a lot worse, even in her memory. The tea parties don't really compare to the Vietnam... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by nangar at 10:14 AM on December 23, 2009

I wouldn't print that card. BECAUSE IT'S FUCKING CREEPY.
posted to MetaFilter by mathowie at 9:39 AM on December 17, 2009

It's tea-time here in England.

What are you on about?
posted to MetaTalk by vacapinta at 10:02 AM on December 16, 2009

jessamyn [8:33]: gay elf sex means what?
*cortex [8:33]: Dragon Age
*cortex [8:33]: it's this new game
*cortex [8:34]: there's this elf
jessamyn [8:34]: okay
*cortex [8:34]: he's gay
jessamyn [8:34]: you can stop at this point
*cortex [8:34]: and you can totally have sex with him
jessamyn [8:34]: and by you
jessamyn [8:34]: you do not mean me
*cortex [8:34]: really, it's pretty... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by jessamyn at 5:35 PM on December 10, 2009

FREE TONIGHT? Y/N? >_

copy and paste into your phone. send to her.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by jessamyn at 8:09 PM on December 9, 2009

Just link to Bad Astronomy already. Whenever something weird happens in the sky, BA has the answer. Look at the simulation video, looks just like the picture. Someone in the comments links to a video of something similar happening in China in April.

The YT comments on that video are half about what kind of angels caused it.
posted to MetaFilter by dirty lies at 2:52 PM on December 9, 2009