Polling The Hive Mind

July 17, 2006 2:01 PM

Grupthink has already surfaced on MeFi Projects and even made a brief appearance here in the blue, but it's changed so much with recent updates, it's worth a FPP on its own. It's now at v1.2.5 with a big addition being topic-oriented Grups. Grupthink's not just another polling and answer site; it's more like watching a hive mind in action. Anyone can create public or private open-ended, dynamic polls that change over time with user input, plus, you can vote on responses, rank them, and add comments. Some of my favorites include: Who is the best Dynamic Duo?, What websites do you visit every day?, Which of the 7 deadly sins do you have? and the addictive Wikipedia Showdown! A blog run by the developers gives updates on the site's inner-workings too. Grupthink also operates as a time-machine: once you login, hours tend to vanish into the ether.
posted by rabble (11 comments total)

Grupthink also operates as a time-machine: once you login, hours tend to vanish into the ether.

If you like Grupthink, you should try watching paint dry! The days just fly past!

(Grupthink: metafilter without the meta. Or, indeed, filter.)
posted by unSane at 2:24 PM on July 17, 2006

at least it's a friend-link instead of a self-link, now.
posted by soma lkzx at 2:26 PM on July 17, 2006

Ooo...viral marketing.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 2:32 PM on July 17, 2006

Like Livejournal memes mixed with Digg.
posted by smackfu at 2:42 PM on July 17, 2006

This post is being discussed in MeTa.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 2:47 PM on July 17, 2006

I've got no patience for Digg but I'm going to give this a shot. The combination of tags, groups & open-ended answers gives it some potential, I think. It gives both the originating questioner & each answerer enough freedom to express themselves & to create interesting types of connections between the data. I've got a similar project on the drawing board & now that I know about this site I'm going to see what I can learn from it, what works & what doesn't. It's interesting enough to me that I'm willing to forgive what's almost certainly a self-link in all but name. Thanks!
posted by scalefree at 2:54 PM on July 17, 2006

Finally - a home for chatfilter.
posted by horsemuth at 3:06 PM on July 17, 2006

Ahem.
posted by scalefree at 3:13 PM on July 17, 2006

Another wonder on the intranet - total strangers asking very trivial questions and other strangers actually commenting on them. Incredible.
posted by homodigitalis at 3:28 PM on July 17, 2006

MeFi represent.
posted by scalefree at 3:57 PM on July 17, 2006

I think it is pretty cool. I like how the pictures can be used for voting options. This could be a copyright problem if the site becomes too popular.

At the same time the votes will be biased by people who all pass time surfing (and posting stuff) on the Internet. So I guess the name makes since in that regard. But it will definitely be a biased source of information.
posted by nickerbocker at 4:48 PM on July 17, 2006