MetaFilter

We do not use the word doxxing generally

Let us now review the list of words we do not use:

1. Doxxing
2. Gibblet-flipping
3. Thorple-slurping
4. Yozz
5. Jojboiling

The use of each forbidden word above-listed shall be punished by the relevant forbidden punishment hereinafter-enumerated:

1. Fupplegronching, until the face of... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by the quidnunc kid at 9:55 AM on November 28, 2012

Thanks for the post, but I'd like to correct one thing: in Puerto Rico, a solid majority has not voted for Statehood. In fact, the Statehood option only has 45% of the vote. It is very understandable that you were confused; I also was until a moment ago when I asked my dad, who's more up-to-date on the issues on the island.

Here is a wiki article about the referendum, which also makes the mistake of omitting blank votes when calculating percentages.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by verdeluz at 8:12 AM on November 7, 2012

As it happens, this was the impetus for me to do a little database work I've been putting off for a while now. I've got the American Community Survey, the "long form" questionnaire of the Census, and they ask both what time people arrive at their workplace and what their occupation is in excruciating detail (5 minute time intervals / 469 occupation codes). Overall, about 8% of workers start during the "second shift" peak of 2-6 PM. The top occupations for workers arriving at... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Homeboy Trouble at 8:47 PM on November 1, 2012 marked best answer

Oh man if I'm ever in charge of a computer lab they're all getting named after prepositions.

A: "Rough day at work?"
B: "Yeah, through is down again, in is off, and it seems like up still can't get through to back except via along."
A: ...
B: "At least down is back up. And I think there's still a backup of through over on across."
posted to MetaFilter by nebulawindphone at 11:08 PM on October 24, 2012

[This is a reply from an anonymous commenter.]

I work on the Daily Show and am involved with the placement of the mugs every day. When the Secret Service spoke with me about what we usually do for the show, I asked about the mugs knowing it would be an issue. "Let me introduce you to the Navy Mess," the lead agent said.

So, I met the appropriate person from the Navy Mess. I gave her a brand new mug which she disappeared with. She... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by cortex at 6:03 PM on October 20, 2012 marked best answer

He makes a lot of decent points and there is a lot of value in making the result of writing code engaging. If it's not engaging, there is little incentive and perhaps only negative incentives (do this or you will fail) for a kid to touch it.

Ultimately, the appeal of coding is to make the monkey dance, but what he shows is such teeny piece of actual coding and he falls way short addressing what's next.

For his cooking analogy, if you grew up on... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by plinth at 8:05 AM on September 27, 2012

the cooking/kitchen analogies are really, really strained. Experimenting in a programming environment, especially a live coding IDE, is very low cost activity, while doing so in the kitchen is much more time consuming, expensive, and potentially dangerous.
posted to MetaFilter by blue t-shirt at 7:51 AM on September 27, 2012

Wasn't there a similar drama that played out on the blue (and green and grey) a few years ago?

The Kaycee Nicole saga
posted to MetaFilter by TheCuriousOrange at 8:58 AM on September 18, 2012

There's probably a German word for that kind of nostalgia, the kind you'd get when finding an old address book, trying the number and being told the line was disconnected. What I saw was a screen after screen of dead lines. It made me hope that someone would soon come along and pull the phone out of the wall for good.

Üsenet.
posted to MetaFilter by Kadin2048 at 8:09 AM on September 7, 2012

A lot of my online friends now I met via LJ. Rather than the fandom-and-furries or emo posturing platform a lot of American people see it as, there was a tight-knit group of smart, funny people, mostly based in London, who wrote beautifully about their lives, their interests, and their favourite songs. I got my first London place to live via LJ friends, kept in touch with the person who is now my boyfriend of almost-five years, and had a little support group and a place to rant when I... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by mippy at 7:52 AM on September 7, 2012

More interesting than the decline of LiveJournal as a social media platform is the rise of other internet sites as a direct result of the fast and broad, but fleeting, success of LiveJournal. I'm not talking about the impact from a feature perspective, though that does exist in the privacy model of Facebook (configurable and variable privacy filters) and Twitter's timeline (similar to "friends" view). As a member of the original LiveJournal crew I'm biased, but working for other... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by lisaphillips at 11:21 AM on September 7, 2012

mwhybark: The Office de la langue française, aka the "language police", don't go around busting heads. They can't arrest people, and they can only investigate anything at all if a civilian makes a complaint. They are however, empowered to fine businesses that make too much use of non-French languages, and if they determine it necessary, to shut down those businesses.

I don't think their powers are unreasonable, at least not completely. Way back when, it used to... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by vasi at 10:41 PM on September 4, 2012

Tamora Pierce! Tamora Pierce! ALL strong female characters, varying ways and whys and wherefores. Some with loving famlies, some orphans, some with jerk families. I love love love her work.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by geek anachronism at 1:12 AM on September 1, 2012 marked best answer

两仨亇丹仠丨乚亇乇乃
posted to MetaFilter by twoleftfeet at 3:02 AM on August 28, 2012

I am a female tech-type who currently works at a startup. Almost every job I've had since graduating 5 years ago has been at a startup, in some technical capacity. Here is a very small slice of 5 years of startup life.

Almost everything you eat in the office comes from Costco. Imagine: a counter spread with open jars of Pub Mix, cashews, jelly beans, Red Vines, Granny Smith apples in those bullet-proof molded plastic cases, Clementines in a mesh bag. Your office is... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by guybrush_threepwood at 7:05 PM on August 21, 2012 marked best answer

The cranes build themselves, and remove themselves by reversing the process. Here's a timelapse of a crane building itself and another of a crane removing itself.

Basically, the top of the crane has a cage ('climbing frame') that fits over the main part of the tower. The crane can raise itself so that the cage is supporting it, with the main tower below. Then the crane lifts up a new section of the main tower, and this is inserted into the cage. That section becomes the... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Paragon at 4:13 AM on August 23, 2012

I have a recurring fear that I'll get locked out of 1Password somehow and, just like that, my entire life online will separate from me and go its own way.
posted to MetaFilter by R. Schlock at 5:43 AM on August 21, 2012

A new arcade opened up in Seattle not too long ago. As the article notes, I imagine that what makes it a profitable operation are not so much the arcade games, but the liquor license that lets them sell beer to the once-kids-now-adults who come to these places for a little nostalgic fun.
posted to MetaFilter by Blazecock Pileon at 12:00 PM on August 7, 2012

Is it Jpfed?
posted to MetaTalk by Ritchie at 7:07 PM on July 25, 2012

I think the hardest part is getting past the "hump" mentioned in the article where you're friendly acquaintances (once you're out of college), and to get through to "friend" someone has to keep pushing, which feels awkward and doesn't always work out.

One thing I like about living in a smaller city is that there's more stability; people who move here tend to stay here a long time, and a lot of people grew up here, worked elsewhere, and moved back, so... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Eyebrows McGee at 6:03 AM on July 15, 2012

I don't have any friends because I am too busy with the weekly moral panic induced by a NY Times trend piece. Why last week I only just stopped breast feeding my 21 year old son in public. It was difficult to stop because I obviously got something out it. Particularly as I am childless 45 year old man with no friends living in a world of declining civility and increasing polarization where anecdotal evidence points the value of stereotypical gender roles and where teen cougars now prowl... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by srboisvert at 6:12 AM on July 15, 2012

Gah.

I'm a standup comedian who runs a weekly showcase and open mic. We do our thing in a fairly small town but we've built a loyal crowd that draws excellent comics to perform for it. Know how we built that crowd? By not setting out to actively alienate half of it. And with that in mind, I would under no circumstances book Daniel Tosh.

That's a ridiculous thing for a rookie like myself to say; this is not a stance that is likely to be tested... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by EatTheWeek at 1:14 PM on July 11, 2012

When the video first went to KTLA (the first news channel to get it), an editor decided the first few seconds were too blurry, and so he cut it; there was no real malice there or anything, just a video editor's concern for clear pictures. Yet those first few seconds showed Rodney King rushing/approaching (pick your descriptive verb) the cops. He appears much more aggressive in those first few seconds.

I can personally attest, under oath, that this is... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by charlie don't surf at 11:40 AM on June 17, 2012

*And not because they're "phony," as the cliche would have it. Some people are phony here, but then some people are phony wherever humans live.

I tried not to double up on this one; I really did. Even going as far as to make a loaf of bread. Yet there is so much unsaid. Perhaps beginning with 'cray cray' will provide the moderators with plausible deniability for a deletion.

In order to understand Los Angeles, one... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by nickrussell at 3:43 PM on June 12, 2012 marked best answer

People who publicly and vocally quit lifehacking remind me a lot of people who have quit drinking. It's like, man, you weren't supposed to be doing it all day!
posted to MetaFilter by entropicamericana at 2:43 PM on May 23, 2012

humans are really creepy and weird.
People are just the absolute worst.

Sometimes they can do really creepy and weird things, true, and they can bring out the worst in themselves and others. What holdkris99 did was sick, sad, and grotesque. But this reflects on his profound personal damage -- not on humanity as a whole.

Because as we saw unfold in real time, people also have the capacity... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by scody at 12:34 PM on May 22, 2012

Man, it pisses me off so much when someone abuses the entire community like this. It reminds me of the anon suicide questions. For the first couple ones that came in years ago, I used to go to great lengths to talk people down from the ledge (literally). I talked with clinical psychology friends, sent emails filled with local help for them, and in some cases had a week or two of regular communication. Then some asshole decided to post a couple fake ones and thought it was funny when we went out... [more]
posted to MetaTalk by mathowie at 12:08 PM on May 22, 2012

kickquote

blockquote!

punchquote

blockquote!

headbuttquote

blockquote!

God damn that was a dumb joke.
posted to MetaTalk by Think_Long at 2:11 PM on May 21, 2012

You haven't been listening to your Simpsons DVD commentary.
posted by Space Coyote

In your face!
posted to MetaFilter by Nomyte at 4:32 PM on May 16, 2012

Five things make the best keychain in the entire world:

1) The carabiner key
2) The Lucky Line Keyring: easy to add and remove keys, but never comes undone accidentally.
3) The Lacie Iamakey, slow but small and indestructable
4) the NiteIze S-Biner size #4: It is the perfect size to hang off a beltloop and into your pocket
5) the gerber shard as mentioned above, so handy.

I have spent years trying... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Freen at 12:10 PM on May 14, 2012 marked best answer

mrs holdkris99 I am so sorry. The story Marc told about your wedding (and the eventual decent resolution) has been one I think about almost daily when I grapple with my own strange family. Your love for him and his for you shows through strongly in your eulogy. May his memory be a comfort to you. Feel free to call on us if there are other things we can do for you.
posted to MetaTalk by jessamyn at 5:54 AM on May 17, 2012

TED's Chris Anderson has posted a response and uploaded the video in question.
posted to MetaFilter by parudox at 2:07 PM on May 17, 2012

Ooh, new hoop fan. Great!

Okay, this season is dispute-shortened, so what you need to know is I think it is 66 games in the regular season. Also the playoff series' will be more compact. Usually in an NBA season, the games are more spread out. This year it feels like there are games every other day almost!

What puzzles me is not so much how to watch, but what to watch.

Watch the pregame shows if you can... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by cashman at 12:37 PM on April 4, 2012 marked best answer

I miss memepool too.

So, to set some context: When I wrote memepool, there was no RSS, no MySQL. The word "weblog" hadn't been coined yet. etc.

So, I wrote my own in-memory database, items don't have permalinks, there were dozens of problems.

Then, it became very easy for people to have their own blogs - so having editorial curation was an impediment. Why write when it might get rejected per the style guide? Etc... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by joshu at 3:40 PM on March 27, 2012

Columbine by Dave Cullen. Award winning, well reviewed, unbelievably engrossing.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by telegraph at 6:07 PM on March 27, 2012

Jarome Arthur-Leigh Adekunle Tig Junior Elvis Iginla. But hereinafter referred to by Iggy.

He's only the 42nd player in 93 NHL seasons to achieve the feat; he's the second man in a Flames jersey to score 500 goals -- the first was the iconic Lanny McDonald, who memorably scored his 500th goal in his last ever game, winning the Stanley Cup.

Iginla was the leader behind the Flames' unlikely 2004 run to the Stanley Cup finals, when the whole city... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by Homeboy Trouble at 1:52 AM on January 8, 2012

Grace Hopper was created by a wise and subtle God as the ultimate weapon to be deployed against idiotic statements that women aren't suited to work in software development.
posted to MetaFilter by Tomorrowful at 1:11 PM on February 28, 2012

I've spent the past year and a half of my life in library school, and about three years before that working in some capacity in rural, suburban, and urban libraries, and currently I'm currently at a cross-road in terms of whether or not I want to work in public libraries. There's a constant state of fear and malaise among the professors, the guest speakers, and the students – a constant question that we, the students, get asked is “so, uh, do you guys have any ideas?”... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by codacorolla at 7:52 AM on February 12, 2012

I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened.

:(
posted to MetaFilter by mazola at 10:02 PM on January 31, 2012

Um...unless I have also evolved overnight the ability to self-replicate, I'm pretty sure rebuilding civilization will be a moot point.
posted to MetaFilter by Thorzdad at 4:58 PM on January 5, 2012

It's a hugely interesting area, the recent apparent retreat from rationality. Why is complete nonsense perfectly ok in the political sphere these days? A very important question.

In general, ideological resistance to rationality is typically a psychological response, if there is something to protect. If disagreement is presented in a way that is interpreted as antagonistic by one side, the other side will instinctively retreat, regardless of the... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by SpacemanStix at 4:22 PM on January 3, 2012

the recent apparent retreat from rationality

Recent?
posted to MetaFilter by yoink at 3:42 PM on January 3, 2012

The US has been in decline since the 1970's and especially Reagan accelerated that dive.

No. The 1970s were much bleaker than today. In 1970, 6000 US soldiers were killed in Vietnam in just one year and unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. was loosing the conflict despite massive bombing raids on North Vietnam causing enormous civilian casualties. Contrast the exit from Iraq with the exit from Saigon and this pretty much shows you how different things... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by three blind mice at 4:42 AM on January 3, 2012

$5 for Metafilter - 100% worth it.
posted to Ask MetaFilter by Elly Vortex at 9:19 AM on December 23, 2011 marked best answer

He's worth more than a dot. He's worth the kind of truth he'd speak to power when others died.

I disagreed vehemently with Christopher Hitchens, especially in regards to using ground troops to bring about societal / cultural change. It was profoundly neo-imperialist, wrongheaded move, absolutely lethal to many, many innocent people. He provided perhaps the most damning intellectual underpinnings for starting the wars that we are only now winding down.... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by markkraft at 11:18 PM on December 15, 2011

Often wrong, but never boring. RIP, sir.
posted to MetaFilter by Rangeboy at 9:09 PM on December 15, 2011

The Cameron example you give is not, really, an example of mindfulness but rather of a person who has many years of experience in thinking critically, being in the public eye, etc. He's merely providing his own gloss on the quality of the question, either as a way to pause before answering or to honestly express amusement, or both.

What gives me pause is your fundamental misunderstanding of mindfulness, namely that there are 'tools, techniques. . .devices' that can be... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by gsh at 6:02 AM on November 26, 2011

Mindfulness, I think, is something you practice rather than something you acquire. I agree with others that David Cameron doesn't seem what I recognise as mindful - I think he is shrewd and tutored. Part of mindfulness means that you become aware, and this allows you to be more empathic and compassionate.

I first came across mindfulness when I was coming out of a period of heavy depression through therapy and reading - not a manual, but just reading a variety of books... [more]
posted to Ask MetaFilter by iamnotateenagegirl at 2:05 PM on November 26, 2011 marked best answer

I live on Natoma St, one of the two alleys between Howard and Mission, just west of 6th st. So basically right in the middle of "the hinge." (I like that name quite a bit, I'd never heard it before.)

When people ask me where I live and I tell them, I invariably get one of two responses:

1. They give me a sort of pitying look, assuming that for some reason or other, I had no choice but to live here.
2. They laugh, in that way... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by roll truck roll at 4:20 PM on November 4, 2011

Eventually the Occupy movement will need to be specific about how it wants to change the world. But for right now, it just needs to grow. And if it wants to sleep on the streets for a while and not structure itself into a traditional campaign of grassroots organizing, it should. It doesn't need to tell the world what it wants. It is succeeding, for now, just by being something different.

To digress and then return.

Last week, there was a march of... [more]
posted to MetaFilter by nickrussell at 12:20 PM on November 13, 2011