Sideblog Archive
August 30, 2021
someone forgot to tell like 99% of the human race this is going to happen to them ... flug with some great information about presbyopia in the What is up with my glasses? Ask Me thread
August 24, 2021
Joe in Australia on why beavers are fish in this super fun thread on Defector's ranking of state flags, included mainly because the comment contains the phrase "born through supernaturally heteropaternative superfecundation," which, iirc, we are legally obligated to include on the sidebar should it ever appear on the site.
August 23, 2021
Algorithms are great *but* don’t go to any guilty pleasures or allow any other person to use your account, unless you want those choices feeding into it. I don’t know a way to come back from the pollution of one’s algorithm. (I found *great* new bands until I allowed this to happen) – cotton dress sock: Lots of interesting tips, recommendations, and suggestions on the How to find new music I like Ask Me post.
August 21, 2021
"something disturbing to raise your spirits": GenjiandProust's Increasingly Strange Stories for an Increasingly Strange Year is another faboo roundup of weird audio dramas, again with tons of info and links to each one ... And for yet more weird and wonderful, PussKillian has posted NPR's excellent list of the best Science Fiction and Fantasy books of the last decade. Cheers! 👾
August 19, 2021
How do I love thee in the aughts and beyond? pleasebekind asks, "Can you recommend any contemporary love poems or poetry collections? ... I would really like to read more works by women and queer poets, as well as poets of colour. I love when the ordinary life is being talked about, or when the poem doesn't make you think it's a love poem in the beginning. Interested to read how other poets write about the erotic, of the body, being a woman, being human. Or perhaps distances/geography. Or identity. Kink also okay or self-love."
August 18, 2021
Speaking as an author here: I hate Goodreads and want it to die. — cstross in bitteschoen's post on Goodreads’ problem with extortion scams and review bombing
August 17, 2021
Oh, look, the new Mefi newsletter has a name! And a second edition! Whee! 📰
Also, the latest Metatalktail Hour asks members to tell the least plausible story about yourself, and it's so, so great. 🕴🏼
Also, also, don't forget, it's the second theme week of August fundraising month, and this time around, we want to see some sweet, sweet art (any interesting art that you like, in any medium). Search tags for "sweetart" to see what people are posting, and/or tag your art-themed post with "sweetart." 🍭
August 16, 2021
Weird Science theme week has ended (see all the excellent weird science posts here!), and for the second theme of our August fundraising month, Sweet Art week has begun! Please help us make a spectacle of ourselves by posting all your favorite arty sites, works, and stories. 💖
August 15, 2021
Bookfilter: Magical Economies. miles per flower asks, "I've recently enjoyed a couple books that dive deep on what magic costs — Sanjena Sathian's Gold Diggers and Naomi Novik's A Deadly Education — and I'm looking for more to read along those lines: detailed mechanics and economic systems, with magic as the currency and thoughtful attention to economic metaphors. Suggestions?"
August 14, 2021
Not so Paleo, actually: clew's post Stones speak and ashes live explores recent archeological research and evidence that "shred the long-standing idea that early people subsisted mainly on meat."
August 13, 2021
Water in my NYC apartment tastes funny. How to test it? I'm a drinking water scientist and this is what we suggest to customers having water quality issues...
August 12, 2021
I'll put it bluntly: modern cooking is a social dick-measuring contest: Kadin2048 has an intriguing comment about the "fixation on cooking at home as a moral good" in theora55's post on Ultraprocessed Foods.
August 11, 2021
"All Killer, No Filler": Slinga has posted the perfectly wonderful 45 minutes of Funky Old Japanese Soundtracks to chill out to, and we love it.
August 10, 2021
Today in Weird Science!: A handy guide to the rocks and minerals of Minecraft, teensy little cannibals who eat their own siblings for survival, and hot, hot, sweaty manikins.
(Hey, it's Weird Science theme week during our August fundraising drive on Mefi!)
August 9, 2021
Theme Week: 📈🚀🔬👩🏽🔬👀⁉️ We're having theme weeks as part of our fundraising month, and the theme for this week is WEIRD SCIENCE! (tag your post with, or search tags for "weirdscience") Also currently in Metatalk, Show Us Your View!
August 8, 2021
Things you were wrong about: soylent00FF00 says, "I've learned that I was wrong (dead wrong!) about a couple of scientific "facts" that I had assumed were kind of "general knowledge" (for a certain nerdy sciencey kind of person), and asks, What sciencey general-knowledge "truths" did you (and presumably "everyone") believe in, that you realized were not true?
August 7, 2021
This stuff is crazy, it's like someone found a alien spaceship in the desert and hooked the warp engine to its own tailpipe to answer questions about the universe. — RobotVoodooPower. Cash4Lead has posted Alien Dreams: An Emerging Art Scene about AI generated art based on text prompts, and mefites have been dipping a toe in.
August 3, 2021
What if MetaFilter...but email newsletter? Well, we've started one and here's the first issue. Discuss and brainstorm and etc. in this MetaTalk thread.
When I hear a chipmunk chucking I look for the nearby raptor: Lots of lovely, fascinating, relatable, inspiring, unusual, surprising, curious, strange, and amusing insights in this Metatalktail Hour post wherein wittgenstein asks "What do you pay attention to/notice as you wander through the world that I probably ignore?"
August 2, 2021
Hey, folks, it's time for a fundraising push! MetaFilter depends primarily on member and reader funding to operate, and that's even more true over time as advertising revenue continues to decline. Your new and increased subscriptions and one-time contributions are what will make it possible for us to continue to operate as the actively moderated community website we've been for the last 22 years and counting.
brainwane has a couple of great posts up about ADHD: The World Federation of ADHD's International Consensus Statement of 208 Evidence-based conclusions about the disorder, and "this was like discovering DNA", about David Cain's (Raptitude) ADHD diagnosis.
August 1, 2021
Heyyyy, it's episode 175 of the MetaFilter Monthly Podcast with cortex and jessamyn!
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