MetaFilter

Been there, done that, the GRAR MRA crap started within quite literally minutes.

I've been around Metafilter in various guises for about ten years now and what you are describing has happened again and again and again. Given the general level of enlightened discourse around here it is surprising that the topic can't be done successfully, but for some reason it can't.

I think you'll find continued efforts to address the topic… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:03 PM on September 24, 2013

Yeah, except that his description was bullshit.

Point taken in this case, although I firmly believe the thread would have augured in regardless.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 11:30 PM on September 24, 2013

(Just to be clear I don't think that thread augured in badly, but I find it very frustrating to read in parts.)
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 11:32 PM on September 24, 2013

I'm glad to see the corner turning on the comments-mean-reader-engagement-means-success ethic on the news sites if for no other reason than the end of the "What do you think?" at the end of every article.

Really folks. I'm reading your article because I believe you have done research or have expertise in something. If I wanted to ask a random person I'd do that.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:23 PM on September 24, 2013

.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 9:28 PM on September 19, 2013

So I'm kinda wondering how this field got checked:

"My request requires community input and cannot be addressed by contacting MetaFilter staff."

I mean, isn't this exactly the sort of post that field is supposed to filter out?
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:36 PM on September 18, 2013

See Matt answer. Answer Matt answer!
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:50 PM on September 2, 2013

This is a strange call out. I suspect it's time to add it to the "someone was feeling pissy" pile and move on.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:51 PM on August 19, 2013

Oh, God. This is it. This is how it happens.

REMAIN INDOORS


TRY NOT TO THINK ABOUT THE EVENT
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:19 AM on July 23, 2013

Two wealthy what?

It's a Metafilter noun now. It saves us the trouble of typing "assholes", "privileged", "oppressors", "dickwads", "corrupt", "amoral", "Republican", "selfish", "greedy", "libertarian" and all of the other things that come part and parcel with wealth.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 9:47 AM on July 23, 2013

Thank you, good sir, for taking a noble and brave stand against the savage oppression of the wealthy. I salute you!

I believe in social advancement through sycophancy. Off to the country club!
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:28 AM on July 23, 2013

Pretty sure Americans have to do whatever rich people tell them.


Only if they want their biscuit.

(Which is a small piece of hard bread, not a cookie you limeys.)
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 6:21 PM on July 23, 2013

People in general are aware of the risks of reading the comments, I think - and Metafilter's comments are better than most places.

And yet not so good for my aunt, who in any case is often not entirely clear what part of what I'm sending her she is supposed to be paying attention to.

Like Blazecock Pileon I usually end up sending the links rather than dealing with the confusion, but I thought I would ask.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 1:08 PM on July 21, 2013

If you want to share links with people without the rest of metafilter then just send them the links directly. You don't need to have it published here first to be able to share stuff with people, that doesn't make much sense either.

Metafilter is at least nominally about the posts. The posts are often framed well and present the links in a sensible manner. There is value there.

If it were simply a matter of copy and pasting… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 2:16 PM on July 21, 2013

Alright, fine. Dunno why this is annoying me so much today.

You can change the post id in the URL below and it will show people a post. It ain't pretty, but it does have a professional white background.

http://tkolar.com/cgi-bin/mefipost?postid=130224

output for above

I reserve the right to fiddle with the appearance later on depending on the preferences of my aunts, uncles, grandparents,… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 9:49 PM on July 21, 2013

Thanks for the notes about Firefox, folks, I didn't know I could make it do that.

Unfortunately though my primary web reading platform is an iPad.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:52 AM on July 22, 2013

There is no topic so genial that someone on Metafilter won't be bitterly sarcastic about it. And it will frequently be in the first few comments as they can't read the article with all that snark waiting to come out.

Hanging out here it's easy to forget that a lot of people go weeks or months at a time without encountering sneering sarcasm.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 2:55 PM on July 22, 2013

I've decided that sneering is a good word in that saying it bends your face into the appropriate expression. It's the visual equivalent of onomatopoeia.

Are there other words like that? Do they have a collective name?
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 6:03 PM on July 22, 2013

Grin comes close I guess.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 6:04 PM on July 22, 2013

She responded to accusations of anti-semitism by pointing out that she was a Semite. Not that her view of the situation has to be the guiding star for her obituary, nor that a Semite can't engage in anti-semitism, but she did wade into the mess of her own volition so it doesn't seem out of place to talk about it in her obituary thread.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 4:04 PM on July 20, 2013

Anti-semitism means "antipathy toward Jews," not "antipathy of people of Semitic origin." Wikipedia actually sums the phrase's origin up quite clearly:

I'm sure she knew all of that. She was making a point.

As I said, she waded into the whole thing voluntarily.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 5:20 PM on July 20, 2013

So, as was suggested above, is entirely possible for somebody of a Semitic background to be an antisemite.

Given some of the definitions kicking around it is entirely possible to be a Jewish anti-Semite as well.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 5:22 PM on July 20, 2013

she's just muddying the waters and playing a semantic game to deny her victims a way to articulate their grievance.

She was not the type to muddy the waters or hide behind semantics. If I had to guess I would say her response was meant to point out that in her mind the Israelis were being anti-Semetic. (Note capital)
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 5:31 PM on July 20, 2013

I'm finding the idea that these threads are only for posting dots and building a little Internet shrine to be a bit tiresome.

It seems reasonable to move along then.

In my mind obituary threads should go for a day or wto before we break out the controversial stuff. Give people time to mourn and pay their respects and such.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 5:35 PM on July 20, 2013

:-)
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 6:07 PM on July 20, 2013

That's only because he has a sad devotion to an ancient religion.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 7:02 PM on July 20, 2013

Never correct other people online over grammar or spelling.

I wasn't. I was re-enacting Helen's failure to clearly present her position, and it looks like I did it pretty well.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:07 PM on July 20, 2013

the vast majority of people would not be able to find what people on metafilter think about this

And this is relevant to Metafilter why?
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:16 PM on July 13, 2013

I'm not looking forward to a new post, because the same few people will come in and start telling everybody how we can't know George Zimmerman was guilty

I can see where people who disagree with you would be problematic. Perhaps you could open a thread just for people who see things the same way you do. Blogspot will help.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:48 AM on July 14, 2013

It would be for things like Zimmerman, Snowden, DOMA, Google Reader, election threads when they happen, major disasters, etc. Call it NewsFilter.

It does seem like a very specific feature in that way.

If we're going to go the direction of special support for newsfilter it seems reasonable to reopen the discussion of giving it its own subsite. In terms of its special requirements -- particularly in the vastly disproportionate… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:52 AM on July 15, 2013

See, the thing is that there are plenty of conservatives around here who show up and are active in threads. Only a very few become lightning rods.

Perhaps that indicates that "conservative" is not the issue in play here.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 6:02 PM on July 15, 2013

You don't need to be a subject expert to recognize crappy writing.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 5:08 PM on July 9, 2013

And the $10,000 question . . . Reiki or no Reiki? And if yes did it leave you smeared with the unmistakably putrescent scent of pseudo-science?
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 9:39 PM on July 8, 2013

dontjumplarry write...
(someone who, perhaps, was going into the interview using all their own ideas, without help of the hive mind)?

To seize on that particular example, what sort of job do you have in mind where a superior candidate would be one who used strictly their own ideas?
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 8:05 PM on June 29, 2013

Since we're talking job interviews anyway, I want to share a good experience I had this week.

I've interviewed for a good number of software engineering jobs over the years. The formula is basically the same everywhere: sit in a room while somewhere between 5 and 8 people come in and spend 45 minutes a piece asking questions. Generally this involves them looking at the resume that was sent out two days before, that they printed out two minutes before, that they're… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:59 PM on June 29, 2013

I think efficient body disposal makes the world a better place.

That advice is also likely to leave tell-tale evidence all over the place so it does the service of getting a murderer convicted as well.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 11:02 PM on June 29, 2013

I thought the interview would be in a few weeks but it turned out to be yesterday. I got my email a couple of hours ago saying I didn't get it.

Bummer. One of those completely crushed me three weeks ago.

On the other hand I'm signing on at a different company today. Hang in there.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 1:33 PM on July 5, 2013

Has ignoring trolls every really been a successful overall strategy for stopping them?

Yes, actually. History is littered with "message" organizations that simply failed to get their message out.

In particular the yearly turnover on the Southern Poverty Law Center's hate organization list is immense. Organizations come and go but the only ones you know the names of are the ones that get press.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 7:56 PM on July 2, 2013

How can "history be littered" with something that, by your very own definition, has been kept out of the public consciousness?

Historians are a dedicated bunch. Bureaucracies leave behind an amazingly rich vein of information about social groups, although in truth they document a lot more births of organizations than deaths. In any case that information can be mined not only for successful organizations but also those that failed.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 10:23 PM on July 2, 2013

This doesn't actually speak to whether ignoring them is a decent strategy. Hate groups aren't disappearing because they said 'Well, nobody's listening to us, might as well pack it in.'

I'm thinking the other way around: if the group was gaining public attention it would be much more likely to attract new members and funding and thus to stick around more than a year.

I'm sure it happens occasionally, but I think… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 3:07 PM on July 3, 2013

Yowza, that's quite a journey! I'm proud to be associated with a community that could help you through it.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 6:39 AM on June 30, 2013

Hopefully this might also cut down on people making cheap comments early in MetaTalk threads along the lines of "What did the mod say when you contacted them?" Cuz presumbably they rejected that option purposefully in order to make the post, right?

Oh, you're *adorable*!
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 3:52 PM on June 18, 2013

There must be a way to work kittens and drones into a single post.

There is. But it's messy.

And AWESOME!
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 9:51 AM on June 17, 2013

Context, context, context.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 1:17 PM on June 13, 2013

There's really no general policy issue to be considered here other than "Answer the question that was asked."

The question that was asked said "While more science based stuff is preferred, I'm not adverse to a bit of metaphysical assistance if you've personally found it to be of use. "

At that point commenters are free to tell them that sucking on pennies while praying with geese really helped them out. The OP gets exactly… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 12:15 AM on June 13, 2013

only has a placebo effect

As a meme this really needs to be reconsidered. People flapping their hands and saying "Placebo effect! Placebo effect!" seem to miss the fact that plenty of people's lives have been affected quite positively by it.

If you're looking for scientific accuracy the placebo effect is a very important consideration. If all you want to know is if a particular treatment worked for a person, it's of little or no consequence.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 12:20 AM on June 13, 2013

everyone else has essentially added him to some kind of Wall of Infamy

This is pretty small stuff by Wall Of Infamy standards. No, at the best what has been achieved here is "That Guy" status.

When you see a wall of text and glance at the username to see if its worth reading? If its That Guy you move along.

If someone makes a frustrating or antagonistic comment that needs a response? Flag… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 11:42 AM on June 9, 2013

If anyone could recommend a pie that goes well with vanilla rooibos tea, that would be lovely and thank you.

I'd say a very good pumpkin pie with fresh whipped cream, but only if you're willing to share.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 2:13 PM on June 9, 2013

misha wrote...
You were not getting deleted because you were wrong, but because what you were arguing had no place in the context of the thread.

I feel like if only the difference between talking and communication were clear to people that much strife could be avoided.

Communication is only achieved when the listener can hear the message. That means speaking up at the right time, in the right context, and in the… [more]
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 2:25 PM on June 9, 2013

This intrusion of British English into a primarily American English website must come to a full stop.
posted to MetaTalk by Tell Me No Lies at 11:04 AM on June 9, 2013