Tagging Metafilter

March 29, 2007 7:50 PM

Is there any way of having an overlapping system of tags to categorize these MetaTalk posts? So for 'feature requests' that could be a sub-tag of either the 'Metafilter', 'Ask Metafilter' or 'Metatalk' tags. So when I want to see what is being discussed about improving Ask Metafilter I start by selecting that tag and then start clicking the sub tags to get more specific. Finally, the reason I am asking is because I am concerned about the flooding of questions on AskMe and the thing I would do is have a separate section for technology questions as those questions seem to be at least 50% of all questions asked. Cheers.
posted by GleepGlop to Feature Requests at 7:50 PM (11 comments total)

AskMe is as helpful as you make it. MeTa, however, is a lost cause.
posted by mds35 at 8:06 PM on March 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

Seriously, I think that everyone needs to stop bringing thier bright ideas for saving AskMetafilter to MetaTalk.
posted by mds35 at 8:08 PM on March 29, 2007

On the other hand, mds35, it is precisely the place to bring 'em, so you're pretty much screwed.

But, yeah, the idea of splitting Ask into discrete categories has come up before and never gotten significant traction, GleepGlop.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:14 PM on March 29, 2007 [1 favorite]

Or how about being able to select which AskMe tags appear on your AskMe front page. That way you can see and answer questions for topics you are interested in. Because we all know that the likelihood of additional answers being posted after it drops off the front page decreases drastically. There are more members, the amount of questions being asked is going to continue to increase. Doubling the waiting period is just a patchwork fix. AskMe is one of the best resources on the internet. It is only going to get more popular. The system of having everything on one page is not going to last, so the powers that be might as well get used to that idea. It needs to be more web2.0 ified. I kind of feel like we're being treated like kids who dont know how we like our AskMe and we wouldnt know how to use it if the interface became more complex. I've always felt that Metafilter was slow to evolve and you just have to watch other sites like digg to see what changes are going to eventually come to metafilter from a mile away... tabs, tags, lets get on with it then! /ranty
posted by GleepGlop at 8:35 PM on March 29, 2007

Tagging Metafilter ... tags to categorize these MetaTalk posts? ... I am concerned about the flooding of questions on AskMe and the thing I would do is have a separate section for technology questions as those questions seem to be at least 50% of all questions asked. Cheers.
Did you write your question this way deliberately to confuse people (well, me anyway), or (surely not) do you not understand that there are separate sections of MeFi?
posted by dg at 8:41 PM on March 29, 2007

Or how about being able to select which AskMe tags appear on your AskMe front page.

What about allowing category url combos similar to the tagging system? ie http://ask.metafilter.com/category/18+17
(Because I'm interested in the religion and philosophy of clothing and fashion.) Then you could just bookmark your favorite combo(s).
posted by carsonb at 9:08 PM on March 29, 2007

Reading AskMe has become much easier for me since the ability to subscribe to the category RSS feeds for the categories I want and I don't read the other categories.
posted by achmorrison at 9:35 PM on March 29, 2007

I kind of feel like we're being treated like kids who dont know how we like our AskMe and we wouldnt know how to use it if the interface became more complex.

I think the larger issue is that any change to the interface creates an "I love it/I hate it" back and forth here on MetaTalk so we have to spend a fair amount of time considering interface changes that don't have major downsides. Digg works great for what Digg does, but the community uses that site much more than they have a hand in determining how it works -- I may be wrong here, but that's always been my opinion.

Offering RSS feeds and tag feeds and a fairly normalish HTML interface allow peopele to Greasmonkey the hell out of the place or only read what they want, but the front page sort of has to be the lowest common denominator part of that subsite because it's where people come from Google who are new to the site and it's nice if it makes sense for them at first glance.

As far as the request abotu MeTa itself, there's not so much traffic here that you couldn't just glance at all the questions in a day to see where AskMe was being discussed. It's still very much an open discusison topic, but that means maybe one question every week, not a few per day.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 6:18 AM on March 30, 2007

I agree with the philosophy of keeping the Ask index simple, but:

"...because it's where people come from Google..."

Is this true or an assumption? Aren't searchers finding the massive quantity of relatively static (on a per-URL basis) text in the questions themselves, rather than the relatively changeable index page?

I don't mean to question the idea of keeping things lightweight -- hell, I'd rather we tone down the fanciness, myself -- but rather to question the underlying assumption that the index is where virgin eyes are landing, and using that as justification for its design.
posted by majick at 7:00 AM on March 30, 2007

Greasemonkey is all well and good, but the proof is in the pudding. I realize that features have been added that allow people to find things more easily, but it doesn't change that once a question drops off the front page maybe one more person responds and thats it. This is a design flaw. Questions are dropping off the front page faster and faster with more members. Making waiting periods of extended length only makes people make sock puppet accounts. This isn't the right way to address this issue IMO. I don't know how much work it takes to implement things, but theres always the possibility of trying things out and then undoing them if they dont work. Of course people are always going to love it / hate it, but like I say the proof will be in the pudding, not in who yells the loudest. Look at whether more people are answering questions. Because I'm seeing a lot of questions these days that only get a few answers, and that's the point IMO that AskMe is broken. There are just too many questions that people see on the front page that its futile to start trying to help people unless you have something really really good to say. The thing I liked about the AskMe of old was that you could tell that since there were only so many questions, people were thinking about your question and trying to come up with something if nothing immediately came to mind. There was more of a collaborative effort to resolve the question and more discussion. I'm not seeing that much anymore. I think it won't take einstein to figure out how to get this to work, I just think its going to take some willingness to take a risk that is not really a risk because its completely reversible.
posted by GleepGlop at 9:05 AM on March 30, 2007

Some questions are more fun to answer than others, and some questions are worded better than others, and MeFi users are better equipped to answer some questions than they are others, so difficult or lame questions will still fail to get a ton of good responses whether or not they fall off the page.

I know you recently posted a very particular question that did not yield a ton of answers (sympathies & best wishes, btw), but I doubt that it was merely due to the fact that it fell off the front page so soon. It was so very specific and perhaps there are not many users here with the relevant experience needed to help you.

We have a ton of users which makes for a potential of smart answers, but it also means there are going to be a lot of questions from those same users.
posted by mds35 at 10:35 AM on March 30, 2007