Adding year of release to Fanfare front page posts

May 4, 2024 8:06 AM

This has been asked before, in Nov 2022, when the site owner called it a "really good idea" and a then-current tech person said it seemed "uncontroversial and positive, so I'll put that on the pile of things to do." Is this still something the community thinks is worth doing? If so, any chance it could be implemented? It might increase engagement in an area of the site that could use it. I know I'd find it useful, anyway.
posted by mediareport to Feature Requests at 8:06 AM (55 comments total)

Mod note: This was originally requested during a transition period where we were figuring out the site's governance with the SC. I went ahead and asked frimble to proceed with the change and make a formal announcement once this is implemented. Thanks!
posted by loup (staff) at 8:08 AM on May 4 [21 favorites]

You're welcome!
posted by mediareport at 10:16 AM on May 4 [2 favorites]

I would like this.
posted by Glinn at 11:53 AM on May 4 [2 favorites]

I would like this too and I am glad to hear it will be resourced!
posted by janell at 4:46 PM on May 4 [2 favorites]

Yay!
posted by Lesium at 5:30 AM on May 5

Also yay!
posted by wenestvedt at 10:30 AM on May 6

I too would appreciate this.
posted by Faintdreams at 4:20 PM on May 7

While we are in there, can we do something with the URL ("a link to stream or purchase") field? I'm not even sure if that does anything currently.

If we could turn that into "Availability (A link to a page showing a place/places to see/rent/buy thjis film") and make it appear above the tags on the right, that would be very cool.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:13 AM on May 8 [3 favorites]

I thought I remembered someone asking for this a while back, and I've thought about following up a few times, but with all the transition planning I wasn't sure it would be well received. I'll be glad for this change to be implemented for sure!
posted by solotoro at 2:11 PM on May 8

Some other FanFare bug reports that may have fallen through the cracks over the years:

• The Watercooler page is inaccessible for screen readers and text browsers, because the poster images all have alt="poster" (in contrast to poster images on the FanFare Home page, where the alt text is the title of the work).
• It’s hard to find shows like All Rise by typing a title into the main FanFare search field. You have to use the separate “Search by title” field, which I always forget. Could the “Search by title” results be integrated into the main search results page somewhere?
• Speaking of that… In Firefox, typing a query starting with certain characters (like '6') into the “Search by title” input throws a JavaScript error (TypeError: a.value.replace is not a function) and causes the search widget to stop displaying results for any query until the page is reloaded.

posted by mbrubeck at 4:38 PM on May 9 [7 favorites]

with all the transition planning I wasn't sure it would be well received

I had the same thought. It took a follow-up email to get this to the MeTa front page, but I'm glad it's apparently now happening.
posted by mediareport at 5:36 AM on May 10

yay!
posted by Faintdreams at 3:37 PM on May 10

Why did it take a follow-up email to be approved? Didn’t we just talk about this?
posted by hototogisu at 3:23 AM on May 11

Mod note: Just chiming in to note that loup won't be back on duty until Monday afternoon, so please be patient in the meantime.
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 8:57 AM on May 11

lol it's certainly not urgent, but it did strike me as odd after the recent discussion of how rapidly questions get posted. I don't think I sent it in on a weekend, but perhaps I'm wrong. Still, it would have been nice to get an email explaining the delay to let me know it had at least been seen.
posted by mediareport at 5:39 AM on May 13 [1 favorite]

Patience is a virtue, but…you know.
posted by bowbeacon at 4:14 PM on May 14 [1 favorite]

This thing on?
posted by bowbeacon at 11:23 AM on May 15 [2 favorites]

Look, I have been polite in previous threads that got absolutely no answers that people had specifically asked for, before. I have tried to be polite with 2 days of pings in this thread, where loup was specifically called into the thread, a timeline was set by another moderator, and it was an easy to answer question.

It is now THURSDAY. Gently, what in the name of actual fuck is loup even fucking doing out here? This is insulting, it's gaslighting, it's fucking disrespectful as hell to the members who fund this site to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars a month. Loup should be ashamed of themselves, and the Powers That Be should be taking action to relieve loup of their duties? We're really pretending that someone is fucking auditing the "tone of the site" to make sure it's all written in the same voice? Fuck that, the administrator is stealing from the users and not doing a god damned thing.

With kindness, I have to just fucking call for loup's immediate resignation. What the fuck? There have been 15 comments in Metatalk in the last week, 2 of which were me pinging this thread to get someone an answer. Why does loup not have an RSS feed of these FIFTEEN short posts that they can read and respond to when they're on duty? This is fucking ridiculous, and I am done being polite about it.

Loup, answer the fucking question.
posted by bowbeacon at 6:24 AM on May 16 [19 favorites]

That's a pretty nuclear reaction there mate, cool those jets!

I mean, I do find it odd that anyone who casually checks the blue/green/gray once a day as a distraction from work is somehow way more on top of what's going on on the site than some of the paid staff. But there's a way of making that point...
posted by Klipspringer at 6:51 AM on May 16 [4 favorites]

I've made that point the last 5 times this has happened.
posted by bowbeacon at 6:52 AM on May 16 [5 favorites]

That same point has also been made by multiple other people including myself many multiple times. It never gets a response. The site admin is too busy with self-assigned busy work to admin the site. It's absurd and is the primary reason I won't donate to this poorly-run, for-profit business.
posted by donnagirl at 7:50 AM on May 16 [22 favorites]

Why did it take a follow-up email to be approved? Didn’t we just talk about this?
MetaTalk posts get generally approved within the same day. In this particular case, I reached out to frimble before posting it to confirm how doable it was, how many hours they would estimate for the work to be done, etc.

As soon as I had all the necessary information I went ahead, approved the post and added a comment. Then I saw the follow up email.
posted by loup (staff) at 9:11 AM on May 16

Mod note: One comment above left standing for context. Our Guidelines and Content Policy are not optional so please remember to Be considerate and respectful and Speak for yourself, not others. Please refer to the Enforcement section of the Content Policy for reference.

posted by loup (staff) at 9:23 AM on May 16

I'm confused why Bowbeacon was banned when other users are allowed to post similar levels of vitriol (I'm thinking especially the Gaza threads). Inconsistency isn't a good look.

But that's just like my opinion, man.
posted by Jarcat at 10:15 AM on May 16 [8 favorites]

And still, loup, respectfully, the question remains why did it take from Monday to Thursday to respond to this thread? Agains, RSS exists, but frankly there are so few comments anymore that just glancing at the one MetaTalk page and using the (X new) markers, you could easily be more responsive to people who are invested in this site.

At this point, I'd truly almost prefer an honest answer along the lines of "I don't really give a $&"$&, my paycheck is small and my days here are numbered" than all this pointed ignoring of the requests/questions of the community you claim to value.
posted by donnagirl at 10:16 AM on May 16 [16 favorites]

I'm confused why Bowbeacon was banned

Who said they were? Profile is active.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:31 AM on May 16 [2 favorites]

@jarcat, I hope you understand we can only discuss the specifics of a moderation decision with the affected member directly. When it comes to I/P threads, we discuss them frequently as a team. Sadly, as I have mentioned in past threads, while we can moderate the thread and step in whenever the Content Policy or Guidelines are being overstepped; we can't change the root cause of the issue; that is, the fact that the people participating in the thread have different levels of involvement and stakes with the situation and even hold conflicting views among themselves.

@donnagirl, you're right it’s Thursday and there should have been an answer earlier. That being said, being available to users in MetaTalk is a part of my job, but it's not most of it.

This is one of the reasons why most of my interactions will be happen directly in the site updates. If there's something you, or anyone else, wants to talk about or want a direct answer to, you can always contact me or contact us directly and we'll get back to you way faster over there.
posted by loup (staff) at 10:42 AM on May 16 [2 favorites]

Appreciate the fast response, Loup, and I understand that you can't address the specifics of anything. I wanted to make my point but I'm not demanding or expecting anything of it.

DOT: I heard it from the source, that they were banned.
posted by Jarcat at 11:04 AM on May 16 [4 favorites]

Surely there's someone available to do this paid mod work who likes metafilter more.
posted by phunniemee at 11:14 AM on May 16 [32 favorites]

I'm glad that MetaFilter's staff seem to have reasonable priorities regarding what is urgent versus what might be important but isn't urgent, and are no longer running themselves ragged treating everything as urgent when it isn't. It's a much more sustainable model. Sometimes having to wait a few days for a response on things that are low urgency, and maybe even sometimes follow up with a check-in or a reminder, isn't such a bad thing, and maybe even a sign that the folks keeping our site running have a healthier relationship with work than what we frequently criticize about the culture of other organizations in our discussion threads.
posted by biogeo at 12:11 PM on May 16 [8 favorites]

Love a work life balance.

My perspective is this: is engaging with the community about community related topics a job duty of working for a community-funded community weblog? I would say yes. Especially when there has been one (1) MetaTalk post of that nature, by my count, in the past full month.

I suppose others may disagree.
posted by phunniemee at 12:18 PM on May 16 [16 favorites]

Ghosting by mods is also very inconsiderate and disrespectful and that should be taken into account both when evaluating a member's tone and when evaluating the mods in question.
posted by hypnogogue at 12:29 PM on May 16 [13 favorites]

What's that line I learned from Metafilter? The cruelty is the point. I'm sure I should do a Nelson laugh on my way out, but really I'm just sad for my beloved Mefi. It was a fun 19 years. Thanks, mathowie and jessamyn, and some of the coolest people I've never met. Party's clearly over. Even my last sock puppet is quitting.
posted by Eggs Benedict Cumberbatch Kids at 6:48 PM on May 16 [4 favorites]

It’s pretty funny to publicly button your sockpuppets. Like, how many times has the same person publicly buttoned?

But, in any event, the point I wanted to make is that interacting with the site membership is a big part of the job of mods/leadership and there just isn’t much of that happening anymore. I agree nobody should have to run themselves ragged keeping up with a lot of noise on MeTa, but that isn’t really where we are now, and the silence from mods over many days does not seem like a healthy relaxed attitude but more like not participating in any meaningful way.

In addition, the tasks that loup mentions seem pretty disconnected from anything that users are clamoring for. Literally nobody cares about inconsistent site copy. And thinking up a way to listen to trans people and then letting it “simmer” seems like something that would take about 15 minutes of thought. So, if it’s like - we can’t interact in MeTa because we are doing this other stuff - I would say let’s have less of the other stuff and more participation in the community.
posted by Mid at 4:13 AM on May 17 [13 favorites]

There are some really nice people in this thread that I like very much who are upset, so I am going to say what I say next carefully.

My understanding of how things work with our current staffing levels is that moderation is driven primarily by flags, but also by MeMails and the Contact Us form. On top of this, state of the site and likely-to-be-contentious MeTas are often read and monitored (though sometimes flags and messages drive moderation on those, too).

This is a MeTa that started off with a low stakes feature request that was immediately added to the workflow, people celebrating, and then only a relative few more comments. It is reasonable that this was not being monitored carefully.

I have no way of knowing if MeMails and flags were being sent, or if the Contact Us form was being used to draw attention here as well. My guess though, is that these methods were not used, because in my experience they typically get a response in an as little as an hour, and rarely more than a half day. There was a specific mod required to answer, so things would/could have moved slower, but still.

If the only attempts to get mod response to this question (which I will remind you the OP described as "lol, not urgent") were invoking their names in a low traffic thread, I would encourage you to consider that "Maybe you should have sent a MeMail or dropped a flag if you thought this was taking too long" is a clearer lesson to take from this than "Clearly the mods hate their jobs and hold us all in contempt." Even if those methods were used, for something this low stakes, you might have doubled down on trying other ways to nudge the mod before you decided to go nuclear.

Again: some nice people are in this thread who were not happy and I mean no disrespect. But as your neighbor here, I gotta say: I think a fair number of us thought this escalated in a weird and aggressive way. Like... you were freaking us out. I really doubt that is how you meant to come off, so that might be worth reflecting on. It really feels like some basic steps were skipped between, "One follow-up question, nbd" and "I demand resignations."

I don't know people's lives or the sum total of their interactions on this site. But it feels like this thread about years being listed in FF posts did not have to get this contentious.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:22 AM on May 17 [22 favorites]

Metafilter:

Loup: “ …please remember to Be considerate and respectful and Speak for yourself, not others.”

DOT: “ I think a fair number of us thought this escalated in a weird and aggressive way. Like... you were freaking us out. ”
posted by Bourbonesque at 10:20 AM on May 17 [1 favorite]

The problem with that as a gotcha is that I literally am speaking for other people there. We sort of fretted about the need to do that, and it ended up being me. I tried to be as nice as I was able. Several drafts were done.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:41 AM on May 17 [3 favorites]

DOT: I think one of the more toxic traits this community has is the focus we put on singular events/comments/posts rather than taking context into account. In this case, yes it does seem like an outburst that isn't warranted, but to people with more information/context it might feel like a valid reaction.

Trying to say gently, just because you don't see something happening doesn't mean there isn't a good reason for it (sorry not sorry for the triple negative). Also to add, I have a lot of respect for the emotional labor you put in to the community, for what that's worth.
posted by Jarcat at 10:43 AM on May 17 [4 favorites]

MetaTalk posts get generally approved within the same day.

And so I respectfully suggest, when that doesn't happen, as it didn't in this case, that you take 27 seconds to send a quick email to the poster, instead of just leaving them hanging for days with no explanation for *why* their particular question had not been posted, when you had recently assured everyone that 24 hours was the norm.

Do you really feel, loup, that asking that is unreasonable?

As for the rest of what happened since I last checked this thread, yow. I don't endorse that vitriol, though I understand the source.

That said, respect goes both ways, loup. This was a minor, uncontroversial feature request. You ghosting me on it for days does not count as respect.
posted by mediareport at 10:45 AM on May 17 [10 favorites]

DOT's comment speaks for me pretty well, I'll cosign. I appreciate his thoughtful and carefully-measured words here. It can be really hard to find a way to say things that people will read in good faith here, and I hope those who are upset with loup about this will understand from DOT's comment that there are other folks here who read this interaction very differently, and try to extend the presumption of good faith as we discuss this.
posted by biogeo at 10:46 AM on May 17 [6 favorites]

“
The problem with that as a gotcha is that I literally am speaking for other people there. We sort of fretted about the need to do that, and it ended up being me. I tried to be as nice as I was able. Several drafts were done.”

I mean, really? Why? Why are other adult people apparently afraid to individually say ‘yo, too much’?

What I hear is that users are now forming committees to workshop milquetoast replies to other users.

Stay gold.
posted by Bourbonesque at 10:56 AM on May 17

Perhaps they felt even the nicest possible reply would be met with snark and derision.

I'm gonna dip. Because I'm not actually a milquetoast person. I'm just someone who was willing to go to great lengths to be nice about what I had to say in this case, moreso than others even thought was necessary. My off-the-cuff answers are... not going to sound like that and the room is hot enough already.

So have a good weekend, everybody.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:04 AM on May 17 [6 favorites]

Why are other adult people apparently afraid to individually say ‘yo, too much’?

Oooh I dunno, maybe they don't feel like dealing with this kinda snark.
posted by ClarissaWAM at 11:21 AM on May 17 [6 favorites]

I was also in that discussion with DOT and slept until noon today or would have either said something myself or signed on to his comment earlier. Freaked out probably carries the wrong connotations but it's unpleasant and un-fun to read unhappy people yelling at loup for not responding to unrelated-to-current-topic complaints a low-stakes MeTa that was basically solved by the time it was posted.

What I hear is that users are now forming committees to workshop milquetoast replies to other users.

Nah, more like one person goes "wtf" and a number of other people also go "wtf". There was no plan, but DOT wrote something because he's a nice guy and now, yeah, a bunch of the people who also went wtf are showing up to go "hey yeah we think this whole conversation is weird" and in my case, speaking only for me "tetchy from some and kind of axe-grindy from others". And maybe my perspective is weird because I am literally facing a second potential cancer crisis in six months right now but I do wonder why people in MeTa are so fucking angry all the time? Because the world is full of big things to be angry about but loup not answering things fast enough in a solved MeTa does not seem like one of those big angry-making things.

I have been the angry person who someone offered a blunt at the show to get them to chill once. If we were at a show and I had one, I would be handing it to you all. Peace.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 11:33 AM on May 17 [4 favorites]

@mediareport, you're raising totally valid points, heard. Please accept my apologies for this, I failed to see the impact of my silence while focusing on getting things ready for the post to go through, and that was, sincerely, a mistake.
posted by loup (staff) at 11:41 AM on May 17 [5 favorites]

Thanks, loup. Probably a good rule to let users know what's going on when they send in a MeTa post and it doesn't get posted in the usual one-day time frame. Days went by with nothing at all from admins, which was weird and had me wondering what I'd done wrong (aside from misquoting jessamyn from that earlier thread lol). When I used the contact form to follow up, Brandon told me it had been mentioned in y'all's Slack but he wasn't sure where it stood and would check, which was helpful. Soon after I saw the post appear with your note, so thanks again for that.
posted by mediareport at 12:45 PM on May 17 [4 favorites]

Now we must move on to more important questions:

1. Do we need year of release for TV shows?

2. If so, should it go after the title of the show/episode, or after the, e.g., "Season 3, Episode 3" or "(Full Season)"?
posted by mediareport at 12:56 PM on May 17 [1 favorite]

1. Year of release can be useful for TV shows - see Dark Matter (2015) vs (2024).

2. Putting the year after the title of the show / episode would match the front page.
posted by Pronoiac at 2:14 PM on May 17 [2 favorites]

For TV shows, I think it only makes sense to include years if that is tied to the season/episode. I'm not sure that seeing "Doctor Who (2005-)" on the front page of FanFare for posts about the most recent episodes would be more clarifying than confusing.
posted by jimw at 3:29 PM on May 17 [2 favorites]

See what I mean? These are all *much* more important questions.
posted by mediareport at 4:36 PM on May 17 [2 favorites]

Does sharing things help lessen psychic damage? Let's find out:

The Simpsons (1989)
posted by Pronoiac at 8:41 PM on May 17 [3 favorites]

To address the derail that became an emergent theme of this discussion: it is my hope that a priority for The Next Metafilter, once the non-profit transition has occurred, will be rethinking what public engagement with site leadership about policies & practices looks like, along with how best to manage user expectations, in terms of what is reasonable to expect from mods and leadership broadly. I think there are not enough active users of MetaFilter left that one person buttoning isn't a significant loss, if we want MetaFilter to continue to exist as a viable discussion space. Something (or multiple somethings) about MetaTalk seems to generate discontent significant enough to cause MeFites to jump ship for good.

For myself, I will note that 90% of the time I have contacted mods and leadership using the "Contact" form, I have heard back in 1-3 hours. The exceptions, which I understand and fully forgive, are those days when mod coverage is very thin and the issue I was contacting them about was low priority, even to me. I am grateful that MetaFilter is here, and that it continues to function as a discussion space, a quarter century on. No other online community I am part of has had this longevity. <3

To address the subject of the post: I appreciate making this change a priority. I recently made a FanFare post involving a movie with several like-titled competitors, and I appreciate the idea of a future where they're automatically disambiguated. Thank you!
posted by cupcakeninja at 6:07 AM on May 18 [3 favorites]

@jimw - In that particular case, fortunately/unfortunately, the episode numbering on Doctor Who has been reset for a second time, so according to the various TV databases we are now on Doctor Who (2024-)
posted by jordemort at 6:49 AM on May 18 [2 favorites]

I'll say it: yo, too much. I don't even know what happened for resignations to be called for, etc. Seemed like a fairly easy-going thread and then BAM.
posted by cooker girl at 8:27 AM on May 18 [3 favorites]

I also thought yo, too much.
posted by whir at 7:12 PM on May 20 [1 favorite]