What does a contact do?

July 14, 2005 5:58 PM

More FNG questions: On my Profile page, I see contacts listed. Or rather that people have listed me as a contact. It looks like an addressbook sort of thing. What does this mean? What does a contact do? How are these used? Is there a contact etiquette? I searched the wiki but couldn't find anything (maybe because I couldn't guess the magic keyword.)
posted by warbaby to Etiquette/Policy at 5:58 PM (14 comments total)

It was a first stab at doing something social software like with the site.

Look at jonmc's contacts page.

You see who he links to and who links to him. Below all that you see all the posts made to the three sub-sites by people he listed as contacts.

I hope to do more stuff with the contacts stuff later on, like let people you have mutual contact with add tags to your posts. I could also work up a page listing all the recent comments from your contact list as well.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 6:06 PM on July 14, 2005

I'm a pretty new user. I couldn't figure out what it was for either. I linked to a couple of people just to see what would happen.
posted by Carbolic at 6:58 PM on July 14, 2005

I was going to get up on one of my wobbly wonderchicken hobbyhorses and rant a bit about 'social software' but I decided it wasn't worth it. Thank me later.

I linked to a couple of people just to see what would happen.

To borrow some SA-speak, e-penis++ is about it, at least at the moment.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 7:20 PM on July 14, 2005

So these are (tagged) links to other users. And the choice is whether to link, and if so, which tag to choose to apply to that link?

Then the links become the basis for a query on posts by username?

Is there any way to alter the scale at which the resulting report is viewed, like a summary / detail mode?

*imagines he's got it*
posted by warbaby at 8:01 PM on July 14, 2005

or to alter the reports sort order by username, date, whatever?

*wants pony*
posted by warbaby at 8:03 PM on July 14, 2005

people have listed me as a contact. It looks like an addressbook sort of thing. What does this mean?

Isn't that what Homeland Security wants to know?
posted by R. Mutt at 8:45 PM on July 14, 2005

I always figured the packet sniffer they installed at my ISP answered that question for them. Is this the etiquette I was asking about?
posted by warbaby at 8:50 PM on July 14, 2005

I could also work up a page listing all the recent comments from your contact list as well.

This is something I've always wanted.

(Also, I imagine e-mail's pretty useless as a way to contact you, but there's some kind of bug preventing me from editing my user page. taz tried to help me to no avail. If you ever have time to look at it, I'd appreciate it much.)
posted by melissa may at 9:21 PM on July 14, 2005

warbaby: Just go to someone else's user page (not your own) and click on "add USERNAME as a contact" and then on the next page select a few radio buttons and then click "add contact." Then when you are back on YOUR user page you can "View contacts and contributions from contacts" and then it may be clearer (don't forget to scroll down to see the contributions of the contact you added). This has nothing to do with tagging the way ask mefi and metafilter posts do.

Good luck.
posted by terrapin at 4:27 AM on July 15, 2005

It's the Metafilter equivilient of wearing a green polo shirt. Link with care.
posted by stet at 8:52 AM on July 15, 2005

so there is an etiquette, but it's an unspoken thing?

I guess I was wondering if people linking to me entails a social obligation / exchange on my part and if I was perceived as rude because I hadn't done anything in return.
posted by warbaby at 9:43 AM on July 15, 2005

Nah, most people don't pay any attention to it. If you feel like it, link to people whose comments you enjoy reading; there's no obligation to link to anyone just because they link to you.
posted by languagehat at 9:48 AM on July 15, 2005

Wouldn't it, like, be easier if everyone just wore those string friendship bracelets and, like we each had our own color and, like, we all wore our hair the same color on Mondays, wouldn't that be just cool?

/or not
posted by HuronBob at 10:07 AM on July 15, 2005

So maybe we should have something using this method of showing social networks?

This would be cool if the relative distance between comments in the same threads was used to weight the links.

*continues to dream of ponies*
posted by warbaby at 1:16 PM on July 15, 2005