- 12:04 AM
- 09/24/20
I think it sometimes works for me in Chrome. I'd like to know who it is working (or not working) for and what browser you use.
posted by rcade at 11:15 AM on May 29, 2018
My current circuit of places to look is the New York Times, Grantland, Sports on Earth, ESPN, Dave Zirin, King Kaufman and Deadspin. The last one isn't a good choice, but it sometimes gives me ideas of where to look elsewhere.
I could use some suggestions. A lot of my old places to check are gone. Canoe.Ca used to have a great page of hockey columnists with around a dozen writers, and I could often find stuff there.
I'd like to find a source for smart writing on soccer, particularly England.
posted by rcade at 10:48 AM on December 12, 2014
I like the idea of OEmbed support. I'll dig into that. Thanks.
posted by rcade at 10:35 AM on July 15, 2014
Good idea.
I haven't come up with a scoring scheme I like for the year-long competition, or how to account for players not always entering every contest. Perhaps the top 10 in each competition would accrue points, or a percentage based on your position and the number of entrants would be used in the calculation. So finishing 17th out of 34 would be the same as 10th out of 20.
posted by rcade at 06:14 PM on July 02, 2014
How does the site's traffic stack up to it's historical numbers?
Not well. I don't know if it was a Google algorithm change or some other factor, but around 4-6 years ago traffic stopped growing and began a decline.
We could use more front-page contributions, certainly, but I think there need to be other reasons to come here too.
I'd like to tie all fantasy games together in a yearly competition that ranks the best player across all of them.
posted by rcade at 02:18 PM on June 27, 2014
It's amusing and deflating at the same time to read this. If 10% of the people who post sports-related links on MetaFilter wandered over here, we'd have a thriving front page.
Though it is OK with me if SportsFilter remains a low-traffic hangout for the people who've been coming here for years, I would like to find ways to attract new users.
I enjoyed coding the confidence pool, and I'd like there to be some interesting fantasy games here that aren't already being done everywhere else. If you have ideas for this, let me know. I can write the PHP/MySQL code to make the games as automated as possible.
I have other ideas, but I'll start there. If anyone has things they'd like to see and do here, feel free to experiment.
posted by rcade at 09:48 PM on June 26, 2014
I added a link to the sidebar as well. Does anyone know the deadline time to get a team whose results will count for week 1?
posted by rcade at 10:31 AM on August 15, 2013
Good suggestions. The little word balloon next to every comment takes you to that comment in the discussion. Is that what you mean by linkifying it?
posted by rcade at 01:43 PM on March 31, 2013
Just stay away from The Unspeakable One and it should be fine. Yog-Sothoth works in mysterious ways.
posted by rcade at 11:44 AM on March 13, 2013
I thought we had the feature, but can't find the script. I'll put a new one up.
posted by rcade at 08:09 PM on October 04, 2012
The very fact that you said "They would work on you and most long-timers"- and yet still my comment was edited- says you don't actually believe that.
That's not true. Your comment was edited because that's been SportsFilter policy since day one and we adopted the policy from MetaFilter. We never considered another approach until you objected because it never was an issue with anybody.
We will stop making partial edits to comments.
As for deleting comments, we're still going to do that in the extremely rare instances where it's necessary. Websites that never do it become cesspools.
posted by rcade at 04:08 PM on September 07, 2012
... doesn't such editing violate the copyright?
My guess would be no. If a message board has the legal right to publish your comment, it has the right to alter or remove it. The situation is analogous to a letter to the editor.
posted by rcade at 03:04 PM on September 06, 2012
I have long felt that comments- here or at Metafilter- should almost never be deleted, except in unbelievably extreme cases where it is legally problematic ... Using gentle nudges will be more effective at moderation than comment deletion, without the side effect of angering the people who make up the site.
I used to share your "Freedom, man!" thinking. Then I ran online web communities for 17 years.
I think you greatly underestimate the amount of problems that bad-behaved users create for a community. Gentle nudges only work on reasonable, even-tempered people. They would work on you and most long-timers because you have respect for the place and the people here.
Some people don't have respect for sites like this one and MetaFilter. They just want to troll and enjoy the ensuing chaos. Others can't express an opinion without personal invective or bigoted opinions. Others are too angry about a subject or person to discuss them without a flamewar. That stuff has to be dealt with. Otherwise, the site will become a troll orgy and good users will leave.
As for you being upset that your comment was moved here, it was necessary to address your concerns properly.
posted by rcade at 02:56 PM on September 06, 2012
Given the dynamic that's made Yankee fans not want to post about their team because of the abuse, you've got no basis to complain when I come into a thread for the first time, see a bunch of haterade, and call it what it is.
I'm not interested in seeing any more discussions involving the Yankees turn into a meta-discussion of how SportsFilter treats the Yankees. That kind of discussion belongs in the Locker Room.
If you're not willing to contact us personally to deal with comments you object to, then the only place I want to see those concerns is here. Not in discussions.
posted by rcade at 01:57 PM on September 06, 2012
I guess I feel that rather than edit it, if you'd just followed up with a comment (in big bold mod font) saying "Hey, let's not do the pile-on and keep it civil" ...
Do people really like that approach? I think anything that calls attention to moderation tends to bother people. They'd rather see comments disappear than be told how to conduct themselves.
posted by rcade at 11:00 AM on September 06, 2012
SpoFi has a long history of shitty attitudes and behavior towards the Yankees and their fans.
I think that's a cheap shot.
Looking at the discussion here the night the Yankees last won a title, I think the way Yankees talk goes here has as much to do with their fans as their detractors.
I got my ass kicked six ways to Sunday for not discussing the game properly when my post was packed with in-game details. You didn't make a single comment about that game. Your only investment in the topic was to thunder at people for anti-Yankees bias. From my perspective as someone who does make posts, that's become the norm. Yankees fans are more likely to complain about how their team is treated here than to contribute posts and comments about the team.
This site is what people make of it. If you want something good to happen, encourage it with your own contributions. If you think people are engaging in "hater" behavior that discourages you from contributing, tell us. Gary and I will moderate this site to discourage that stuff and encourage people to post.
posted by rcade at 10:26 AM on September 06, 2012
Here's a recent comment from Jessamyn on MetaFilter that says they don't partially edit comments except for broken HTML and typos. That wasn't my experience in the early years of the site.
I would really love it if people could stop basing the emotional energy of their baseball fandom over how much they hate some team.
I can understand your ire when it comes to how people express their Yankees hate.
But getting no energy from it? If a franchise dominates its sports for as long as the Yankees, they're going to attract a lot of counterfans who are as motivated to see them lose as their own team win. As a Rangers fan, loving my team doesn't give me skin in the game through the World Series very often. Hating the Yankees, though ...
posted by rcade at 08:33 AM on September 06, 2012
Or did you mean here?
I meant here, and only in reference to partial comment deletions. I looked in MetaTalk to see if in-comment editing was ever discussed, but didn't find a thread.
I also think that if you're going to delete text and then reference it here as done above, you should quote it verbatim rather than paraphrasing it.
It's not a matter of being dismissive. There's no way to quote it verbatim. After the comment is saved again, the original is no longer available.
One of the reasons MetaFilter and SportsFilter are more civil than other sites is because of active moderation. Comments are rarely moderated here any more, but in the early years we doused a lot of flamewars using the technique you object to.
posted by rcade at 09:38 PM on September 05, 2012
It has been SportsFilter policy since day one to remove parts of comments that violate site rules. It doesn't happen very often -- when I did it today on two comments in another discussion, it was the first time in at least six months.
We don't note those partial edits, either. Typically, a sentence or paragraph is removed. This is a policy we adopted from Metafilter that has never generated any controversy, as far as I recall.
posted by rcade at 06:03 PM on September 05, 2012
I did, in fact.
Then it should have been obvious that the sentence was an accurate paraphrase of the reviewer's sentiments, not an attempt to editorialize. It doesn't say there's no doubt of Armstrong's guilt. It says the reviewer has no doubt. Big difference.
From the post: "After reading the book, no doubt is left in the reviewer's mind as to Armstrong's guilt."
From the review: "The Secret Race isn't just a game changer for the Lance Armstrong myth. It's the game ender. No one can read this book with an open mind and still credibly believe that Armstrong didn't dope. It's impossible."
posted by rcade at 10:40 AM on September 05, 2012
The Locker Room is visible to non-members too. The Fantasy Sports category page will show you the latest posts as well as the Locker Room did.
posted by rcade at 06:36 PM on September 04, 2012
I don't recall us holding results in the past, but it's not the standard at present.
posted by rcade at 04:16 PM on July 27, 2012
In the future would it be okay to do something like MetaFilter does and state "Locker Room" with a link to bring a side discussion here?
Yes. I added the ability today for editors to move comments from the front page to a locker room topic. We should discourage metatalk outside of the locker room.
posted by rcade at 03:12 PM on July 23, 2012
I get that child rape is one of (if not the) most horrible crimes there is, but rcade this seems to be your #1 issue on SportsFilter, Twitter, etc.
It's an important issue to me, but to put it in perspective, I've posted 150 news stories here and elsewhere the past 30 days. I post news when I think it's a big deal.
The four Penn State stories I posted on SportsFilter this month were about the release of the Freeh report, Paterno's secret $3.3 million deal, the statue tear-down and today's NCAA punishment. The only one I might have huddled, in hindsight, is the secret contract. The others are such big news I'd feel like we let Touchdown Jesus down to not have them here.
posted by rcade at 03:09 PM on July 23, 2012
It appears that Penn State was the subject of five front page posts in July and one in June.
posted by rcade at 01:51 PM on July 23, 2012
I get it, this is very upsetting, but it is only tangentially sport related at this point and all these threads are starting to feel like ax grinding.
I disagree. The story's the biggest one in the news at the moment, and ESPN is devoting constant coverage to it.
A punishment this severe against a college football program would be worthy of a post regardless of the reason, as would the removal of the statue of a sport's winningest coach no matter why it happened.
The reason this is getting so much prominence is because it could be the biggest sports story of the decade.
posted by rcade at 10:36 AM on July 23, 2012
I use Chrome and am not seeing any problems. Sounds like a plugin issue.
posted by rcade at 09:31 AM on July 16, 2012
Fenway is a strange place to play soccer. Where do you sit for the best view?
posted by rcade at 09:20 AM on May 30, 2012
It's true, bperk. And I'm fairly certain other members feel the same way and often hesitate to post because of just that.
I don't know what you and Bperk are so upset about, but it's been spilling into several discussions lately and it's a buzzkill. You're not being persecuted because people disagree with you. The fear of being banned or your opinions deleted because they are unpopular was completely unfounded.
Did everyone treat your side of the argument in a welcoming manner? No. Given the soreness of the subject, I'm surprised you expected that to happen.
posted by rcade at 05:17 PM on January 24, 2012
Kirk, Gary and I are glad to have Rick's help. With this move, I'm able to step back from moderation and focus on coding the site.
posted by rcade at 10:23 PM on January 19, 2012
I just checked out MeFi. Matt Haughey's a damn showoff.
What services and sites do you use that you would like to include on your SportsFilter profile? For me, it's Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus and Delicious.
posted by rcade at 07:27 PM on January 14, 2012
Me too. How does MetaFilter handle it these days?
posted by rcade at 07:07 PM on January 14, 2012
rcade: why did I have to add <br/> to force returns? When i didn't it all ran together. Same as in the previous round. WTF?
A comment in a discussion is not the best place to make a bug report. I didn't overlook it intentionally. The answer is that I don't know why the preview isn't matching the saved comment. I need to work on that code.
For now, I use this workaround (as I think you do):
Line 1</br>Line 2</br>Line 3</br>Line 4
I have been asking for years now for my 2005 Locker Room interview to be revived. I was under the impression that was doable. If not, than I apologise.
SportsFilter moved to this platform in an emergency. Our ColdFusion/Microsoft SQL Server app stopped working and I couldn't make it work no matter what I did. Our hosting service had major customer support failings at the time, too.
To save the site, I moved it to this platform -- after a few days when I borrowed my Drudge Retort code to get it online quicker. That was extremely unpopular. So I emulated the old site with new code and the existing site design to make it as seamless as I could.
Moving it to this platform required Microsoft SQL Server's XML export feature. There were bugs. Lots of line breaks disappeared. Some content appears to have been omitted.
Getting all of the archives fixed is doable, but it's a huge programming undertaking less likely to benefit the site than creating new features and fixing bugs. I can restore some specific things that are glaringly absent, if they exist in a backup, by hand.
... I don't participate because I don't like the posts that are here. I know I should do something about it, but since I don't feel a part of the site because of what I outlined above, I am uninspired to do so.
I hope that as you see improvements here you'll become more enthused. But there have been bugs fixed and minor issues addressed throughout the past year.
posted by rcade at 07:01 PM on January 14, 2012
I used to subscribe to the Monitor. It wasn't entirely free of religion, if I recall correctly. There was one Christian Science devotional article in each issue.
posted by rcade at 03:51 PM on January 14, 2012
I wasn't angry. I was just having some fun because you think I'm ignoring their voices, when I'd love to hear more from them and anyone else who feels strongly about the site.
If some longtime members are interesting in moderating the site, I'm open to that, but there isn't much need. Only 15 comments were deleted since Dec. 1. Where a new moderator could help is in deciding things like the subject of this post -- how much of a political tangent to allow in a sports discussion?
SportsFilter was once run by seven people who owned the site, but it wasn't seven people who did the work. People were busy. The three of us who did the work took it over.
Now I do almost all of the work -- which isn't a lot, except when coding is needed -- and most of the front-page posting. I've gotten a little punchy about questions regarding my style of posting, because I can't embody what everybody wants SportsFilter to be -- or remembers SportsFilter being -- as a single person. A community blog like this or MetaFilter requires a variety of strong and distinct voices sharing interesting and thought-provoking links.
I'm not going to knock people for not contributing more, because I think it's somewhat understandable. SportsFilter has stayed the same, while the web has changed. If you want to share sports links, there's now Twitter, Facebook and thousands of sports blogs. When we started, we were one of the only sports blogs -- and the first community sports blog. The excitement users had back then is in sharp contrast to the relaxed atmosphere here today.
One of my goals in the new year is to get back to coding the site, both to wipe out the last of the bugs and start adding new features again on a regular basis. As I do that, I'll look for ways to involve members who want to get involved.
I am aware that your bug reports are still open -- particularly the last few slash problems -- and I can't blame you for being bummed about that. If anyone here codes PHP and wants to be involved, let me know. The site is a Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP application. I would need some help figuring out source code repositories so I could share the scripts and incorporate outside submissions.
posted by rcade at 04:12 PM on January 12, 2012
Kirk and justgary, do you feel your voices are heard?
What are you getting at? Gary used to take the lead on moderation and Kirk on site design, but in recent years I've done more because I'm the guy running the server, paying the hosting bill and coding the site -- so that keeps me involved on a daily basis. I also post more links because my other gig at the Drudge Retort immerses me in news all day.
If there's some kind of coup you'd like to engineer, I keep a spare palace key in a fake rock by the front door.
posted by rcade at 12:42 PM on January 12, 2012
Are all three of you making decisions?
Sometimes. There isn't as much need to make decisions these days.
The reason I want to nip this stuff in the bud is to refute Dyams' premise that "posting White House/Obama crap as topics will often lead to this."
I agree with Beaverboard that "SpoFi members typically show a great deal of restraint when the discussion veers toward politics."
posted by rcade at 11:50 AM on January 12, 2012
There's some latitude here for letting a political discussion grow out of a sports topic. But if the association is thin, the discussion won't go anywhere good. I'm going to be quicker to kill tangents like that when they're a purely political argument.
Regarding another moderation issue, despite Debo270's kind words, I don't think we should have deleted the karma's a bitch sentiments from the Michael Philbin discussion. He had a serious criminal past. That's going to make some people view him unsympathetically.
(I didn't know about his past when I posted the link, because many media outlets weren't mentioning it. One paper even deleted those details from a story because of reader outrage.)
posted by rcade at 07:00 PM on January 11, 2012
Sorry I haven't responded, Gary. I wrote code to extend the time for locker room posts, but it doesn't work and I'm still looking for the bug.
The "///" problem has to do with escaping characters properly. Since it can happen on any script that runs the site, I have to squash it each time one pops up.
posted by rcade at 08:27 PM on November 25, 2011
Congrats on the kid, Jerseygirl!
I think SportsFilter's growth has slowed, but the football season has attracted some new members. Using everyone's first visit date, I can do a member count chart. I'll see what I can whip up in PHP.
posted by rcade at 08:31 AM on October 13, 2011
I think the Huddle helps the site. I want to tie it to Twitter so members who post tweets with a specific hashtag automatically post them to the Huddle as well.
posted by rcade at 01:25 PM on September 28, 2011
With 1,437 links posted here, I have an approach that's not going to change. People who'd like better links need to post better links and support the users who post them with comments and praise. Otherwise, you get lots and lots of me.
I post stories I think are worthy of attention using some provocative language to attract attention. I'm closer to lowbrow than highbrow, since I spend my workday wallowing in the news here and on the Drudge Retort where being fast is better than being smart. I can be a reactionary dope, an overemotional asshat and a save-the-abortion-rights-of-gay-whales liberal. I don't know much about some sports, but that doesn't stop me from arguing about them.
If any of these things are bad for SportsFilter, the community's designed to be self-correcting. Every member can post on the front page.
posted by rcade at 12:18 PM on September 28, 2011
Me too. And I'm starting a slow golf clap for TBH that I hope others will build on.
posted by rcade at 01:38 PM on July 12, 2011
Spammers have never gone to that much trouble here before. It is a bad omen. I knew it was a mistake to teach the rest of the world capitalism.
posted by rcade at 08:25 PM on April 04, 2011
Let's see how it falls out in the next couple weeks. I get the impression that it's supposed to work better than it does at the moment.
It would be a shame to lose Times links entirely, but if they don't let blog links through the paywall we may end up going that route.
posted by rcade at 09:07 AM on March 30, 2011
I think we're going to double the editing window to 20 minutes.
posted by rcade at 10:42 AM on March 15, 2011
Currently, you have 10 minutes to edit your own post or comment. The Pantheon has forever minutes.
posted by rcade at 01:09 PM on March 12, 2011
I've never designed mobile sites. If anyone can offer advice, I'll put one up.
posted by rcade at 09:28 PM on January 06, 2011
Though, I may be forgetting the Great Yahoo Member Influx of 2005. Was it '05?
'05 sounds about right. That's when we instituted the new member test.
posted by rcade at 10:06 AM on July 20, 2010
The blogging model we use here, borrowed from MetaFilter, relies on users taking the time to find and share great stuff. There's a relatively small number of users doing that -- 56 users have posted 288 stories the past 90 days, not including me.
If you don't think the subject of a post is "front page worthy," the proper response is to share the next thing you find that's front page worthy. It isn't to criticize a link that someone else thought was worthy.
The model doesn't work if users stop thinking it is worth their time to post something. The site will shift to an editor-driven model where you get links from me and a few other diehards with thick skin.
posted by rcade at 10:26 AM on July 19, 2010
Because I post so often, I wrote a script that deletes my front-page posts that get no comments after 18 hours. That link was picked up from MetaFilter.
posted by rcade at 01:24 PM on June 24, 2010
What are you talking about? Since that mom quit in a huff, the regulars went back to salty language.
posted by rcade at 09:45 AM on May 24, 2010
Auto-Login Isn't Working
Hmm. I've made a change to the home page. Let me know if this fixes the problem.