Thursday, March 1, 2012

MKM Open Thread (Mar 1, 2012)

Welcome to your MKM Blog open thread for March 1, 2012. Beware the Ides of March; drink Olde English the next few weeks.

Good morning, everyone. Nice work yesterday and thank you all for your patience as I continue to churn out less shitty content than I usually do thanks to the limits of iPad technology. Expect a bunch of stuff starting this weekend. Expect another few days of hilarious typos and sub-hilarious intentional writing until then.

Hey, here's a link to a YouTube clip to get you started.

26 comments:

  1. Annoying Guy Who Uses Deadspin To Remind Everyone That He Is A Liberal Just Like YouMarch 1, 2012 at 9:17 AM

    That YouTube clip promotes a welfare state. RiCk SanToRum is not amused!!1!11!

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    1. A Real Life ConservativeMarch 1, 2012 at 12:23 PM

      Am I allowed to hang around Deadspin? I've been around occasionally, and keep my politics to myself, but I'm afraid if anyone finds out, I will be shunned.

      Delete
    2. There are plenty of conservative commenters. Please come and be funny. Personally, I prefer when people of all ideological stripes try their best to make comments that are funny for everyone, not just for people who agree with them.

      Delete
    3. If you don't keep your politics to yourself (outside of DUAN, maybe), you'll likely find yourself shunned by a significant portion of the Deadspin audience/commentariat... and that's without regard to what those politics are, specifically.

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    4. @ ARLC

      I agree with Sharting. Every now and then people will make a political joke that will get a response, but that tends to be relatively infrequent. As long as you stay away from those and avoid the temptation to give a rebuttle, you'll be fine.

      If you make funny jokes, you will fit in well. It's really as simple as that.

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    5. @StF: That's a good point. Many people (myself included) have given in to the temptation to make jokes that pander to perceived ideological allies, but it's lazy and cheap and leaves everybody with a bad taste in their mouths. The best jokes are the ones that the most people can laugh at.

      Also: people tend to be defensive (understandably in the current insane climate), but, if somebody makes (for example) an Ann Coulter-is-a-disgusting-professional-troll-from-hell joke and it gets a bunch of +1s, you shouldn't assume that means that everyone who liked it is some flaming liberal. Likewise, if somebody gets a lot of love for a crack about Keith Olbermann being a pretentious, supercilious, arrogant dickweed, that doesn't mean that everybody who liked it is doing survivalist training in the Idaho wilderness, either. A good joke is a good joke, and everybody can laugh at a good joke.

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    6. That second paragraph was aimed at the Real Life Conservative, not at StF, who of course already knows all that stuff.

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    7. Perfectly stated, AOBTS. It really does come down to the golden rule in every situation -- "Be funny." I don't think politics need to be avoided, just as I don't think racist, sexist, or any other kind of jokes need to be avoided. Just realize that if you're making a comment with the purpose of anything other than "be funny," you're treading on thin ice. An unfunny liberal comment will be met with as much scorn as an unfunny conservative comment... neither one have their place at DS.

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    8. Annoying Guy Who Uses Deadspin To Remind Everyone That He Is A Liberal Just Like YouMarch 1, 2012 at 1:23 PM

      Most political jokes are about as funny as SarAh PaliN is smart!11!!1

      Delete
  2. R for L jokes, FTWMarch 1, 2012 at 10:07 AM

    I am waiting for the first "If Jeremy Lin pricks somebody, does he not breed" joke in WUD ... don't let me down, internet.

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  3. And now for some constructive criticism.

    I’ve been bothered by Tim Burke’s posts for a while. I find his writing to be poorly disguised trolling. Rather than bitch anonymously about it, I thought I’d explain why.

    Example 1:
    This post just serves to make a juvenile joke about an attractive young woman liking penises. Ha. Ha. If this were a pink commenter, it’d never be approved. If it were a starred commenter, hopefully they’d lose their star and take an involuntary vacation for a week.

    Example 2:
    Thin-skinned. If someone has the temerity to correct him, or post an alternate opinion, he gets instantly defensive. In this post, where he found himself on the wrong side of the first amendment, he doesn’t try to engage with his replies, and he takes the unheard of step of blocking the promotion of unstarred commenters.

    Example 3:
    Straight trolling. This early morning post about Mike Milbury & Jeremy Roenick is typical: a grabbing, sensationalist headline - Nearly Come to Blows - that doesn’t match the facts of the story. Watch the video - this was a heated argument, for sure, but these guys were in no way about to actually fight each other.

    There are a lot of really great writers on Deadspin, which is one of the reasons I visit. Burke is not part of that group. My point in writing this isn’t just to hate on Burke, but maybe to point out some things that could be worked on or changed.

    One man’s opinion.

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    Replies
    1. Sorry, links not working.

      1: http://deadspin.com/5862782/clearly-this-woman-loves-the-cocks

      2: http://deadspin.com/5886265/former-nba-star-tom-gugliotta-ejected-from-game-he-was-watching-from-the-stands-[update]?comment=47137910#comments

      3: http://deadspin.com/5889523/mike-milbury-and-jeremy-roenick-nearly-came-to-blows-on-nbc-sports-tonight

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    2. I agree with you. Admittedly, I don't keep up with all of Burke's posts, but the Gamecock one in particular has been the standard for absurd headlines at Deadspin. The "Packer Girl" post also came to mind as one that I thought was inappropriate, and sure enough, it was Burke's.

      http://deadspin.com/5871106/weve-identified-jilted-packergirl

      I know that the Featured thread is basically a bunch of folks disagreeing with me, but anyway I thought it helps establish a pattern of behavior. There's certainly a type of eyeball-grabbing post that is acceptable, but I don't think these are examples of that.

      Frankly, most troubling for me is the comment promotion thing. I saw that you said that in the thread and tried to do it myself, obviously to no avail. Do you know for sure Burke disallowed it?

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    3. I don't know for sure that he locked out the promotion, but I've never seen or heard of it before. I asked him about it but never got a reply.

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    4. The Real Phin, For RealMarch 1, 2012 at 1:05 PM

      Wait, one MAN's opinion? Who dictated this to you?

      Seriously though...well said.

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  4. Uh-oh. Someone's not too happy with Lionel Osbourne. For those of you who can't see the pink comment, it reads, "Takes a real man to try and sully a Coaching Legend by spitting on his grave...all from behind a keyboard. If Coach Wooden was alive, he'd probably take pity on you, and offer you a job."

    http://deadspin.com/5889516/reeves-nelson-lawyers-up-demands-retraction-from-sports-illustrated?comment=47516977#comments

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    1. I think "I take pity on you, and would probably offer you a job" will become my standard reply to people who disappoint me.

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  5. Do any of you all get irrationally irritated by lifehacker posts?

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    1. Universal Enveloping AlgebraMarch 1, 2012 at 1:57 PM

      Some of their articles - the ones pertaining to computer tips and software, in particular - can be useful. I generally ignore the general-advice, here's-how-to-stop-being-a-lazy-loser articles (which, for me, is a bit of a lost cause anyway).

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    2. Yeah, that's pretty stupid.

      [looks at desk]
      [sees literally dozens of loose bits of twine]
      [updates firewall on life]
      [looks at porn online]

      Delete
  6. This will probably be moved momentarily. But ... umm ... what?

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  7. Replies
    1. Now I'm even more pissed about this. I had that same Lintrain joke typed out that day, with Allen Iverson instead of MC Hammer. I laughed my ass off just now reading that absurd joke, but he's not getting a +1.

      / sour grapes

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