Simon Willison’s Weblog

Time to revisit your 'no closing older threads' policy, I'd say...

Dave S. - 23rd August 2004 15:13 - #

I’d love to see the search terms that are getting some of these people to you. “Gmail invites” is easy, but what about the others?

Why do you keep these old threads open anyway? It’s pretty clear they’re not going to improve.

Rory Parle - 23rd August 2004 15:57 - #

You think you have it bad, huh? http://www.kryogenix.org/days/famous

sil - 23rd August 2004 16:04 - #

And the points about closing older threads are certainly valid. Every time I see my "rich and famous" thread, as mentioned above, I think about shutting down older threads; I get very little in the way of extra stuff. Once in a while, though, someone posts something valid; I've thought about comment moderation if the thread is over a certain age, but doing that in pyblosxom is awkward, and I don't want to just give up and move to WordPress like a pitiful sheep :-)

sil - 23rd August 2004 16:06 - #

hehe sil... "I ame sory that is not my fone i mesd up it is 6104734732 sory sory..." (snip) Classic funny :-)

Richard@Home - 23rd August 2004 16:18 - #

I'm inclined to say leave them open - it acts as a wonderful reminder of the human potential for stupidity. However, that said, I'm not the one whose bandwidth, webspace and CPU time it's consuming ;)

Fatty - 23rd August 2004 16:30 - #

Being reminded that people that stupid actually exist is chilling. It starts off funny, then becomes annoying, then quite depressing.

Darren - 23rd August 2004 16:33 - #

Crikey, that gmail invite post is still getting comments? I bet you'll still be getting them after gmail actually goes live and anybody can register. I had invites going spare at the time, but I didn't waste them on anybody posting there - after all, an email account is useless to somebody who can't read, surely?

When I read posts like that and the famous "how to be famous", I swing from amusement, through amazement, to despair and back again. It's like the September That Never Ended, except focused into one single web page. I could probably avoid the despair part if I could kid myself that these were all non-native English speakers with a very tenuous grasp of English - but they aren't.

I agree with sil for the most part, but maybe per-post filters could fix this? Have keywords associated with each post that, if included in a comment, automatically requires that comment be moderated before becoming active.

By the way, Simon, do you realise what kind of google juice this post will get? You have "have a gmail invite", "hack your email", and "hotmail inbox". If anybody links to you, they'll probably use those terms as well. Oh, and I just used them too. Bring on the moronic hordes...

Jim Dabell - 23rd August 2004 16:33 - #

Closing older threads would certainly fix the problem - I just can't bring myself to hack on my blogging system any more (it's old, crufty and unpleasant). When I finally get around to the WordPress upgrade I've been promising myself for months I'll start closing things like that off. They're pretty funny though.

Simon Willison - 23rd August 2004 16:33 - #

My favorite quote from the "rich and famous" post is: "yo i want to be famous be ryich and stuff like that like an actor or raper or a wrestler"

Daniel Talsky - 23rd August 2004 17:55 - #

OMG, I can't believe all of the comments. I had a post on my site stating I had some invites, but I have yet to really have any comments on it. I don't have anymore invites now but I was surprised I only had one person asking for one, and he didn't follow my directions.

Mike Wills - 23rd August 2004 18:11 - #

pls help, i want to be rich and famous using gmail invites to hack my hidden hotmail inbox... pls call me at 8675309

Jenny

Jenny - 23rd August 2004 19:30 - #

Wow! I was just setting up a turn-off-comments-on-old-posts script for my weblog when I read this. Now I'm thinking I should leave them turned on in the hopes of getting free entertainment...

Michael Moncur - 23rd August 2004 19:40 - #

dear threads, you r soo funny and witty!!! i wt 2b jut like u. will you pls pls pls have thrds on my mums website???????? ?!???????!!????!!! dont worry about simon!!!!!!!!!!!! hes just a snarky cause every1 talks to his blog subjex + not him nemore!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i promis 2 b nice to u. mums site is on the internet. we are with bbuinternet but do not worry cos i get 65k modem if i can seel my cat soon pls plspslplspls pls. p.s i ca ngiv u g-email invites.

Alan Green - 24th August 2004 04:11 - #

Do I win a Gmail invite if I post using Semantic HTML for this thread instead? I've always longed to have one (LOL).

Seriously though it's got to be one of those classics where marketing has caused so much hysteria that all sorts of people come crawling out of the woodwork in the attempt to obtain a glorified e-mail client/service.

I suspect most of them don't honestly know why they are asking for the account other than they've heard you have to be invited so they presume it must be something exclusive and good.

It's worrying stuff.

Robert Wellock - 24th August 2004 12:21 - #

Haha, now you're boosting the pagerank even more. Like Jim said, you have "have a gmail invite," "hack your email," and "hotmail inbox." That MSN sucks one is funny too.

Tom - 25th August 2004 09:03 - #

Oooo your giving free gmail accounts away? Got any left? oo teh wit :D

Tim J - 25th August 2004 13:41 - #

I'm gonna be famous because i got a Gmail invite but now i can't login to my inbox.

mort - 26th August 2004 10:20 - #

Here's a frightening thought: do you realise that if you'd ask in your comment form for sensitive info like hotmail addresses + passwords, a hell of a lot of people would happily post them?

mort - 26th August 2004 10:27 - #

re: GMail, I can't quite make out what the fuss is about. I hate trying to read email on a web interface. I used to have a couple of web accounts, but they were throwaway accounts used to shield my real email account from spam.

Brian - 28th August 2004 07:02 - #

rotflmao That Gmail invites thread is beyond funny. Sorry, Simon, but it's like comedians say, there's nothing funnier than watching anther comedian eat it on stage. I suppose this is the blog equivalent. I've now moved on to the hotmail thread. Ooh boy, this is gonna be fun!

Brian - 28th August 2004 07:25 - #

One gmail invitation for the first guy contacting me :)

Eugenol - 28th August 2004 15:30 - #

Thanks for keeping it simple and real!! Please send me an invite if you still have one.

Guru Rao - 30th August 2004 05:27 - #

One Gmail invite for the first person to commit online suicide whilst using this site.

Chris Beach - 30th August 2004 17:11 - #

looking for a gmail invite, thanks

Mr Smity - 2nd September 2004 22:45 - #

LOL

Lewis Henshall - 5th September 2004 05:13 - #

If you really want a Gmail account you can buy them for $2 for this site! http://gmail.head-nod.com/ [p]It's quick and easy, that's where I got mine!

Johnny Gmail - 19th September 2004 10:08 - #

my problem is i have to talk to my childern they arein pakistan.that e-mail likeworld_04@hotmail.com can not add me and they cannot chat with me . plz do some thing.that we can do. iam soooooooooooplz for that .do something .

a.w.moughal - 31st December 2004 02:11 - #

Hi Could you please send me a gmail invite Thanks West

West - 26th June 2005 02:19 - #

i need an invtie to gmail

Sasha - 28th June 2005 16:36 - #

I really want gmail acc

potatolay - 27th July 2005 10:21 - #

I really want gmail acc

potatolay - 27th July 2005 10:25 - #