Slashdot Mirror
Slashdot Announces Idle Section
For the last few months we've been beta testing Idle.slashdot.org, our offtopic humor/meme/viral video/pictures section. Like many of you, we spend most of our waking hours on-line seeking stuff to entertain our brains, but most replicators out there pick so much content that it's incredibly boring filtering through the mediocrity to find the funny. We intend to fill our idle section with a very small collection of the very best the net has to offer, making it the most efficient way to waste your time. Some of this content will make it back to the Slashdot mainpage, but much of it will be new content that we wouldn't dare soil the precious Slashdot mainpage with. We are also using it as a test bed for new functionality on Slashdot — currently the page is a reasonably dynamic/interactive experience with various voting controls and filtering options. Finally you will see occasional original content, starting with a recurring special feature today where Samzenpus shares some real tech support email from some of our most intelligent readers. We hope you will enjoy wasting a slice of your day with us, and in addition will submit content through the usual channels, but put it into the 'Idle' section so we know not to take it seriously. Now go about your day — it's mid August, so I'm sure everything you do is urgent, exciting, and oh-so-interesting.
Translation: Porn, stupidity, and bugzappers.
I tried visiting idle.slashdot.org once. I was outright embarassed by the content. So much so that I changed my sig in response to Slashdot's, "Never visit idle.slashdot.org" teaser. My reply? "Good idea."
I hate to say this, but Slashdot does attract a lot of intelligent people. They're not always the ones who post, but they frequent the site anyway. Attempting to "entertain" the more intelligent types with the same sort of filth/LCD* they see on their television is a counterproductive goal. Slashdot and Slashdot-Idle cannot coexist.
Sorry guys, but it's time for you to go back to marketing school. Using brand recognition for a product that does not represent the brand will only devalue the brand. You may see short term gains on the new product, but in the end you will see long-term losses across the board. If you want to do something like Slashdot-Idle, try making a new site rather than lumping it in with Slashdot.
* If you don't know what LCD stands for in this context, you should turn in your geek card. Assuming you had one to begin with...
P.S. What's this fascination with making a Digg-like site, anyway? 95% of what's on Digg sucks. Stop trying to be like them.
P.P.S. Idiocracy was not a documentary. Stop trying to bring it about.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
That the CSS on idle.slashdot.org won't suck ass and/or be ass ugly? I'd really prefer that no ass be involved in the layout or design of the page.
11 was a racehorse
12 was 12
1111 Race
12112
Yes, you've already rammed it down our throat enough for us to hate it, now we can hate it even more.
It's not funny, it's not clever, and it's not even a good waste of time. It is pointless.
So will this turn out like 4chan /b/?
I demand moar pr0n source ftw! Rick-roll = sage!
Is there any difference between this new service and... Digg? (or XKCD because the best the net has to offer is already posted there.)
I have my worries about this, and I have no doubt that we all do here on /.. What I definitely do not want to see is /. becoming another digg/reddit/delicious. On the other hand, hopefully slashdot will be able to mold the content more so that it doesn't just become a "HERE'S ANOTHER FUNNY CAPTION PIC FROM 4CHAN" fest. Don't get me wrong, those things have their place and are sometimes humorous, but it doesn't fit the niche that is /.. Remember, the slashdot tagline is "News for Nerds" - not "Funny Image of the Day for Nerds".
/. staff.
With any luck, it will hopefully become something more along the lines of Daily Wtf, which still provides insight while remaining humorous. And in any case, congrats on rolling out a new feature for us
Not enough people post goatse or rick-rolling links in Slashdot, so we needed to dedicate an entire new area to it?
I look forward to all the lemon party and meat spin misleading links.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Order -> chaos /. -> #$%&*
The Slahsdot-subsidized return of autopr0n.net is only days away. Thank the gods!
will Slashdot get slashdotted?
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
If I want LOLcats, I go to Digg.
If I want Pseudo-Politics, I go to Reddit.
If I want to know about the latest announced Apple product, I go to appleinsider.
If I want to know about the worlds largest TV, I go to The Register.
If I want actual Intellectual articles with in-depth discussions, I come to slashdot.
Please don't ruin this for me.
-jX
Don't you just love politics? It's like a comedy of errors.
And judging by my test here of the idle page, not something I'll be trying until we "upgrade" to IE7 here at work finally :/
Damn I hate IE6...
The idle section looks horrible. Fix plz.
thinking CmdrTaco has hit some hard times? I mean, let us look back of the past few months...
1. No funny April Fool's this year.
2. Various off hand comments about stuff. (Java, Olympics, etc.)
3. Just up above he's kinda of an ass. I mean, some people are probably working pretty hard. I know End of Fiscal year for some people is going on.
4. I dunno, maybe getting tired of being squeezed by other sites like reddit or digg or other stuff?
Anyone know more or want to spread light on the matter?
import system.cool.Sig;
I'm not trying to be over critical with this, but doesn't /. already have a nice niche? There are already quite a few sites out there dedicated to "offtopic humor/meme/viral video/pictures" etc. What are we trying to accomplish here?
(or how about FarkTV?)
I've dipped into 'Idle' a few times now and it's a great way to waste your time....my wife already moans about the ammount of time I spend 'do-ing' /. and it ain't going to get any better. Great idea!
Smivs on the intertubes!
You mean the google version of out of beta or the microsoft's one?
For being beta it added several stories to the main (in production?) slashdot site in the past months. This will mean that it will really add a lot (daily) from now on?
/. just lost some serious cool points here...
"why to be like other people, there's already so many of them"
The interface sucks. I was hoping more slashdot-like, but with the ability to post pics and video, not that DHTML garbage.
Horrible site. Poorly organized, old content, just terrible.
BTW, Fark already has a geek section. Just link to that.
Is this "News for Nerds" or "Stuff that matters?" Is there anyone here that hasn't seen the "Idle.slashdot.org is a total waste of your time, never go there" teaser atop the page? Besides the fact that it's embarrassing to have such tripe "social link sharing" site associated with slashdot, idle honestly adds zero advantages or new things over digg/reddit/etc.
In my humble opinion it's a terrible idea to dilute the slashdot brand at a time when it's already pretty weak.
everything in moderation
I know we can't get the same people of way back then together in the same place again, but GIS would have a Slashdot personality in any case. Any noob blog out there can rehash articles, repost links that have been posted thousands of times before, and wait for gnaa's frosty piss to start off the comments. Becoming yet another fark clone will not make people want to stay; producing Slashdot-specific content for Slashdot will.
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
The site that has been the number 1 most efficient waster of my time at work just got more efficient?!?!?
I can smell the pink slip from here!
Well, back to rejecting software patent applications.
idle section stories show up on the mobile browser version of the homepage. Since I don't bother to log in on my mobile, I'm assaulted by this idiotic crap that I can easily avoid when using a normal browser. Please consider removing it.
I believe that this isn't viral anymore, it is now bacterial -like the clap.
Prediction: The real iPhone killer is going to be sex robots from Japan. Think about it.
I frequently read slashdot.org/palm from my blackberry and this idle crap keeps appearing there. It's just horrible, not to mention that very little of the content in idle is mobile friendly. The only comments are things like "is this Digg now?" Please, don't do this. Create a whole new site if you feel like this is really what you want to do with your time, but don't associate with slashdot.
I never would have thought it possible to make slashdot appear any less credible, but you may have just found a way.
Don't do it. We've all had grand ideas that got abandoned and I know it feels bad, but you should cut your losses now before it's too late. Really. Stop.
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
special feature today where Samzenpus shares some real tech support email from some of our most intelligent readers
Where do we find this? I sought and did not find.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Again .. god dammit .. why did I just waste time and bandwidth??
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
...can get really old. I know I need to turn of my brain once in a while with junk. Reality TV, fast food, and beers have their place in the life of an intellectual. Besides why do you think technology has spread so quickly? Scientific research or low brow videos of finger-smelling monkeys?
we spend most of hour waking ours on-line
Fixed it for you!
You just got troll'd!
Can we have pillow-biting nancy moderators and shadowbans and a filter to censor naughty words too, like they do on Fark?
Now go about your day -- it's mid August, so I'm sure everything you do is urgent, exciting, and oh-so-interesting.
Superfluous.
Nothing new to see here.
Move along...
In case anyone doesn't know, shadowbanning is where you can post and see your comments as normal, but nobody else sees them. Basically, you're screaming into the void - and if you're a donor you're paying for the privilege.
In other words, it's a rather childish type of fraud.
Yes I am shadowbanned on Fark, for the crime of replying to a comment which mentioned a rival site. I hope Slashdot can avoid that crap.
Before, it told me that idle.slashdot.org was a total waste of my time and that I should never go there!
/headasplode
Thanks for making Idle official and full-time!
Because now I can adjust my preferences so that I never see this unfunny garbage again. If I want "teh funnay," I'll visit 4chan, k thx.
I have a suspicion that idle might actually be a good thing to happen to slashdot. Here's my conspiracy theory:
IIRC Taco has full control over the stories and editing of slashdot, but marketing, advertisement and other things are mandated by corporate overlords. I somehow suspect that a bunch of trained monkeys in the marketing department created a lot of pressure to make Slashdot more Digg-alike and in a moment of pure genius, Taco created idle - the best parody of Digg the world has ever seen. It's colorful and flashy to please the marketing department, contains the worst stories and oldest mémes out there to convince them this isn't going to work out, all the while preserving the rest of Slashdot and consuming the least money and effort possible.
I mean just look at it and the way it's announced. It's as if the Slashdot team wants us to hate it.
:/- spoon(_).
I don't mind modding once in a while and the policies seem to work generally and programmers should have a better idea of how to implement a content filtering method that might be useful for everybody. I for one welcome our new content filtered overlords. I think that there is sufficient intellect connected to slashdot to become a filter for those who would like to understand or begin in programming. I know bad code when I see it and why not let others look at life through rows(colored) = glasses; ps -A;kill -SIGKILL #*;? .....
For each comment, where content != goat
... redundant.
Have gnu, will travel.
jeez you guys act like the idle section just slapped you in the face even though it's been up for months.
i took a look at it a long time ago, it's not for me so i don't click on the link. Where's the problem? Maybe some of the less mature posters will head over there instead of cluttering up the main stories.
stop your whining
I came to the datacenter drunk with a fake ID, don't you want to be just like me?
How about updating the Funnies list instead? Many of the ones there don't even update anymore (Under Power, Totalitarian Burger), and a few (Helen) the links don't even work anymore because the comic is dead. And a bunch more have devolved into sitcoms and soap operas. Fix the bugs first, then add new features!
To quote John Scalzi: "What the fuck is wrong with you?"
/. editors thought needed to be filled. "Oh our current content isn't engaging enough, let's pile on some crap!"
/.
I mean, seriously, was there some demand for this I missed? Some void the
I agree with other posters. Start a new site for this garbage; it has no place at
CDE open sourced! https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/
That's a hell of a shark you're trying to jump.
dee dah
Is there going to be an RSS feed so I know when to efficiently waste my time?
OK, I wasn't impressed by the content, but honestly I didn't *see* very much of the content. .... another small picture on its own page. YAWN. OK, done now.
1) The page is really, really slow. Click-the-scrollbar-and-wait kinda' slow. Is it just me? I'm on a 2.66GHz dual-core but hey, I'm running Vista -- maybe the page is allergic.
2) The page layout is dumb. You see a teaser for a "story", click the teaser and all you get is a picture: one small picture on its very own page, with a couple words of caption. So you click Back, click another teaser
Well, the article is about /. and so is my post.. but has anyone else noticed a difference in how mod points are awarded? I check /. this morning at work and had 15 moderator points. Anyone else see this? The FAQ still says you only get 5 points and they expire after 3 days.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
This contrived shite represents EVERYTHING THAT IS NOT FUNNY on the internet.
fail.slashdot.org
Slashdot is a great tech reference to me, thanks to all good open eyes people submiting interesting stuff. Idle area can be fun, as an coffe area, but kept faraway from main Slashdot. When I want some geeks and interesting ideas on what people can do in their lives I visit: http://www.geekologie.com/
Information technology means all information.
I've hated slashdot since the day I came here. That's why I keep coming back.
Honestly, though, there have been trolls and firstposters for as long as I've come here, and it's just what you deal with.
Thank the gods /. ditched that Katz journalist, though. If you think idle is bad, you haven't experienced the great mindless stupor that once haunted these halls. ... or have I just had his postings blocked this whole time? He is gone, right?
There's a 68.71% chance you're right.
Sisko, you insensitive clod!
Good to see everyone agrees on v1 and Firefox though.
Same content as Digg. Idle Slashdot CSS. Lame.
Chewie does not get a medal. Come on, George. Can a Wookie get a medal?
Is it the Slashdot's version of digg and 4chan?
Isn't that what DIGG is for?
Like many of you, we spend most of our waking hours on-line seeking stuff to entertain our brains
You misspelled "wanking" there. ;)
Anyone remember when this place was "News for nerds, stuff that matters"?
Slashdot was once an enlightening and stimulating place for people from the IT industry / Science Industry / etc to come and read the latest RELEVANT news, and then discuss it - the discussions were intelligent and insightful, and many times posts came from people who were known and respected in the field being discussed.
Stories that made the front page catered to such minds. Many of the articles would even warrant me spending an hour or so researching the topic and gaining insight into something new and exciting. Slashdot used to be "brain food".
This seems to be the fate of such places on the Internet. Usenet... Slashdot... (more examples that I couldn't think of)... it seems like as more idiots connect themselves to the Internet, the more idiotic the Internet becomes. Places once frequented by intellectuals seeking an intellectual forum become watered down with stupidity and insipidity - and are overtaken by those seeking a cheap laugh and simple entertainment.
Slashdot has been going downhill for a couple of years now, and seems to be gaining momentum. It makes me sad. There are a billion and one places to go for idle, mindless discussion and "college humor". There are a million and one places to go for discussion of "common tech news". Once this place has completely caved into mediocrity, there won't be anywhere else to go. Slashdot will no longer be unique. Slashdot might as well merge with digg or 4chan.
Someone oughtta buy this place out and put it back how it used to be, pink-slip all of the new editors and FUD-mongers and politiks, and have idle.slashdot.org redirect to www.bored.com.
Just disrupt the deflector shield with a tachyon burst.
If you put some chavs in a tank for 6-8 weeks and watch them 24/7, you might get to see them mate. Usually, you have to pay to see that sort of thing on TV.
Wait.. Slashdot is announcing a well-known section? What the Hell is the point in that? If you've been paying any attention you'd have noticed it.. and I don't remember signing up for a beta.
What day is it? Could you please tell me?
I would rather not read the "Idle" section in my main news feed from this site. Any chance you all might consider making a different main feed which doesn't include the Idle articles?
I, for one, welcome our new /b/tard overlords.
Yes, if only so we can get low UIDs.
that this was a Python language article. But then it was obfuscated, so I knew it must be about Perl.
Yep.
Low UID memes have now officially Idled Slashdot.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I think you mean Myspace.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Or is that dead now?
"XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve your problem, use more." - Anonymous Coward
Great work, /.
Congrats on your new section which has been officially called "the idiots' section." You realize now that all the real idiots will stay away from it.
Nice marketing, too, by mixing up the words "nerds" and "idiots" under the same brand.
block all items that match:
item.slash:section = idle
now i can hide the stupid section
I'm with what looks like the majority of Slashdotters here in that I will be ignoring the Idle posts (as I have been during your testing period). When I want to waste time, I know where to go. When I want geek news, I also know where to go... here, except that now there's slightly more crap I have to filter out. Bleh.
I know End of Fiscal year for some people is going on.
I think he might've forgotten that a lot of college-going people are getting prepared to _return to college._ I've got to move, go through TA orientations, present my internship presentation, and I'm finding out if my grant came through or not.
Probably the biggest joke yet. Well, in my experience:
http://support.microsoft.com/
It's spelled faggot. And for your information, ./ covers a lot more than just Apple.
snotr.com, child of mininova.org do the same for me couple of months, however, I feel lack of shark with lasers there
I had never looked at idle before but clicked on it and checked it out. I was very disappointed that it is so bad. I love /. and have from the first day I started reading this site. I think the next /. Poll should ask the readers if it should be kept, moved somewhere else completely or taken down. The results would be something to bring to the next marketing meeting when the talking heads go on and on about re-branding to target gen y and beyond. I understand that /. is not a democracy and needs to generate a proft but alienating your loyal readership is not a good way to go about that.
And why is it linked on the main page?
http://i33.tinypic.com/2nb4z1w.jpg
-- Boycott Shell
The left panel 'Idle' link takes me to idke.slashdot.org Its just like regular Slashdot, but I presume this is the version we are supposed to read when we aren't working. Or is it aliased to slashdot.org because the assumption is we are all idlers at heart?
It's worth noting that the sidebear link to "idle.slashdot.org" actually points to "idke.slashdot.org", which (being in error) actually just redirects to the toplevel site.