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.
Is there any difference between this new service and... Digg? (or XKCD because the best the net has to offer is already posted there.)
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?
Horrible site. Poorly organized, old content, just terrible.
BTW, Fark already has a geek section. Just link to that.
I feel the same way. If I want content like that I'll read fark or digg.
Besides...the only times that I've been to idle they've had stories that were already featured on other websites.
Agreed, the last thing we want is for the cesspool of Digg-reading, MySpace dwelling, Pokemon-playing LuSerS!!!!!1 to spill over into where the grownups are trying to have intelligent discussions.
But this is already happening, people mess with every post theses days.
I hope Idle somehow 'cure' the offtopic/meme/first post/* attitudes that we constantly see here, by moving the Trolls away to a place that fits them best.
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Attempting to "entertain" the more intelligent types with the same sort of filth/LCD* they see on their television is a counterproductive goal.
It might be that this trend is inevitable. Look at the devolution of the Discovery Channel*, what are they discovering, how to use grinders and say FbeepK. I think that I figured out why this is though. If the average IQ is 100 and IQ distributions fit on a bell curve, where does the bulk of the population lie? Now where does the bulk of the money lie (I don't believe that IQ and income are highly correlated)? Now if you're into making money (aren't we all) then what is the logical thing to do (disregarding principles)?
I come to Slashdot to learn from the many fellow geek who are a lot smarter/more experienced than I. I know that I go for the funny a lot, but I try not to post unless I think that it is really good (not much beats a good laugh).
*Excepting Myth Busters.
If you don't know what LCD stands for in this context, you should turn in your geek card.
I don't know what this is in this context, so maybe I should. LCD to me = liquid crystal display.
Look where all this talking got us, baby.
"Which usually means they're the type to appeal to sex and voyeurism."
Ah, yes. Sex. Voyeurism. The true enemies of intellectuals everywhere.
Oh yeah, except for all those intellectuals who were delightfully perverted. (Most of them).
Anyhoo, I'm off to look at Kafka's porn collection.
Reality TV doesn't mean "britney spears handycam show", it also includes the shows on Powerblock which I find incredibly informative, because I like wrenching on vehicles (but I suppose that makes me one of those lowest common denominators you're talking about, right? working with my hands? A real intellectual pays a dealership 75 bucks to change his oil).
It also includes just about every cooking show ever, and every documentary you've ever seen.
Get over yourself.
You are not an intellectual.
I doubt you've ever even met one before.
The stuff you decry really isn't reality at all. All that "real life of washed up celebrity" shit is scripted and fake. An intellectual would have caught on.
As long as idle is off by default I think we are safe.
Actually, that was the question I wanted to ask. When Idle was still in 'beta' (nice how it never said beta anywhere on it), it was impossible to block it from the front page. Is it now possible? If not, then this would be my biggest feature request, slipping in just above getting support for non-ASCII characters back to where it was six months ago.
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