I perhaps found Metafilter from a link on maybe The Well or proto-Salon.com in 2001. I remember showing up and spouting some young liberal ideals and getting shut down by Metafilter's arch conservative of the time, "aaron" (I believe). I responded, if I remember right with something to the effect of "I didn't realize this was a country club". Some other members came to my aid and because of that virtual friendliness I wound up making some friends here and the place stuck, it was my home, for a time. My girlfriend then would get so mad that I wasn't spending more time (romantic and otherwise) with her because I would be plopped in front of my CRT monitor that turned the whole apartment a soothing blue following links, reading threads and posting and commenting into the wee hours of the night.
Metafilter's earliest person to seriously use the term fascist and get briefly suspended for it
It's been a long time and I haven't posted or commented here really in probably 7 or 8 years. I still love the place and feel like I had some hand in creating (as an early adopter) what is now so commonplace everywhere (commenting/blogging/blah blah blah). But the fondest memory, wasn't or isn't a fond memory -- however it is memorable. I used to have go around after go around with people who I wound up saying they were supporting a proto form of fascism. I can't find the link as I don't have time to search that hard. But this, remember, was when you really could not call a spade a spade on a moderated board that fancied itself as metro, modern, liberal, open minded, creative during the fancy pants dotcom boom. Now the term and the understanding of what has become of Planet Earth and the USA is very much so understood by a great many. I got a lot of shit from "conservatives" back then and I gave it right back. Holla!
Anyhow, you couldn't back then, for instance, bring up or follow up what you brought up about the Bush and Prescott families having consorted with the Nazis. Now this is common knowledge, historically documented and basically conventional wisdom. Anyhow, I got suspended for a time and was let back in via a personal email I sent to Matt arguing that the thread that got me in trouble was still going on and I now had no way to argue my point. He let me back in. Thanks Matt. Even the "liberals" on this board gave me shit, as it were.
But when it comes down to it, my most memorable thread in at least my memory was this one that I "FPPed" on 9/11/2001 through the same tears we all cried that day, that week, for the rest of our lives. I basically lost interest in posting here after this and the response it garnered -- which was either condescending or really, basically ended up being no response at at all. Oh well. . .
Reflections on a Mote of Dust
Thanks for the site Matt and thanks for the friends I made through here. Also, clever idea, this cat-scan.com thing. Hello again and best wishes to all!