My List is My List

Ally – Your (and others’) lists are great. Sad how petty some can be. I don’t make more lists because I’m neurotically indecisive about ranking things.but I love to read lists and see how another’s experience of a film is different from mine. It make me want to view a work again based on another’s perspective and appreciate what I may have missed previously.

I hear ya. These sort of things USED to bother me… but you know, in the entire scheme of things…

That dancing banana is really distracting when you’re trying to write a post and it’s right in your peripheral vision.

You’ve got to take other people’s lists for what they are. You look for the lists that have a lot of films you like, and pick out the ones on those lists you haven’t seen. It’s weird how sometimes I might show a list like acclaimedmusic.net to a friend, and he’ll complain “What, this album 20 spots higher than this album? This one 30 spots lower?”

It might bother me if something I think is only decent is appearing at the top of every single list where other films are being left off completely, as with Social Network and My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, but I’m not going to nitpick individual lists by people who aren’t professional critics.

I was kidding but yeah… one-film-listing is a strange exercise.

Just because I don’t like the japaneselessness of this thread either.

If I’m here and you’re here, doesn’t that make it our list?

Matt: Didn’t Mr. Hand dramatize the awkwardness of transgressions into one’s personal space?

Yes . . . but remember what happened to the pizza—everybody got to take a slice.

Look at everyone posting and furiously commenting on the various critics’ best of 2010 lists here.

Maybe we could petition the powers-that-Mubi to change the list functionality so that one could disable the ability of other users to comment if someone were so inclined?

And if everyone gets a slice, Matt, no one is truly satisfied.

Yup . . . public life is a harsh mistress. Take away lesson. If you want the pizza to yourself don’t have it delivered to the classroom.

I think your metaphor went awry several posts ago, Matt. The OP’s issue involves those who, seeing the pizza, loudly declaim, “Damn, man, I wanted carrot sticks, or jawbreakers, or fireworks. How dare you suggest your idea is fulfilling when it leaves me empty?”

embed failed.

http://video.adultswim.com/tim-and-eric-awesome-show-great-job/the-things-i-like.html

nobody’ll click on it anyway…

I don’t think so. Posting a list is essentially publishing it in a public space, making it subject to comment, some of which may be negative, some of which may be positive, so of which may be neutral. It’s not different than a comment made in a thread here on the forum. You’re not disagreeing with me because you’re rude, you’re disagreeing with me because you have a different opinion on the matter. Once I put something in a public space such as this, I no longer have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Why would anyone think anything different?

Apu, well, I like recommendations and additions and have taken some into account. However, what bugs me is when people criticize my tastes and tell me I’m wrong for liking or not liking a movie or country or whatever.

And Danger Paule – I hear what you’re saying. It’s just that it happens so often to me and I am not able to delete comments on my own list. Maybe I should just flag them. I don’t know.

Or maybe I should make a list of all the comments on my lists that I find inappropriate.

Matt: I feel like I’m being forced to repeat myself on this thread, but the difference between publishing a one-off comment on a thread and issuing a list is one of intellectual gradation. While a poster might throw out a tangential, half-hearted, or poorly informed response to a recent thread, the typical list-maker (at least in my experience) has spent hours and hours devising the perfect list of topic X. Thus, the list-maker deserves a bit more respect than the knee-jerk, “I can’t believe you like X when you’re supposed to like Y.” Whether you acknowlege it or not, there are a lot of sharpshooters out there aiming at targets but unwilling to put any out for others to snipe.

-While a poster might throw out a tangential, half-hearted, or poorly informed response to a recent thread, the typical list-maker (at least in my experience) has spent hours and hours devising the perfect list of topic X. Thus, the list-maker deserves a bit more respect than the knee-jerk, “I can’t believe you like X when you’re supposed to like Y.”-

Well, yes, I don’t know what specific comments are being referred to, but this site—lists and all—could benefit from a bit more thoughtfulness all around. What I’m saying is you have to be realistic about your expectations when you’re involved in public conversations. Once “my list” is posted here, you can’t expect to maintain control of it.

Matt: you and I aren’t really out of sync on anything here. People should be more thoughtful and judicious. Bravo. And I’m sure I followed you dor a reason

It’s also the case, I believe anyway, that a lot of seemingly assertive comments on lists are as much meant as a way to engage and converse about the subject as they are intended to “tell off” the person making the list. I think the list feature serves as much as a sort of side forum as a stand alone feature. People want to talk about what is being listed sometimes and make comments that may seem aggressive, but are really more just providing a sort of not too serious “challenge” as a way of doing that. I don’t get the feeling they, at least most of the time, actually expect the listmaker to change their lists or agree but to offer some differing opinion on why they felt film X was better than film Y so the person who made the comment can then carry on a more one on one conversation about the subject as opposed to the free for all style of the forum. It’s kind of like writing on a person’s wall. Some people prefer doing that to posting in the forum, but to start a conversation it sometimes seems more interesting to pose a question or challenge than to simply agree or say nice list because things don’t have much room to expand from there. Certainly, some of the choices about how the comments are worded could be better, but the intent often strikes me as being mostly benign.

Yes, I agree with all the Greg. It can be much tougher to read intended tone in writing, especially if we’re talking about crossing cultures and native languages.

I’ve always appreciated suggestions, but I don’t make ranked lists so there’s never really any comments about that. Either way, yes this is a public forum where comments of any kind should be expected, but shouldn’t we be able to delete comments on our lists the same way we can on our wall? Seems logical, no?

Yes, that seems entirely reasonable to me.

-Seems logical, no?-

Yes.

you shouldn’t pop lists, they could get infected.

“Or maybe I should make a list of all the comments on my lists that I find inappropriate.”

HA-HA do it! I’ll add it to ,my fave.

Yeah, I know… it’s annoying…. just the other day, someone replied to one of my posts telling me who I should and should not find funny. Jackass. Some people just don’t have a clue…

Certainly, some of the choices about how the comments are worded could be better, but the intent often strikes me as being mostly benign.

Benign, yes, but also blatantly misleading. If the point of using words is to convey the meaning you intend, then such poorly worded comments should be said in a more helpful way. If they are worded as such to draw a reaction from the person then they are just trolling – and if you look at these people’s behavior you will see that in many cases this behavior is repeated and very much lives up to the origin of the word: to troll, as in to stealthily maneuver about while trailing bait for fish to unknowingly be snagged by.

In either case, those people should be ignored because they’re either trolls or can’t figure out the English language.

I agree that in general comments such as “this particular film deserves a higher ranking”, “your list lacks films from a particular country” or “you’re wrong about this particular film which you dismiss on your list” are not meant as hostile, but can rather be understood as people making use of the lists section as a side forum in order to express their opinions. In most cases these comments are attempts to make a manic listmaker rethink about a film they personally love, and given that comments on the lists section are frequently written in a rushed manner without a 30 minutes editing period as the spelling mistakes show, it’s a matter of course that some of them may sound more adversarial than intended. I think that offensive remarks are an exception rather than a rule, and agree with House that the listmaker may as well get provided with the opportunity to delete these. It’s obvious that with a repertoire of more than 250 lists and several thousands of site users you will get some comments which may displease you, and that’s indeed the result of publishing a lot in a public space instead of keeping it private. The vast majority of reactions can be described as positive though, and as far as I’m aware people generally acknowledge their appreciation of your efforts, which means that as long as you can overlook sporadic disagreements I would suggest to just carry on.

Thanks to Leaves for helping us understand that the “point of using words” is to “convey the meaning you intend.” Beneath the agitated and and bellicose sensibility Leaves likes to project is some good, old-fashioned common sense. But I am curious, Leaves, when we will see your lists or rankings. You’re quite talented when it comes to parsing the logic and rhetoric of others—and I do mean that as a compliment—but many of us, I think, would appreciate seeing an aesthetic emerge from rankings, reviews, and lists.