# Meta Is Murder

**URL:** <https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155>\
**Category:** blog\
**Created:** [July 13, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155 "2009-07-13T00:00:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![MikeH](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/m/258eb7/32.png) [@MikeH](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/MikeH)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/41 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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On a slightly different level, I fall into this trap when writing software. Instead of writing the software I set out to write, I decide the task would be easier if there were a tool or utility to help me implement feature X. So I start out writing that utility. And then that utility would be so much easier to write if…

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**Author:** ![SeriouslyG](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@SeriouslyG](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/SeriouslyG)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/42 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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I can’t believe how much people are groaning about the meta in this post. Jeff actually says something good on the subject, and releases the news about [meta.stackoverflow.com](http://meta.stackoverflow.com), which is an actual news item worthy of post. I think Jeff’s doing a great job.

Get over yourselves, people. This sentence is false.

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**Author:** ![JM13](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/j/5fc32e/32.png) [@JM13](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/JM13)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/43 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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void Foo()  
{  
cout “Hello World!”;  
}

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**Author:** ![Khan\_V](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/k/9fc29f/32.png) [@Khan\_V](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Khan_V)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/44 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Hum, build something… That’s a great idea

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**Author:** ![Jimbo](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/j/d78d45/32.png) [@Jimbo](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Jimbo)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/45 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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You realize you’re meta-meta-blogging here?

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**Author:** ![ThatGuy](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/t/e5b9ba/32.png) [@ThatGuy](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/ThatGuy)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/46 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Meta is an important part of my “artistic BS” meter. If it’s a play about a playwright or actor, a film about a film maker of any kind, a song about music, and so forth, my standards for how good it must be to be not complete BS goes way up. There are exceptions (e.g. Johnny B Goode), but the rule does a lot to clear a lot of bad art out of the list of things to experience.

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**Author:** ![Harry\_M](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Harry\_M](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Harry_M)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/47 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Meta programming is awesome.

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**Author:** ![Phenwoods](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/p/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Phenwoods](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Phenwoods)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/49 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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“Joel Spolsky had a great example of how meta-discussion can kill community in our latest podcast. … And you go on there, and the first subject of conversation is who’s going to be elected to the podcasting gear website board of directors. And the second subject of conversation is whether the election that was done last year was orthodox, or was it slightly … was there something suspicious about that whole thing.”

That was the same podcast where you discussed, at some length, the the best way to have a vote on what logo to use for your next website, wasn’t it?

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**Author:** ![John\_Sonmez](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/j/bcef8e/32.png) [@John\_Sonmez](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/John_Sonmez)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/51 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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“Triple-meta alert! That blog entry was me blogging about blogging about blogging. See? Painful. I told you.”

Meta about meta about meta about meta, I can break the chain for you since this is a comment.

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**Author:** ![Tom](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tom](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Tom)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/52 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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I love metaprogramming.

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**Author:** ![Steve](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/s/f19dbf/32.png) [@Steve](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Steve)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/53 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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I agree with your message: meta is ok, but should be killed (as in dealt with) immediately. Some people want Stackoverflow to be some sort of canonical programming tutorial, for example, and that’s not what it is.

I do have to say though that Jeff didn’t need to reiterate this with a post. Slow week?

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**Author:** ![Tone](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/t/71c47a/32.png) [@Tone](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Tone)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/54 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Many of your podcasts have touched on meta-discussions. The last one really talked about it. This really supports the idea that you get the most of what you focus on.

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**Author:** ![SDD](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@SDD](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/SDD)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/55 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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I was expecting more methadone / meta no done jokes…

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**Author:** ![Apathetic](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@Apathetic](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Apathetic)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/56 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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honestly, who cares

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**Author:** ![RickM](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/r/90ced4/32.png) [@RickM](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/RickM)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/57 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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This post is meta^2, meta about meta.

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**Author:** ![AscendingM](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/a/0ea827/32.png) [@AscendingM](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/AscendingM)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/58 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Really this boils down to “I’m bored by stuff that doesn’t interest me”. When it’s meta you don’t care about, it’s annoying meta. Surprising.

What’s worse than top 40 music? People talking about how bad top 40 music is.

The example Joel gives is a bit weak, given that meta only takes over when there’s nothing left to talk about. So the alternative wouldn’t have been a vibrant community talking about podcasting gear, but instead it would be crickets and an abandoned site.

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**Author:** ![Adam\_K](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/a/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Adam\_K](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Adam_K)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/59 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Problem with Wikipedia is that it gets too meta about itself. It should just be a simple process of clicking a link and editing whatever you want. But in order to keep the project sane, and not destroy what someone else has spent hours perfecting, the logged-out edit page boilerplate is longer than the content itself. With rules about moving, images, inline citations, and proper capitalization it’s hard for someone to just come in and make the mid-sized corrections they’d like to.

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**Author:** ![securityhorror](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/s/35a633/32.png) [@securityhorror](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/securityhorror)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/60 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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Jeff,

when you write something like this (now and again), do us a favor:

Ctrl+A  
Delete

Or just reboot.

I can see a post about Agile smartiness coming.

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**Author:** ![Adam\_K](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/a/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Adam\_K](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/Adam_K)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/61 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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P.S. I should know; I’m an administrator.

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**Author:** ![ChrisM](https://discourse-cdn.codinghorror.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v2/letter/c/47e85d/32.png) [@ChrisM](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/u/ChrisM)\
**Post date:** [July 14, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://discourse.codinghorror.com/t/meta-is-murder/155/62 "2009-07-14T00:00:00Z")

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What about those for whom their line-of-business is metaprogramming? Resharper and Codesmith come to mind.

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