Best Of MetaFilter

putt putt golf by Evil Erin (cc by)

MeFi member parliboy gives a good explanation why putt-putt golf competitions are actually pretty serious and the courses are somewhat standardized.

Things don't always go perfectly according to plan. Moisture in the carpet affects traction and skidding. And skidding plays a much larger role with a banking shot, with a decent angle, because the changed angle of the ball might not be what you want it to be if the weather is off. (And no, you're not allowed to wipe to rain off of the rail; the rules actually prohibit that.) Wind plays a role, like with "real" golf.

#Snowpocalypse Atlanta 2014 - traffic by William Brawley (cc by)

How a few inches of snow turned into an eight hour traffic jam.

Space Shuttle Columbia Memorial by cliff1066™ (cc by)

MeFi member arnicae shares what it was like during the aftermath of the Space Shuttle Columbia's crash 11 years ago in east Texas.

The response of the communities of deep east Texas, an area of the country with some very problematic and sad history is nothing short of phenomenal. Though the weather was cold and rainy throughout the days and weeks that followed the crash, searchers, many of them volunteers from throughout the South (and around the country) stayed out for twelve hour shifts.

MetaFilter member chambers recounts an amazing story of working at a college TV station and accidentally making Beavis the new face of C-SPAN for a weekend, long ago.

IO Graph Art by nathanmac87 (cc by)

With the end of 2013 behind us, we've just launched a mini-site called MeFi Labs featuring a year-end summary of statistics, top mentions of Amazon items from 2013, recent Amazon mentions, and recent YouTube mentions in posts and comments. We're also discussing it on MetaTalk.

This is the third week of results for our Mefites Choice contest.

Guess The Album Game by shrff (cc by)

1. mannequito made an epic post that serves as a history lesson and homage to the silent/hidden track on albums.

james tiptree award anthology 2 by cdrummbks (cc by)

2. filthy light thief furnishes us with a post covering the history of new wave Sci-Fi writer James Tiptree Jr., and the revelation that eventually came to light about the author.

Get Smart. by Baylee_Farris (cc by)

3. zarq drops a megapost about the comedy spy show Get Smart, featuring every episode on YouTube along with the movies and spin-offs that followed.

Emptily Nested by CarbonNYC (cc by)

In a thread about a famous Christmas cookie cookbook, MetaFilter member Elsa shares an amazing personal story about cookie cutters, stern family members, and giving thanks.

Most every December, MetaFilter throws a best post contest and this year is no different: The MeFites Choice Awards.

Week one has passed and the winners have been announced. Here are the top three posts to MetaFilter according to voting members of the site.

Where My Ladies At? is a post about sexism among scientists that includes this brilliant video response as well as a huge list of female STEM online educators. It was posted by Blasdelb.

A Star Trek video of Picard's crew singing "let it snow" by Gelatin came in second.

And last but not least, the man of twists and turns made a comprehensive post on the state of conspiracy theory culture in America, looking back over 50 years.

We'll continue to post weekly recaps of the winners throughout this month.

stars by davedehetre (cc by)

The key thing that Gaia will do is astrometry, where they measure the positions of a billion (many millions) of stars. And that stupidly simple-sounding thing turns out to be pretty profound...

The whole thing made me look at adults in a different way. I learned they didn't all know everything and some might even be sorta dumb. I also learned that you couldn't always trust what they said or their judgement. My promise to not get plants lasted a whole two days. I became defiant and started to suck on hemlock needles just to spite them. These things could cure things like scurvy goddammit and they're making it out to be all scary and bad was part of my 11 year old justification for disobeying.

Jalliah talks about how she learned that adults don't always know everything.

Final Assembly of Aero Supersports by joncallas (cc by)

On the occasion of the Toyota company founder's death, MeFi member ceribus peribus reminisces about his father's time working for Toyota and how it was different than American car manufacturers:

My Dad worked in a very senior position at TMMC for over 16 years before his retirement, so I became familiar with The Toyota Way, the Toyota Production System (yes, TPS reports), kaizen, and kanban through discussions with him and from glancing through the written materials he brought home.

MeFite Zeamon: "Hi Everyone. I just wanted to check in and thank you all for the encouraging comments regarding my Orrery."

Cows cows cows by aWorldTourer (cc by)

Peemster--the author of a piece linked on MeFi--shares with us additional information from his source farmer Nate Wilson.

I would open by telling you quite frankly to be highly suspect of anyone that tells you they have accomplished a successful "cow-tipping" as they will almost certainly lie to you about more important things, as well. I am most comfortable stating unequivocally that "cow-tipping" is naught but a classic urban legend, promoted largely by juvenile minded, immature, inebriated young adult males attempting to embellish resumes otherwise lacking in noteworthy personal accomplishment. Kindly allow me to make my case...

"Wow, I love a lot of these. But as I was going through the reddit thread, I came across this picture. It isn't the most stunning example of colorization, but it was striking to me nonetheless. The person in the photo is my great uncle, Raymond Bowman..."

milkcrateman recognizes a relative.