Colin McFaul

@MAFIA36790 Thanks, it's been awhile.

(unless you're one of those heathens who uses IMPLICIT NONE)

@ChrisWhite xLGNGN. Or else it will be an int.

I found your answer a bit jerkish, but not enough to warrant a downvote.

@KyleKanos My guess is jerkishness; the question there is at +0/-4

Ah, I have discovered the problem: it's a browser plugin. I can log in to Meta now.

Is anyone else having trouble logging into Meta? I'm logged in to the main site, and my other SE accounts automatically recognize me and log me in. But none of the Meta sites recognize me at all, even when I manually click on "log in."

A chemistry group on my floor has a betting pool for the WC. They're even playing all the matches on a projector screen in their meeting room. Not only is the PI totally on board with this, I think he's even the mastermind.

@KyleKanos I've heard of Summer Games, and I think I've heard of the idea of Done Quick.

checks weather for US/Belgium match 81 F? 74% humidity?That sounds great. I hope no one complains about those conditions.

I know I haven't really be keeping up with the more recent chat sessions the way I used to.

@JamalS It's been pretty quiet the last couple of months or so. The "official" chat sessions used to be a bit busier. I think there are just fewer pressing things to discuss.

@ChrisWhite I'll try to ask at least one of those in the next day or so. I haven't really had a chance to read the paper yet, and some of those are above my paygrade, but I think I can competently evaluate at least one of those questions you suggested.

@DIMension10 Dude, I haven't touched any of your answers, and I haven't touched any of the questions they're attached to. CHILL.

@DavidZ So you consider Hawaii and Arizona not to be in the US? ;)

@Shog9 That's partially my motivation in mentioning that. I got a couple of downvotes on old answers in the last few days, and suspected maybe he was downvoting in retaliation for some slight. Then I found that comment. So maybe he thinks I'm downvoting him, and he is returning the favor. Otherwise, I wouldn't mention it.

@DIMension10 also in referenced to this comment, I am certain that I have not downvoted any of your posts recently, and I think I have never downvoted anything you have written.

@tpg2114 That's a good point. I'm just laughing at it. I don't really take them seriously, and will probably forget about it by tomorrow.

Oh, I'm in an "invader"

@aufkag HA! thanks.

@tpg2114 I've just gotten to the part of that thread where they call me a "sick user," an "obnoxiously idiotic troll," and an "obnoxious non-physics troll." :)

@ManishEarth I want to flesh it out a bit more before it goes up.

I've just finished my outline for the journal club question, so I should have something a little bigger than a stub by the end of the workday.

@tpg2114 Yeah, that should hopefully help balance those two conflicting needs.

So maybe we put that in as a strong suggestion. Point out to people that non-OA papers probably won't get as good a response.

But asking about a non-open access paper does restrict the number of users who can respond.

I sort of don't want to require it, so we don't restrict the papers that could be asked about.

I'm torn on the open access part.

@tpg2114 I would expect something like peer-reviewed would have to be a requirement, to keep it from devovling into personal theories.

@tpg2114 Absolutely. There's definitely a lot of things that would have to be fleshed out.

@ManishEarth I've been thinking about something similar for a few days, and am trying to put together a Meta question about it. I was thinking of something like a journal club: users would find a paper, and post questions about it. That's been done before as chat sessions, but I'm thinking of trying to encourage people to do that on main.

@DImension10AbhimanyuPS Thanks for that, I was mildly curious. What is wrong with that guy?

@ManishEarth Yes, and they are super awesome.

I'm sort of here. I have to go grab lunch.

@ChrisWhite True, and that's probably the fatal weakness of that approach to the wording.

I was thinking to point people to other SE sites where something would be on topic

The possible suggestions sentence would need re-writing.

@ChrisWhite I had just copied that from the current Math wording, and changed Math -> engineering.

part of its mission is to research prior art and ID BS patents

I think they may have fast-tracked it

I don't know if we want engineering for our third spot, but we could just steal the math wording: "Engineering questions are off-topic unless they relate directly to physics. These quesions might be on topic on other SE sites. Possible suggestions: DIY, EE, robotics, reverse engineering, patents."

@ManishEarth "essential stuff such as vim does not run inside Final Term yet" :(

i like that.

and maybe adding a sentence to the effect of "specific questions might be on topic."

@ManishEarth I like that wording with "preprints and solutions of major open problems" replaced with "personal theories."

I agree; we don't necessarily need it in the close reason. I'm mostly trying to feel out what the difference is between "good" new theory questions and "bad" new theory questions.

@DavidZaslavsky Yes, I was going to mention that exact example.

@ManishEarth Ah. Even better.

@DavidZaslavsky If the math-specific reason is supposed to be temporary, and non-VTC'ers are meant to use the general "belongs somewhere else" reason, then we should get rid of the math-specific reason.