Memeorandum Colors v0.2, or How Not to Ask for A Bugfix

Posted by Andy Baio

Memeorandum made some minor markup changes recently which broke Memeorandum Colors, a Greasemonkey script I wrote that colors Memeorandum based on linking behavior. (Read more about it.)

If you were using Memeorandum Colors, here’s the updated Greasemonkey script and Firefox extension. (Unfortunately, it won’t work in Chrome because they haven’t implemented cross-site requests in user scripts yet.)

Now, a funny story. On Monday afternoon, I was alerted that the script was broken by a guy named Pat, a political blogger in Detroit. He asked politely if I’d fix the script, and I promised to take a look at it. I fixed it last night and was cleaning it up for release this morning, when I saw this on Twitter:

I never looked at his site, so was totally unaware of his political leanings. I was just busy.

Enjoy the code, Pat! Sorry I took so long to fix the code you use and love, for free, every day.

Update: Pat deleted his three tweets (archived above for posterity) and, in an epic 17-tweet rant, offered me and five others “an ass kicking that you will never, ever forget.” He follows up with a threat to sue me for publishing his “likeness and words” — screenshots of the three deleted tweets above, posted in public, addressed to me, and reproduced for non-commercial commentary and criticism under the Copyright Act’s “fair use” provisions.

Update 2: And now his Twitter account’s gone. I saved an archive of his threatening tweets for posterity. If you want to get in touch, his new account is @RightBloggerPat.

August 6: Pat wrote a followup on his blog, with his perspective of the whole ordeal. He admits he jumped the gun and apologizes for the mistake. Case closed.

Comments

    I love that PatInDetroit hates “socialism,” but uses open source / freeware software so he can blog.

    Silly, silly hypocrites.

    NuAngel

    Next time write a special script that changes every link into “Obama Is God” and we’ll see who gets the last laugh.

    He probably thinks Kickstarter is socialism too.

    Keep up the good work bud.

    @Jay: “Classic liberal” = modern day libertarian, and apparently in this case, it also means complete idiot.

    And, since you were “right on it”, this only proves that you’re the “liberal idiot” he said you were.

    Way to walk straight into his clever trap!

    Oh, they’re not the same? Sort of like comparing granny smith apples with sweet delicious apples? One’s kinda sour and ones kinda sweet but they’re both apples?

    Wow, his Twitter responses to you are.. let’s say interesting?

    I love that he can’t just admit that he flipped out because he thought you were taking too long. No, he has to flip out further and say that you only updated because he called you on your bullshit.

    Wow.

    This guy also goes by the pseudonym Paleo Pat. He’s confrontational and often blows things out of proportion. Given the slightest opportunity he’ll turn any discussion into a political argument and will go on rants, as you’ve experienced.

    At one point he attempted to become involved in the WordPress development community (search the wp-hackers mailing list for Paleo Pat) but he wasn’t received well due to his hot headedness and general irrationality.

    Free speech certainly brings out the best in people.

    I’ve found that the best, if not only, response to people of his ilk is the following:

    “You’re invited to suck my ass until my head caves in. Contact me as soon as possible to schedule an appointment.”

    Report him for threats.

    Assholes like him shouldn’t get away with bullshit like that.

    Looks like he’s back with a slightly new handle at twitter.com/PatinDetroit2.

    Um, that PatinDetroit2 is not me.

    And, you can kiss my ass. You guys wanna mock me for being fat? Go for it. Come say it to my face and see what happens.

    Threats? No, Just promises.

    Damn geek ass mother fuckers.

    I called your silly ass out and now you got your boyfriends coming after me. Fuck them and you.

    Further more… I deleted my twitter screen name for reason.

    It appears that some of your friends have got some issues. I’ve got 3 DEATH THREATS in my inbox. Got to print them out and go visit the FBI in Detroit first thing in the morning…

    Can’t chap a guy on the ass a little without people going batshit insane.

    You need some serious help. Who’s calling you fat or making death threats? Certainly not me or anyone else I know. As far as I can tell, you’re the only one making threats and accusations.

    I simply don’t understand the sense of entitlement that would lead someone to behave the way you have today. You seemed like a decent guy over chat, I promised to look into the code, and was in the process of pushing the fix when I saw your insulting rants on Twitter. I have no interest in your politics (I’m not very political, in general) and never looked at your blog until today.

    And it’s interesting how nice you are in one-to-one conversation, but absolutely raging in public. For the record, the entirety of our instant messenger conversations:

    Pat: You there?

    Pat: I am the owner of politicalbyline.com and my name is Pat

    Pat: and I was wondering if you planned on updating Memeorandum colors, as it stopped working for some reason yesterday…

    Andy: I heard…

    Andy: Not sure what the issue is

    Andy: I looked into it briefly, must be a slight Memorandum redesign breaking it

    Pat: I see… You must understand, I feel lost without it… can you please, with Democrats, Republicans with sprinkles on top, try and fix it? :-:( :'(

    Andy: Glad to hear you like the script

    Pat: it’s a roadmap…

    Andy: I’ll see what I can do tonight

    Andy: I’ll publish an update on my site if I fix it

    Andy: waxy.org

    Pat: Thanks…

    Andy: and probably twitter.com/waxpancake

    Pat: Did you ever look at that code? or no.

    Andy: not yet

    Andy: sorry

    Pat: Ok.. 🙁

    Andy: Hey, I fixed the script.

    Andy: Just need to redo the Firefox extension build and I’ll get it up

    Shortly after that, I saw your tweets and wrote this post. Seriously, who’s the one who’s “batshit insane”?

    This guy clearly loves attention, in any form. It’s too bad that the only way he gets it is from being a complete idiot.

    This guy Pat clearly has some rage issues, and he is using his political views as an excuse to lash out at others.

    As the links above shoe, he has a history of flipping out and hurling threats and insults at those who inconvenience him, or openly discuss his behavior. This suggests that he has some serious anger issues in general, though not necessarily based on the cover of his religious or political beliefs. It’s not just “Internet Tough Guy”, though that is a display of it.

    All things considered you can’t fault a man for making a considered apology.

    I have a certain amount of respect for someone who makes a mistake and genuinely apologizes for it.

    This situation is typical of the internet — down from the freebie given to all for the betterment of our online experience, to a blowhard whose actions suddenly throw others who share some of the opinions, into the same net.

    I hate socialism. And I love Memeorandum colors.

    There. Mama make all better now.

    Freeware and open source thrive on people in the private sector collaborating to get really cool stuff done. Socialism is the view that government can do everything better than the private sector, and forceably removes our money in order to do it.

    Two completely different things. Unless Andy Baio is getting money from the government, his work has nothing to do with furthering socialism, and everything to do with furthering free enterprise. He gains notoriety from his work, which leads to other opportunities to get paid for his intelligence and experience. The free market at work, a Ting Of Beauty.

    So, he apologized (and it was a terrible apology at that), but look at his tagline: “Seeking to reclaim Conservatism from the crackpots and the crazies — Seeking to reclaim America from the those who wish to destroy her”

    There is a larger lesson to take from this episode: this is exactly the type of conservative who thinks they’re sane and saving America. Extrapolate away.

    Wow, I’ve come across some completely unhinged people in my political dealings in the past, but this guy takes the cake. I hope he takes the advice of others and goes to see a therapist about his rage issues, but for all we know he probably thinks all therapists are “libtard fags” out to seduce him.

    I sincerely believe Pat and his ilk should be pitied. The guy is obviously a web panhandler trying to make a buck out of his extreme political posture. I say “posture” since I have no idea about his true political beliefs, except begging money out of the poor misguided saps that might visit his page. He is obviously trying to raise a storm in a teacup hoping this will put a few more cents in his jar. For the record, I consider myself a conservative, but I wouldn´t touch this guy with the smelly end of a long stick.

    On the other hand, well done Andy! You handled the whole mess in a very classy and civilized way. Keep up the good work.

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