Pinterest, ladysplained.

[Ensign Steve]

Oh, hah, I just noticed that Shea fixed the link on the cookies. How'd you find them, tin eye or just google unicorn poop? Fortunately most people don't do that. Why do you hate PFLAG, Shea?

[LadyShea]

I don't hate PFLAG at all, dude, but I wanted a recipe for unicorn poop cookies and had already repinned, so I googled unicorn poop cookies and picked one.

[LadyShea]

Hey ES Pinterest is hiring and they're in Palo Alto. Just saying Pinterest / Careers

[Ensign Steve]

Pinterest is officially cool.

George Takei (georgetakei) on Pinterest

[Demimonde]

So has anyone else been having some technical issues? I have been having a bug where I will be following a person, but they disappear from my feed. Then I have to unfollow them, follow them again, reload the main page and they are back. The weirdest was that I actually stopped following myself last night. My pins vanished from my feed and I had to log out and log in again before it was fixed. Weirdness.

[Ensign Steve]

I haven't seen that specific phenomenon, but I have had it where I tried to unfollow someone (too many spam posts, don't know if they got hacked or if they were a bot the whole time) and they were unfollowed but their pins would still show up intermittently. I was like, "yeah, I could see how that might happen," and try to guess their back-end configuration based on the types of bugs I'd see.

[LadyShea]

I seem to be following people I have no memory of following. Also I disconnected Facebook and changed my log in email address and they are STILL showing me FB friends to follow. I emailed them about that. I don't want to see them on my Pinterest dammit!

[Ensign Steve]

It might be that it is reading a local cookie file on your computer to get your Facebook friends. Go to your Facebook application settings and make sure Pinterest is not enabled there. Also, check your browser security settings and make sure third-party cookies are disabled. That should theoretically fix it, but also you can make sure to log out of Facebook altogether when you're not using it to get rid of the cookie entirely.

[Stormlight]

Pinterest Is a $7.7 Billion Company - Forbes

[Ensign Steve]

Pinterest appeals to college-educated females between the ages of 25 to 44. A sweet demographic known for its spending decisions and habits.

[Ensign Steve]

Okay, I can't figure this bug out and it's pissing me off. There are three pins, one is mine and two are somebody else's, that will not move down my front page no matter how many more pins show up. That stupid picture of the upside-down coffee filter as a tablecloth has been squatting in the newest pin slot since I first pinned it. I'm tempted to delete it at this point because I'm so irritated of looking at, but that won't help with the other two pins unless I decide to unfollow her, too.

[LadyShea]

Originally Posted by Ensign Steve

It might be that it is reading a local cookie file on your computer to get your Facebook friends. Go to your Facebook application settings and make sure Pinterest is not enabled there. Also, check your browser security settings and make sure third-party cookies are disabled. That should theoretically fix it, but also you can make sure to log out of Facebook altogether when you're not using it to get rid of the cookie entirely.

I am not logged into Facebook really at all ever...and my browser settings are such that all logins and temp allowed cookies are cleared when I close it so I have to log in every session, I have cookies off by default unless I temp allow them.

See, Pinterest wants me to look at those people all the time, because I one time let it access my Facebook

[LadyShea]

Okay, ES, figure this out. All of your Pins are stuck at the top of my page too

[Ensign Steve]

Can't help you, sorry.

[LadyShea]

You broke Pinterest! Your 5 Pins don't reload. Like if I refresh, those 5 stay there while the rest reload. Like they are stickied

Coffee filter
Santa Cruz
Fog City Diner
iPad storytelling app
Linked IN

Now it's ONLY those 5 and nothing else on page at all, 3 minutes after hitting refresh

[lisarea]

Mine went blank once a while back, and it looks like that again. It never did repopulate the older pins, but it looks like I'm getting those same ones, even ahead of newer ones, along with a few older ones from someone else I'm following.

...aaaand now stuff is coming back, but those are still at the top.

Stop hacking, Ensign Steve.

[Ensign Steve]

[Demimonde]

Mine is borked too. I tried log in/log off and was thinking about doing the unfollow refollow thing, but then I realized if it is borked on your page ES it will stay borked on my feed.

Have you tried pinterest support?

[Ensign Steve]

Fuck it. I'm taking the whole thing down.

[lisarea]

Not before I REPINNED IT you didn't!

It's kind of weird how the order keeps changing. Could they be experimenting with some kind of weighting system or something?

[Qingdai]

I'm getting about 3 pins now. ES.

[lisarea]

Originally Posted by lisarea

Not before I REPINNED IT you didn't!

It's kind of weird how the order keeps changing. Could they be experimenting with some kind of weighting system or something?

Yes. Yes they are.

There's definitely some kind of popularity/freshness algorithm to the things that are popping back up to the top, and I DO NOT CARE FOR THAT. The good thing about Pinterest is that I can follow the things I want to follow, and not have my interests dictated by popularity.

I like seeing some home decorating and organizational stuff on there sometimes and all, but the thing I really am loving is the kind of abstract free association things that people get going on, and those are relatively unpopular in the community at large there. If I had my druthers, I'd be able to weight that stuff for my own board, rather than having whatever happens to have the broadest appeal in a huge and disparate community like that, because that's always going to default to unchallenging and inoffensive.

[LadyShea]

the thing I really am loving is the kind of abstract free association things that people get going on

Such as?

I also don't want my board weighted by popularity, I don't like that at all.

[lisarea]

The cleanest examples I can think of are Mr. Steve's red pill and blue pill boards, and this account. So for example, there'll be a bunch of pins about the Technological Singularity, or the seven deadly sins, or Dada or something, so you can follow and/or participate in little narratives and rabbit holes originating from different abstract topics.

[LadyShea]

So the spammers are annoying because they sucker you from a cool picture to some totally unrelated commercial site.

But, it seems to me, that you could legitimately affiliate market with Pinterest without ruining everything...say by recommending goods or books and linking to it via an Amazon advertiser account.