I met a few folks at aecklund’s super cool (albeit insecure) downtown hangout and also on the now infamous library tour. Before then I knew of no one personally, if you don’t count having read Killing Yourself To Live.

My nom de plume comes from a song title (not some presumptuous status statement), but “convincingindie” was deemed too long by the lords of how-long-your-mnspeak-handle-can-be. And “cindie” would have been misleading (ala taylor and hipmn).

I used to think Max was always drunk when he commented. Now I know he is.

And I was the guy who found Apesgrapes – the face for MNspeak’s midget clown obsession.

Taylor I met at Geek Prom. S4xton (Aaron) at the Prairie Home Companion Premiere. And I met Steve Marsh for the first time at the Twins game Friday night. I had lunch with the Bartel Cartel. And I stumbled into Kristof’s store. And ALAMN Bob has been in a story or two as well. I believe that’s my MNSpeak family tree as far as off-line meetings go.

Back to work.

Now that Rex has provided the roots of the MNspeak family tree, I’d like to hear more…

I actually met Taylor through MNspeak.

This site really developed out of conversations I was having with Chuck and Alexis and Sarah, and all three (plus Geoff and Jaime and Rachael and Taylor) contributed heavily early on.

Although sites like Metafilter, Gawker, Gothamist, and Flavorpill were all big influences on this MNspeak, the greatest influence was probably a combination of talking to Chuck about web communities and watching Alexis’ web habits. It got me interested in ways that people carve out identities online, and I wanted to build a community around these ideas, starting with my friends.

I met Leigha in literally my last hours in town. She and Taylor are both super hot.

I’ve never met indie or tmayhem or mpls simpleton or bud or several of the others with nom de plum’s.

And I still haven’t met Max, but I hope to buy him a beer when I’m back in town in a few weeks.

At first, MNspeak released a new feature every couple weeks (commenting, for instance, just barely made it into version 1.0), and if I could add anything now, it would be more social networking (Friendster, MySpace, Facebook) functionality, because people seem really interested in knowing each other.

An FPP is a Front Page Post. When you comment on an FPP, it is called a “comment.” People sometimes mistakenly refer to a comment as a “post,” which, you can imagine, gets confusing.

An introductory course in 1337?
I can’t locate the discussion where that originated (okay, I’m actually just too lazy to search for it) – but I recall it having to do with “kids these days (and Prince)” and their obnoxious text messaging language (LEET or 1337). It then, of course, spawned an absurdly long thread in 1337.

An explanation as to why we’re obsessed with midget clowns?
About a week before the new Minneapolis Central Library opened, a handful of mnspeakers were invited to take a private tour of the place. Cristina was on the tour, and brought up the question of signage and general navigability. A rapid-fire discussion ensued about how to rectify the problem, and it was finally determined that midget clowns would be awesome guides at the opening. The library didn’t seem very amused by the suggestion.

What makes a good FPP? What the hell an FPP is anyway?
Hell if I know.

And seriously, don’t all of you know each other?
I think there was a core group of people (Rex’s friends – Taylor and Alexis?) that were here from the start who knew each other. And I think there have been quite a few meet-ups/parties since then. For the first month or two, I didn’t know anyone (I thought hipmn was a girl – turns out hipmn was Max, who I did know). Then I met Rex right before he moved out of town. And then I met a handful of folks at the library tour. I think a lot of other people are in a similar boat.

Okay – it’s too hot to type any more. Hope this helps!

And seriously, don’t all of you know each other? I’d love to see a MNspeak family tree detailing who’s met in person and how long you’ve been carrying on in this scandalous fashion.

You try sitting in one spot for 40 hours a week and do nothing.
It’s not particularly interesting and it saps the life force out of you bigtime.
I’m seriously considering talking to my boss and saying this isn’t really working out and hoping they can do something about it. I hate the fact that they make jobs sound challenging and difficult and they turn out to be nothing. I made a point of asking in the interview process, “is there enough work to keep me busy because I hate to sit there and do nothing.”
I was assured that there was plenty to do.

I sort of have to pay my mortgage so I can’t quit.