Having a second account, known as a sock puppet, is generally discouraged. However, people have sock puppet accounts for various reasons and they are not forbidden unless they are being used deceptively to mess with the site (see this thread for an example).

Some reasons people have sock puppet accounts:
- their account was blocked/banned and they want to "start over" (this is not always okay, check with mathowie if you are uncertain)
- they want to ask a question in Ask MetaFilter that is not linked to their primary account
- they have a second account for making jokey comments (see usernames like baby jesus or Official Mefi Head Complainer)

It is against the rules to use a sock puppet to get around the time limitations between AskMe, MeFi and MeTa posts. People who do this will risk losing the sock puppet account, getting a time out on theeir main account and/or having their extra question or post removed. Please do not do this.
(tags: sockpuppet accounts users ) April 20, 2006 - back to questions

You can add their username to the end of a string like this:

http://www.metafilter.com/username/carsonb

This works with usernames with spaces or some with other odd characters and is not case sensitive

http://www.metafilter.com/username/PUKE & cry

Please note that this does NOT work with a small subset of usernames [for example c:\awesome] in which case you'll have to find a comment or post by that user and click on their username.
(tags: usernames users profile ) March 23, 2007 - back to questions

MetaFilter: http://xml.metafilter.com/rss.xml
MetaTalk: http://metatalk.metafilter.com/rss.xml
AskMetafilter: http://ask.metafilter.com/rss.xml
MetaFilter Projects: http://projects.metafilter.com/rss.xml
MetaFilter Music: http://music.metafilter.com/rss.xml
MetaFilter Jobs: http://jobs.metafilter.com/rss.xml

There are also a few specialized RSS feeds

tag feeds: http://www.metafilter.com/tags/peace/rss
user feeds: http://www.metafilter.com/user/1/postsrss [for all posts by user #1]
sidebar blog feed: http://www.metafilter.com/sideblog/atom.xml
thread feeds: http://www.metafilter.com/12345/rss [works for all threads across the site]
(tags: feeds rss xml tags users ) March 6, 2006 - back to questions

If you contribute to other online communities, you can link to your profiles at some other sites from your MetaFilter profile page. (announced here) To add a link, click on "Preferences" at the top of any page, and scroll down to the bottom of the "Customize Metafilter" page. Under the heading "Social Apps", choose a service name from the drop-down menu and then enter your username at that site. If you want to add another link, click "add another service" and you'll get another menu/name combo. When you're finished, click "Save your Preferences" to save everything.

If you want to remove a link to a site you've added, go back to editing your profile. Clear your username for the link you want to remove and click "Save your Preferences". The link won't show up on your profile anymore.

It's not always easy to figure out your username at other services, so here's a quick guide to finding your username/id at some of the more challenging sites:

Flickr
Your Flickr photostream URL does not necessarily contain your Flickr username, and your Yahoo! login is not necessarily your Flickr username. To find your Flickr username, sign into Flickr and take a look at the line at the top of the page that says, "Signed in as...". Whatever appears there as a link is your official Flickr username. Make sure your Flickr profile isn't set to hide your profile from searches.

LinkedIn
Go look at your public profile page (you'll have to log in if you haven't already). Your profile page will show you your public profile URL and whatever is at the end is what you need to enter. It should look like this:

http://www.linkedin.com/in/[some name]

Grab [some name] and enter it as your LinkedIn Name in your MeFi profile.

SportsFilter
Log into SportsFilter and click on your profile page. You should see a URL like this:

http://www.sportsfilter.com/member.cfm/[some number]

Jot down the number, and enter it as your SportsFilter ID in your MeFi profile.

Facebook
Log into Facebook and click on the "Profile" link at the top of the page. You should see a URL in your browser address bar like this:

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=[some number]

Copy the number, and use that as your FaceBook ID in your MeFi profile.

Steam
Log into the Steam website, and click the "View my SteamID" link toward the top of the page. You should see a URL in your browser address bar like this:

http://steamcommunity.com/id/[some name]

Use the name as your Steam Name in your MeFi profile. If you see a URL like this instead:

http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/[some long number]

Go into your Steam profile settings and set up a "Custom URL". Note what you enter for that custom URL value and use that as your Steam Name in your MeFi profile.
(tags: social users profile userpage ) August 8, 2007 - back to questions