Submitted by gsamek on Wed, 06/09/2010 – 1:31pm
Session Convenor:
Geoff Samek
Session Reporter:
Geoff Samek
Discussion Participants:
Helen Fu, Jeffrey Jones, Kaarli Tasso, Travis Mitchell, Eugene Daniel III, Andrew Humphrey, Eric Galatas, (Two others only left email addresses)
What’s good about commenting on Websites?
- One participant noted that it can increase attendance to a venue and used a museum as an example
- Gives a sense of empowerment to the users
- Like many letters to the editor at the same time
- Can help you find like minded people
- Can also expose you to disparate opinions
- Reading the comments can help give you a sense of an article before you read it
- Can increase traffic
- Example was given of a site who removed commenting and then site traffic took a nosedive
What makes a good comment system?
- Notifications for replies to comments
- Article’s author helps moderate conversation
What are the problems with current comment systems? (Solutions if talked about found below each problem)
- Bullying online can drive people to be depressed
- Take an off-ramp from a conversation thread, allow one-on-one conversations
- Moderate comments from a live chat
- Older people accessing comment systems is tough
- Permanence of comments is scary
- Don’t want to blog because afraid of commenters
- Not understanding what your privacy rights are
- Dominating personalities can silence voices
- If you are a facilitator, actually ask more people to chime in
- Education
- Problem is intimidation, perhaps let a person know that they can contribute
- Post in another forum, or another reporter
- Misinformed rants show what people are truly thinking
- Bring order to the conversation
- Vote to ask for more
- Using a message board to help shape your opinion on issues
- Showing people how they arrived at that conclusion
- Feedback on ads
- Comments on ads
- Vulgar comments
- Limit comments, then push them out of the conversation
- Huge dose of positivity from commenters (fire extinguishers)
- Communities regulate their community behaviors, self-policing, that is real life reflection
- Facebook allows you to you report comments that are bad
- Putting up personal information
- Woman accused of molesting little girls, small town story became really big
If all else fails, when should we ban users from commenting, how should we handle banning?
- After banning, keep in touch with people
- Freedom of the press not true, being on a given website is not a right
- Suspend not ban
- Comment probation
- Trial of your peers
Other thoughts?
- Every article should have comments, even if it’s a tough article
- Have to involve the community in everything
Resources