The Art of Commenting
Blog February 9th. 2008, 3:14pmOur dear Clog is going through a lot of growing pains this semester. Not only did we start the year off with a new editor, but we’ve also had to work with a tiny staff while adjusting to a whole new blog design.
If you take a glimpse at the Daily Clog right now, you’ll see a clean, attractive interface–the kind you’d want to show to your mom. Beautiful, yes, but the transition did come with various technical difficulties. Since the semester began in mid-January, the Clog and its resident tech have been working hard to fix a wide spectrum of flaws in the new design, whether they be lost comments or broken links. We still have a lot of work to do, so bear with us.
Speaking of lost comments: Where have all the commenters gone? The last time we checked, blogging was supposed to be a highly interactive medium.
Don’t get us wrong. We do get comments, and we very much appreciate them. The occasional gripe about our writing abilities is nice, but we love what you think about the actual post topic even more. According to Lifehacker’s guide to weblog comments,
“Leaving a comment on someone’s weblog is like walking into their living room and joining in on a conversation … (g)ood blog commenters add to the discussion and are known as knowledgeable, informative, friendly and engaged.”
Why not jump into the Clog’s lively conversations?
Geek to Live: Lifehacker’s Guide to Weblog Comments [Lifehacker]
Popularity: 32%
Tags: blogs, commenting, redesign, technical difficulties
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February 11th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
The answer to your missing comment question is the obvious one: No one wants to comment. A blog post that says “Hey, look over there” doesn’t really stimulate the reader to say “I want to join this conversation!” because there isn’t one. The conversation is wherever you’re pointing.
If you’re genuinely interested in getting comments, you need to post original material that the reader can directly engage. After you build up a commenting base, you can then get them to hop on with other random topics, but they won’t join the party if the party is just a list of directions to other parties.