Winer decides to turn off blog comments | Hacker News Reader

Winer decides to turn off blog comments

scripting.com

19 pointslarrys22 comments

This is the post that put him over the edge:

http://scripting.com/images/2012/02/19/somePeopleAreVeryVeryDim.gif

I'm frankly not surprised-- Winer has complained in the past about comments. From the perspective of someone who often disagrees with him, I've never really understood why he had them in the first place, as he simply does not tolerate alternative views well.

The reason it took so long is probably that people who do not tolerate alternative views well do not usually like to think of themselves as people who do not tolerate alternative views well.

Comments are often worthless, and the reason comments are worthless is because there's no identity invested in them. When sites like HN and Reddit work (which isn't all the time), it's because there's a community of identities which are invested in the comments. When a site like HN or Reddit grows too much, though, most of those identities disappear.

Publishing your own blog post as a rebuttal, or emailing the author, are generally worth more, not only because of the identity involved but because there's a barrier of entry you won't bother crossing unless you're sure you have something to say.

I agree with this.

A lot of it is people using your space to say random things that have little to do with the blog post they're responding to.

At one point I realized that's just another form of spam.

Why not post your screed in your own space? Because you have readers and I don't. Oh. Thanks soooo much. :-)

I was thinking about doing the same thing, but then I've decided to keep them open, but just for 15 days after the publication date of the post. That way it is easier to moderate, and I can still have some valuable comments from the real followers of my blog. Just my two cents.

Your strategy makes sense. He's also deleted all the comments today that were based on this story here:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3609912

Seems like nearly everyone disagreed with him. Although the article seemed to not be directed at hacker types, or if it was maybe he was worried about looking out of touch.

The comments are still there, I just changed my site template so they're no longer part of the rendering. If you have an account on Disqus you'll find your comments are just fine.

Scripting News has gone the way of Daring Fireball. It was bound to happen.

Has Daring Fireball ever had blog comments? I don't think it has. Neither, from what I can tell, has Kottke.

Kottke used to occasionally open up posts to comments but hasn't done it in a long time.

http://kottke.org/plus/misc/opencomments.html

The TapTapTap guys made this http://daringfireballwithcomments.net/

I guess he figures people will just discuss the articles on sites like this, and he'll no longer have to worry about doing the moderation work. Lazy, but it could work.

The amusing thing about this is that Dave Winer used to be quite vocal about comments being one of the defining criteria of what makes a blog. I guess his thinking on this has evolved. Sad to hear that he will be shutting down opposing viewpoints on his site.

You have me confused with someone else. I often said quite the opposite.

Dave: weren't you arguing, back in the early days of blogging, that a blog without comments available did not fit the definition of what a blog is?

Agree with this. The best is to have once-a-week or something moderated Open Forum type post and solicit comment there on all or any given topic. We were living in the world of sanity in the days of editorial page with letters to editor, but blogging brought that model upside down. In the long run and collectively, the comments have not really helped other than where they are specifically appropriate (like link sharing sites like HN/Reddit etc).

Since the only time I have ever commented on his blog was to make a correction or help him out, I guess I've just been saved some work.

Those are useful comments, and I wish there was a way to just limit it to that. In any case, thanks for your offering of corrections and help. I still have an email address for that kind of stuff.

sadly, if comments were open, I'd point him out he may want to hide the email of the guy who annoyed him.

This is the comment that put him over the edge apparently:

http://scripting.com/images/2012/02/19/somePeopleAreVeryVery...

Actually, that comment came in as I was turning off comments. It just verified that I was making the right decision.

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