Closed Comments: Don’t Make This Mistake at Your Law Blog
Are You Talking To Me or With Me?
My ironic moment of the day: I found the ABA Journal’s article Web 2.0 Still a No-go via Twitter, tweeted by Michael Lubofsky (aka @lawmarketing). I was fascinated by the article and had something to say. And hey, abajournal.com is in blog format, so yay; I was actually going to get to respond with what I thought were some very valid points.
Then I got to the bottom of the post and found this:
“Commenting has expired on this post.”
“How sad,” I thought at first. Then my thought pattern quickly changed to, “How ironic that a blog post talking about lawyers not understanding Web 2.0 has closed off its comments.”
Why in the world would anyone do this?
Blog Posts Don’t Expire
You slap it on the web; it’s there forever. Blogging is a conversation, and hopefully an ongoing one. Blog posts from 2005 still get new readers today, and those readers still have something to say. Is their view less important because they found your post a few years later? I think not.
The ABA post is from September. Clearly folks are still reading it. (At least @lawmarketing and I are!) What are they gaining by closing off comments?
Build Bridges, Not Walls
Closing off comments means you’re having a one-sided conversation. You’re saying “This is all about me. I don’t care about you.”
Web 2.0 is interaction. Today, next month, presumably twenty years from now.
How do you feel when you land on a blog post, have something to say, but then can’t say it because the blogger has put up a wall where a door should be?
- About Amy Derby
- Amy Derby, aka the Law Firm Blogger, provides professional blog writing services for lawyers who know they need blogs but either don’t have time or hate to write. She also provides consulting to lawyers who want to write their own blogs but aren’t sure where to get started. Formerly a corporate bankruptcy paralegal for DLA Piper, Amy has been blogging for lawyers since 2004. Read more.
November 18th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
I hate it, but understand it. Spammers are rampant on the web, and it eats up resources dealing with spam bots. I personally prefer “more strict” spam catching rules on older posts, similar to what SpamKarma2 supports, but some blogging platforms don’t support it. Drupal is notorious for having major issues with spam, and ineffective spam filters, for example.
November 18th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Hi Sara,
So good to see you here!
The way I see it is that some folks like to have their website in blog format. By this I mean, they don’t want comments. They want articles on the web. They do it on wordpress or another blog format because it’s convenient. I don’t have a problem with that.
But allowing comments for one month? Or a week? That I don’t understand.
My feeling is, pick one. Either you want interaction or you don’t. Saying “commenting open for a limited time only” seems silly to me… especially when your article is about Web 2.0.
Maybe I’m missing something. I’m hoping someone can explain what a benefit is of doing it this way. :-)
November 18th, 2008 at 10:33 pm
P.S. I’m also assuming the ABA can afford to hire someone to go through their spam. But I know what you mean.
November 18th, 2008 at 10:34 pm
Hi Amy - that is just silly. I hate that feeling when you’re just about to respond and you can’t. Only time I switch comments off is when I have pmt and I feel like I’m going to be extremely rude to people or ban them.
November 18th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Hi Cath,
Heh. I can completely understand in that case.
What do you think about putting up the option to comment only for a limited time on a post, and having the ability to comment “expire” after a certain period of time has passed?
ABA Journal isn’t the only online mag/news outlet I’ve seen do it. I’m sure there’s got to be a logic behind it. I just don’t know what it is.
November 18th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
All else equal, it is friendly and welcoming to keep comments open indefinitely/forever. From hard experience, however, all else is not always equal. In particular:
1) Comments on older posts are more likely to be spam. While advanced blogging platforms now achieve reasonable spam control through other means, on older platforms a comments deadline of 7 or 14 days can make the difference between a bearable spam burden and one that is out of control.
2) Other inappropriate content (e.g., hateful or vulgar) may be harder to catch when it takes the form of comments on old posts since one’s regular readership is not running across it and alerting the editor.
3) Similarly, some low-quality comments (hawking of quack medical ideas, wild accusations about public figures) can be addressed effectively on current posts because the regular readership will swarm and shame the offender. Posted on a six-month-old item, they may sit unrefuted indefinitely to be read by search engine visitors.
4) If a topic comes up regularly at a blog, it’s most helpful to the community if a newcomer seeks out the current post on that subject and joins the conversation there, and a deadline on old-post comments gently encourages that to happen.
5) Where the value of a comment to an old post is especially high — such as when it offers a needed correction, or gives someone who is criticized a chance to have their say — it is usually quite feasible to reopen the old post to accept the new comment; one could even announce at the bottom of all closed posts that emails are invited from persons who would like a chance to correct/respond.
None of which is to say that closing comments is the better option, just that the decision is going to vary case by case.
November 18th, 2008 at 11:35 pm
Hi Walter,
Thanks for bringing a fresh perspective. I appreciate the opportunity to see things from another point of view.
I agree with you that things will always vary on a case-by-case basis, but I have to wonder about the message big name publications are sending by putting up these kinds of walls.
Your points 1-3 make a lot of sense, but as someone who spends a lot of her time on wordpress blogs I can say that askismet (or any similar spam filter) + holding new comments in moderation would make these non-issues. Of course, this assumes that publications such as the ABA Journal have someone on staff to moderate. Perhaps they don’t. Would hiring such a person be worth the money? I’d say so. (Virtual assistants do this sort of work, and I’ve seen some who work for as low as $10/hr.)
Regarding point 4, if this is the case I believe it would make sense to redirect with a link at the end of the post and a note saying something along the lines of “join the discussion at [this new post].”
I’m not sure I understand your point 5. But if I understand what you’re saying properly, it sounds like more work to answer emails than to simply moderate comments.
I’m sure a lot of folks will disagree with me, but my feeling is that if your business/publication is going to blog, then you should make sure you have the time/staff/resources available to make sure your blog is reflecting you well. I’m not so sure shutting people out does that.
November 19th, 2008 at 2:07 am
In response to your response to Walter (LOL), I do comment moderation for less than $10/hr. ;-)
You already know everything there is to know about me. I just wanted to mention that although there are people like me to go through spam that askismet missed, spammers take up server load. If you get too many spammers attacking at once it can overload your server. I’ve known it to happen on high traffic websites. Although, in this case, comments haven’t been disabled, it was an idea that was being considered because of the load of spam bots on the attack - most of which are going after those outdated posts.
Otherwise… I hate closed comments. If you post something interesting, allow people to comment. I still get LEGIT comments on something I wrote almost 2 years ago. I wouldn’t want to push away people with an opinion. :-)
November 19th, 2008 at 3:18 am
Hey Angel,
Very interesting about the spambots taking up server space. I would never have thought of that!
I also didn’t know you do comment moderation. Good to know. :-)
November 19th, 2008 at 7:31 am
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