The Book Tower

I’ve come across a number of blogs recently that have their own comments policy. Judging by what I’ve seen, I am finding that there are two main areas worth discussing. I’m calling them the haughty and the housey.

The Haughty Comments Policy

This is a comments policy that says something like:

Only make a comment on this website if it is an intelligent contribution to the discussion. Irrelevent comments may be deleted.

It might be me, but I find this type of comments policy arrogant. After all, somebody has taken the trouble to read an author’s posts, perhaps on a regular basis, and is now taking even more trouble to write a comment.

If it’s judged offensive in any way, fair enough, but who has the right to decide if a comment is an intelligent contribution or not? Surely if it isn’t then that will be apparent in the context of the discussion itself, which is what discussion is all about. While I agree that some comments might have absolutley no relevance at all and deserve to be deleted, is this something that needs to be spelt out? Isn’t this taking it all a little bit too seriously?

The Housey Comments Policy

This describes the author’s blog as being akin to their own home, so where you wouldn’t trudge into their house with muddy boots and help yourself to a glass of their vintage port, you’re also expected to treat their website with respect. This means no foul language or irreverent comments, especially if the author doesn’t know you.

While I agree that it’s obviously rude to wade in and start posting rude comments on a website you may have only discovered five minutes ago, I think the house analogy isn’t really an appropriate one to use.
Would you leave your front door open all the time for anyone to stroll in, but at the same time put up a notice warning them to behave themselves if they did? The very nature of a blog means you are leaving yourself open to the world. It’s your open front door to your own very personal views. If you’re worried about this, maybe don’t have a website. Or don’t accept comments.

Which leads me to moderation. There are, as we all know, two types of comments setting. The moderated and the unmoderated.

The comments on this website are moderated, mainly to fight off spam. Textpattern is pretty good with spam, although I have had the odd spam comment slip though undetected when I’ve left comments unmoderated. The ones that always begin with the words ‘nice site!’ and then list dozens of unscrupulous links.

I also moderate comments for a couple of other reasons. I sometimes get comments that, although not spam, are best described as odd. Comments that say things like “nice day for a trip to London!” or “I am a Yahoo!” where, however you look at it, they definitely do not make a valid contribution to the discussion. But maybe I should leave the peculiar ones in. I don’t want to come across as haughty.

I also worry about coming back from my hols to find my website has been taken over by squatters, who use my comments section for their own unmoderated forum. But this sounds like I’m getting a bit housey…

So if you have a blog, do you have a comments policy and are your comments moderated or unmoderated? Any squatters, and what do you do about those occasional ‘weird’ comments? Do you think you are housey, or maybe even a little bit haughty?

Let me know…