Looking for feedback
We’re trying out a new comment system on CNS Business and would appreciate any feedback and problems that readers find with it. The new business site layout is based on WordPress rather than Drupal (as this main site is) so we cannot use exactly the same comment system. After looking at all our options, we decided to go with Disqus, which is the neatest system that we have found so far.
We could commission someone to build a custom comment system but we’d rather avoid that expense if possible.
You can still comment anonymously – you have to click the little box that says “I’d rather post as guest” – but you will have to supply a name or a pseudonym and an email address. If you comment a lot, you can register with Disqus with either a real name or a pseudonym, or you can log in using a Facebook or Twitter or Google+ accounts, so you don't have to go through that each time.
Comments will be moderated before being posted as before.
Some of the advantages are that you can share particular comments that you especially like, and you can view comments from newest, oldest or “best” – comments that people have starred as a favourite.
So please let us know what you think, or if you have found something better that will work with WordPress.
Category: Viewpoint
As the saying goes, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. However, it's your gig. I've commented quite a lot (on many sites) over the years, but I'm getting pretty tired of it all these days. I am retiring from intellectual jousting.
Hi-ho, it's off to work I go, gotta make that crust. Good luck CNS.
John
I just tested it out. Disqus does not check to see if it's a real email address so apart from having to put in a name and making up an email address it's really not that different. Shame about the trol button though.
Something that works on some sites – and looks like it should work on CNS News since posting a comment ('as a guest') pops up a 'comment to be reveiwed' note similar to the main CNS site – is using a fake email address, e.g., anon@ymo.us. It is, however, annoying to have to do this every time and I find my commentry on those news sites that require fake names/emails is lower than on CNS. But higher than on those sites that don't take fakes, on which I never bother to post, for personal reasons, even if the site is international and will 'never' be read by anyone I know in real life.
Have you tried registering with Disqus with the fake email, which might make the process easier? Would that work or put you off commenting even more?
No. Because I have no interest in registering anywhere. Even if its all fake. Just on principle. (Why would they want me to register, to go to the trouble of retaining my information, if they don't plan to do somethign with it? Even if thats just send me spam. Adn if their use of my fake email fails, from their point of view, will they allow me to continue to comment indefinately?)
And then I need to remember what fake info I gave disqus. What fakery I told Compass. Who I was on CNN/Yahoo/MSN/Weibo/etc. So I don't bother. I might go to the trouble of making a 'one off' nom de plume for a comment, but usually the very act of having to enter the anonymous information makes be double-think bothering to leave a comment. (Which may raise the level of the commentary on the other hand; no silly one-liners.)
Udate: My test on the CNS-Bussiness site worked and my fake name comment is showing. I hope people like what I have to say. I thought it was insightful. 🙂
Unfortunately the vote up/down buttons on disqus are not as obvious as the thumbs. (And no laugh button. 🙁
Further update: On a US news site last night I was reminded of the truly off-puting registration requirement before voting up/down on a comment. At least Disqus doesn't require that. So there are much worse systems out there than having to give Disqus a fake name/email in order to post. Thanks for keeping CNS comments as open as possible, it is appreciated. (Anonymously appreciated, of course.)
CNS, just put it this way –
ALL IN FAVOR CLICK THUMBS-UP HERE –
ALL OPPOSE CLICK THUMBS-DOWN HERE
Hi CNS,
While I completely understand the idea of technology rehaul… I'm not sure Disqus is that great. Here I see it take forever for the Disqus results to load (on the sites that have them) and sometimes they do not even load at all.
Further, my comments would stop entirely as providing an email would be a non-starter. I am sure that you are still standing beside your previous statements that you do not collect information on the people leaving comments but this seems like a system that would indeed collect data.
Moreover, if people started putting 2+2 together from poorly chosen pseudonyms (some not too sharp knives in a drawer) perhaps there could be fall out on those people, violent or otherwise. I don't like it. Too risky.
CNS – I LOVE THIS NEW SITE. One of the best parts are your reporting skills but the other part is the fact that you leave the comments moderated yet untracked and unfiltered. Please keep freedom of speech alive in Cayman through your news site. The "other" paper collect this information, and more, and you could not pay me to post on that site … or read it for that matter but that is for another day.
Can you provide evidence that emails and ip addresses are not being tracked already? Just curious.
CNS: If you leave an email when you comment, that stays there. If you don't, there is no way to find out your email address from your IP address. IP addresses are stored for a few hours and then purged.