I think a good blog should have easy to use, attractive, intuitive comments. This is one of the great failures of blogs like The Plank, which are fine blogs with terrible comments sections. Yglesias has consistently dozens of comments on his blog, but they’re not terribly fun.
The American Scene, in my humble opinion, could touch up theirs a bit and switch back to standard (simple) html from whatever that ghastly system is they use. I hope the comments here are okay. I’ve made a couple changes today. Feedback is always appreciated.
(On a side note, this is one area that I think a lot of big media players underestimate in importance. Comments keep people coming back for more. That increases page views, etc. There are even some advertising options available in the comment mix. I don’t know. I’m not a huge techie. I just think this is one area where a lot of sites could dramatically improve…)
Cheers.
Yglesias’ commenters are some mean S.O.B’s for the most part. It reminds me of the reasons I left chat boards for the blogging world. I will say that I never leave comments anywhere that requires a registration (Ezra Klein) and I prefer not to leave them where they are aren’t published right away.
I also really like the feature you all have where you can see what your comment will look like before you post. It gives poor typists like myself a chance to occasionally catch a spelling or grammar error.
The point I guess i am trying to make is that your comments section has all the elements I find enjoyable.Report
Agreed re: the preview feature, Mike. I’m also glad that is back. I also like the email alert feature on follow up comments to a post on which you’ve commented, though I don’t personally use it.Report
I use the email feature with heavily trafficked blogs where it’s harder to get back and check the post for follow-ups. It can be annoying when you lose interest in the thread but your still getting emails a week later. I’m sure there’s a way to turn that off…I’m just too lazy to investigate.Report