Comment Isn't Free.
There's a bit of a brouhahahahaha (sorry, I couldn't stop typing it) brewing over at The Grauniad's Comment Is Free: Georgina Henry's imposition of a 'one comment per half hour' rule seems to have riled up a lot of people.
"For those that want to cotinue to debate the issues raised by CiF bloggers, we're proposing to introduce a comment frequency cap which will only allow individuals to comment once every half an hour. If it works it might make for more thoughtful contributions from those who tend to write before they think. If it doesn't work - ie, if it simply dries up or drives away the best while leaving us with the worst - we'll think again."
Reaction has been swift, for example:
YellowDuck Comment No. 139173 July 18 18:38 DEU Hihi. CiS? Comment in Slow-motion? That will be the end of flippant posts, then, funny one-liners, add-ons you had forgotten about, spelling corrections, etc. We'll have to think about everything for half an hour now and then mull the next reponse for another half an hour. Then you'll get comments like this:
"Well, if you may remember, MrPikeBishop, about three hours ago you said this, to which I replied two hours ago, such and such and, followed by a PhD thesis on the uses of tooth brushes throughout the ages and zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz (4076 characters by the way).
So: Anyone up for a posts trading scheme? I will actually be working a lot next week and the week after, so I've got some spare posts to go around. But this week I'd like to sharpen my debating skills in one of them Israel/Palestine circular argument threads and could do with some extra amo. Anyone willing to swap posts and character counts?
Do the number of posts really influence the debate? I don't think so. Over at www.spiegel.de a respectful German weekly with a popular debating forum, comments are moderated, but on average the number of comments goes into the 1000s. Needless to say, because of the moderation, all comments stay on topic. Thing is, of course, moderating comments costs money, you have to pay someone, even if it is just a happless arts student, so this is out of the question.
Either way, Georgina, you have to start thinking about rebranding yourself. Comment is obviously not free this way. It would be taking the piss to leave the name as it is.
There are some right nutters posting on Comment Is Free, and I do have some sympathy for those posters (who appear to be in the minority, based on a quick scan of the comment threads) who think a strong policy to deal with them is a good idea. It is very irritating to have to wade through piles of dross posted by one troll just to find one tiny nugget.
But there are always trolls, they're the cockraoches of the internet. Commenters already have to register, and there's already post moderation - and I do think the average commenter is perfectly able to either squash or ignore a troll, so on the whole I'm much more inclined to agree with commenter TheNuclearOption in the same thread:
[Guardian]T&C number 11 reads: "11. Arrogant Tossers We reserve the right to behave like arrogant Tossers whenever we see fit. We are the professionals and you are just proles. The scum who we allow to gaze with adoration at the wonderous prose of our contributors. Should you have the audacity to show up and ridicule the limited intellect of our contributors we reserve the right to show our unbridled power by acting like Tossers. At least we'd like to if we had any half decent developers but on the salaries we pay we are lucky to recruit McDonald's rejects."
OK, now I'm offski. Just wanted to vent my spleen. Also, I'd like to say to the developers that I'm sure you do an heroic job for very little money. I've seen the adverts and bloody hell you guys are paid peanuts.
By the way Georgina, someone's already posted the easy-peasiest comment-policy hack in the world - just delete your cookies, and hey presto, no time-limit.
Silly Grauniad, no clue at all.I'll give the last word to commenter Zolaink:
It seems that this thread is the most popular on CiF. At the same time this thread is mostly, over 90% to say the least, critical of the management techniques and provider ethics.is there something to be learnt from this?
Posted 12:27 PM by Republic of Palau
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"I think all foreigners should stop interfering in the internal affairs of Iraq."
-- U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, 21 July 2003
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