Comments

Have you noticed… — 34 Comments

1. I think right leaning sites are going more and more to the subscriber model. I’m not sure why but the obvious reason is money. I’m not sure it is going to work. I joined Fox Nation to watch Tucker Carlson’s interviews although the recent ones have not been that interesting. I have not signed up for the “VIP” stuff. I get 30 fund raising texts a day from Trump.

2. In March FrontPage Mag’s comments section was de-platformed by Disqus.

   They now have another service providing their comment section, but that’s another threat to conservative blogs. It’s still free to comment and read comments.

3. while providing free speech to an exclusive conservative community …

   The siren call of exclusivity. It’s a feature not a problem. Not everyone falls for it, but most do.

   A couple years ago I switched to higher security setting on my browser so it won’t allow my disk be infected with third party cookies. A considerable number of sites won’t let you proceed until you enable these cookies. Bye bye websites.

4. I haven’t read a PJM article in several months now– once they started refusing access unless I closed my ad blocker, I stopped reading anything they post.

5. I read and commented at Caracas Chronicles for some 15 years. Over the years it evolved from a balanced/left-right/Quico-Juan Cristobal Nagel stance to unbalanced/left/Quico (a.k.a. Francisco Toro.).

   With the arrival of Trump on the scene, Caracas Chronicles did something I hadn’t seen it do before: take a very partisan stance against a U.S. Presidential candidate/President. While Francisco Toro wrote this for the WaPo, his attitude towards Trump permeated Caracas Chronicles, where he was editor . (No accident that Quico/Franciso Toro is a Reed graduate.) Francisco Toro in WaPo: Donald Trump is no Hugo Chávez. He’s more like Nicolás Maduro.
   (Reply: Maduro dissolved the National Assembly that got elected with two thirds of its members belonging to the opposition. Did Trump dissolve Congress?)

   As a result, the comments pages at Caracas Chronicles became rather raucous, as many of the commenters there were oil field Republican types. My biased view is that Caracas Chronicles should have maintained the more-or-less neutral stances it took towards Clinton, Bush, and Obama.

   When Caracas Chronicles changed editors in early 2019, one new policy was to do away entirely with comments. In a sense, I can sympathize with their move. The raucous comments became too much of a hassle for the site operators. But as their blatant partisanship in American politics was the cause for the increase in raucous comments, they brought it upon themselves (or the former editor did).

   As I had never contributed any money to the site, I guess I can’t complain. I used to read Caracas Chronicles daily. Now I spend maybe 5 minutes a week.

6. I read a few sites that disallow comments, but I am like you, Neo, in that I prefer that commenting be available.

   A note about ad blockers: I get it. I really do. Some of these sites need the ad revenue and if I block ads it’s detrimental to their income. I don’t mind unobtrusive ads off to one side or at the top or bottom of the page. I might even occasionally click on one of them if it piques my interest.

   BUT… One thing I can not stand are ads that are obnoxiously intrusive. That would be pop-ups and slide-overs. It’s like you are reading a magazine or newspaper and someone suddenly comes up and snatches it out of your hands and shoves an ad in your face. And then they inexplicably expect you to buy their product! This obnoxiousness is everywhere and it’s one of the quickest way to drive me off of a web page.

   I have an ad-blocker but if a site is interesting enough and it does not use the aforementioned obnoxiousness, I will white list it. If it’s just a quick link to a local news site and they demand I disable the ad blocker, I simply hit the “Back” button and go on with life.

7. I can understand charging to post comments but to charge to be able to read them is completely insane.

8. I think this is done for reasons of self preservation. Just as lefties are placing fake signatures to invalidate petitions for Republicans (allegedly) so lefties will (if they haven’t already begun) plant racist (maybe even threats of violence) etc comments on center/conservative blogs leading up to elections. Deplatforming here we come.
   It is very hard to monitor comments particularly if the commenter is malicious. All that commenter has to do is publish a threat and then screen shot.
   I’m all for bloggers protecting themselves any way they can and will gladly pay for access if it’s helpful.

9. You can see a site’s comments on disqus.com itself (at least for now), but you have to know the specific url. If you are a frequent commenter on a given site, that site will be listed under “Frequented Communities” on your main disqus page. Click on the links to access comments on posts on the respective sites. You may be able to figure out the url’s for other sites by trying various permutations on their names.

   Here are the disqus comment sites for three of the Salem entities. I haven’t figured out the disqus url for PJMedia.

   https://disqus.com/home/forum/hotair-th/
   https://disqus.com/home/forum/townhallcom/
   https://disqus.com/home/forum/redstate/

10. I love the comments section. It gives such a good idea of where people’s minds are. My family laughs at me for this, but I have learned so much by reading the comments in so many places.
    I don’t Facebook.
    Many of the sites that I read have eliminated their comments section or pushed it to Facebook, or like you just wrote, require subscription.
    I cannot afford all the subscriptions.
    Neo – I am not sure how I even found you, but you are on my daily read list. I don’t read most of the comments here, but some I do.
    You have a well run shop.

11. Gah I hope not.

    I enjoy reader reactions as much as the content. This decision is definitely a loss in my book.

12. Townhall also

13. I subscribe to the Salem group, but I seldom read comments there. Kind of a wild group in the comments. I subscribe to keep the independent information flowing. Same with the Epoch Times.

14. Charging for comment posting probably helps in keeping the level of crazy down.

15. I think it’s the dying gasp of the outgoing model for Social media: Where, if the content is free you’re the product. This has evolved to branch into a subscription model for independent journalists that reject platforms but have a talent-following, like Substack – of people who are willing to pop for subscriptions because the quality of the product is merited, top-quality investigative and editorial journalism.

    But that isn’t what the Salem Group offers. “…it will allow us to get away from Big Tech punishing us for user comments, ..” Oh, Puh-leez, the old
    ‘Big Tech’ boogah-boogah. They’re looking a little ‘Big’ themselves, these days.

    I think they’re just cashing in on the Substack wave, to persuade people they ought to pay a subscription for ‘exclusive’ admittance, to mediocre content – and they ought to admit it, but of course won’t.

16. I have noticed. I was a paid subscriber to PJMedia before it became a part of the Townhall group, and I seriously are not interested in all their site.
    I have a blog with few viewers, I also send out a newsletter to around 80 people with the same links and comments. I find more and more the links go to a paywall. I think they may be lessening the number of people who actually read them because of that.
    I am subscribed to far more than those, but to no one who is the single poster, as Neo. I am dropping some subscriptions when the year is up. I am elderly and I can read the major news sources I subscribe to and make up my own opinions. I do not need to pay to read theirs.

17. Yes, I too have noticed and regret it, but it seems the way the wind blows these days for good reasons and ill.

    I choose to see it as an opportunity to waste less time reading online blather, as interesting as it can be.

    Still, it was useful for testing “Am I crazy? Or do others see the holes in these carefully manicured opinions as I do?”

    How I remember the heady early days when the internet was to be breathtaking expansion of free speech and democracy!

18. https://ussanews.com/2022/06/17/the-cato-institute-fails-to-stand-up-to-cancel-culture/

    Here’s another item for the ‘libertarians are not your friends’ file. They’re not each other’s friends either.

19. Unless an article is of great interest, I don’t visit sites which do not allow commenting. Hardly ever does a writer get it exactly right and comments often mention aspects that the writer failed to include. As well as comments that refute particulars or even the whole of what the writer is asserting.

    Even more annoying is when a site superimposes a window on top of the page, requiring you to either subscribe or provide your email address in order to read the article. When I run into that, I refresh the page and copy the title before the window reappears and then paste the title into the brave search engine. Almost always, links to other sites carrying the article or discussing the article’s info/theme appear. I’m referring to news articles and opinion pieces. My view is that I shouldn’t have to pay to get the news or to read someone’s opinion. The days of the newspaper opinion pages are long gone.

    Recently I learned that Townhall, which I only occasionally visit has banned me and with no notice. Surprise, a first for me. I was unable to discover the particulars. Apparently someone complained and Townhall’s red flag algorithm was activated. Since I don’t curse, I can only surmise that someone didn’t like my opinion(s). Perhaps om 😉 ?

20. I used to belong to a group blog (yargb), and lately I have been receiving notifications from blogger that posts made 15 years ago have been “unpublished”. No media company associated with Silicon Valley can be trusted to allow free discussion or not misuse the data provided by their customers. Free, as in beer, is not free, and advertising can no longer pay the bills. I think we will need to pay hard cash for information and communication in the future, it is a natural reaction to censorship and abuse.

21. In engineering there is this thing called a “feedback loop.” Very generally, it is designed to scavenge output results, process them, and return information to the input cycle for the purpose of process improvement, error correction and output moderation.

    Smart designers, including those in the software arena, include feedback loops; it is also recognized that the shorter, and more precise, the feedback loop the better. Which is why companies, during product development, spend money seeking evaluations of proposed products rather than plunging into expensive design, production and public release to discover whether the product is publicly viable or not (see: Ford Motor Company’s Edsel for a good example of the latter, and more recently, the Walt Disney Company, Florida Division).

    Comments are both a writer’s and the readers’ feedback loop and to do without removes a critical aid to product improvement. Eliminating the comment feedback loop also raises questions about why that particular writer, or organization, finds sufficient value in self-isolation to establish it as policy (one classic example, very visible to all, is the Left refusing to consider any feedback on their positions as anything other than prohibited heresy).

    I understand the economics involved; maintaining even minimal decorum within the comment structure is time consuming and time is money, as is the possibility of defending against whatever Leftist actions may be incurred as a result of comments. That said, I don’t think writers, or their organizations, do themselves or their readers any favors by eliminating comments.

    It is, however, their site(s) and they are entitled to operate it as they see fit and readers are just as entitled to adjust their behaviors accordingly.

22. I’ve read Instapundit since the beginning. There was a time I wished he had comments, but I got over it long before he actually joined PJMedia and introduced comments. I can probably count on one hand the number of times I actually commented on one of Glenn’s posts. I agree with him and usually think nothing else needs to be said.
    As for their VIP service, we’ll I don’t really enjoy their other content. It doesn’t help that Stephen Green seems to think clickbait headlines are a good idea despite Buzzfeed teaching people to ignore them. The VIP stuff just seems a mirror image of leftest content. The lefts habit of just taking an opposing view of Republicans is bad when they do it. It is no better when some do the same in the right. The enemy of your enemy might be a friend, but I prefer just having friends.

23. I noticed that on HotAir recently. There are a few sources of news and commentary I’ll go to just for the content, but for the most part I stop frequenting a site once it closes comments. For one thing, the comments often are the most interesting part; for another, I’m averse to reading content from authors who restrict comments. It’s not a universal law, but it’s a good rule of thumb for avoiding wasting time on someone who can’t engage with others’ ideas.

24. Geoffrey:

    Are you feeling censored again? Or just petty? You could just look at the site and see if I had ever commented there (too much work, Geoffrey?) Here’s a clue, that is very, very, very unlikely.

    Just maybe it is your style and a site host that got tired of it? It may be as that that site’s host is not so gracious and patient as neo. Try using Occam’s razor, logic, and some self awareness.

    Other sites let you comment? Astounding! 🙂

25. I WAS THE first executive editor of Pajamas before the stupidity made them become the non-catchy PJ Media (Peanut Butter and Jelly Media??) I just left this over on Instapundit where they were humping their readership for money to “FIGHT THE LEFT!”\====

    =====

    Speaking as a former exec editor of Pajamas, the latest move of shutting up everyone except those that pay is a move that’s going to drive “Salem” back to being dunked like witches. I don’t mind asking to pay but to shut up those t hat don’t want to and make yourselves a nice warm little tent of conservatives…. well, it just reminds me of William Burroughs on hash smokers:

    “Now your heroin addict does not say hardly anything and that I can stand. But your Opium “Smoker” is more active since he still has a tent and a Lamp . . . and maybe 7-9-10 lying up in there like hibernating reptiles keep the temperature up to Talking Level: How low the other junkies are “whereas We–WE have this tent and this lamp and this tent and this lamp and this tent and nice and warm in here nice and warm nice and IN HERE and nice and OUTSIDE ITS COLD. . . . ITS COLD OUTSIDE where the dross eaters and the needle boys won’t last two years not six months hardly won’t last stumble bum around and there is no class in them. . . . But WE SIT HERE and never increase the DOSE . . . never-never increase the dose never except TONIGHT is a SPECIAL OCCASION with all the dross eaters and needle boys out there in the cold. . . .
    Been a long time on PJ…. back to when they hired somefolks to give them a name. Lived through that guy who wanted us to push his loopy lightbulb shit…. and so much else. Megan? Schmegan.

    I’m outta there. Fernandez should get going too.

    Discount “LOYALTY”???”
    Well, as we used to say on THE WELL (original social network): “LOYALTY MYASS”

    ===

    What can I say? I’m just that kind of a curmudgeon.

26. The new motto at Salem needs to be: “If you fence it they won’t come.”

27. So much good content – so little time.
    Besides Neo, I always read Glenn at Insty, and often Don Surber (Trump fanboy but good news summary, tho with annoying ads).

    Hang out here, including reading (most of) the comments & comment myself? Or try to write my own unread blog? Or hang out at Arnold Kiling’s econ/Libertarian blog? -which last year switched to Substack. Maybe Althouse? or her TikTok choices? Glenn Loury’s BloggingHeads TV (the Black Guys with John McWhorter) has been on Substack for a year, too, but allows comments to all (so far). Freddie DeBoer is making thousands monthly thanks to his readers there, as well as a lot of work for his, often mistaken, Marxist side. (Like Marx, good criticism but lousy solution ideas)

    The Substack model is to allow the content creator to say how much to ask for support, and whether all or some or none of the posts allow comments by non-subscribers.

    The early free, wild blogosphere was great. But unsustainable for the majority of bloggers blogging for free – most content providers need to get paid.

    Neo remains a hero for continuing to work so hard, for so little money – tho maybe the comments here and her own news addiction seem balanced so as to optimize happiness – changing to Substack might well lose this cozy set of dozens of good comments. Usually more than 10, seldom over 100 – very readable.

    What to do?
    Play some more computer game? Or read a book? (Go to bed after midnight?)

28. I don’t frequent websites that don’t allow comments. Now instead of reading PJMedia I just glance at it and move on. Their suicide, their business.

    The Daily Mail is the best internet news website on the planet. Not only will they print almost -anything- but the comments are a howl, and it’s free!

    Yahoo news committed suicide when they removed comments, nobody reads it anymore.

    Paywalls and no comments are the death knell for news and opinion websites.

29. The first blog I read consistently was Ed Morrissey’s Captain’s Quarters back in pre-Obama days; followed him to Hot Air and loved the commenter crew in the early days. My favorite bloggers (after Neo) got their start as “featured” commenters: J.E. Dyer and John Heyward aka Doc Zero.
    Then Salem bought the site, insisted on Disqus as their comment platform, and basically kicked everyone out that wouldn’t play.

    I seldom read Hot Air now; Jazz Shaw is occasionally interesting, but the same stories show up elsewhere.
    I like Red State’s authors but ignore their comments.

    The blogs where I do occasionally sample comments are Legal Insurrection, PowerLine, and According to Hoyt – as huxley said, it is useful for testing “Am I crazy? Or do others see the holes in these carefully manicured opinions as I do?”

    Sometimes it’s fun to spot the holes first; sometimes it’s just good to know other people are independently analyzing the News of the Day. Crowd-sourced additions to the media posts that Neo features are a great feature here, as are perspectives from people with so many professional, educational, and cultural backgrounds. It’s the real “diversity” that seems to be lacking in a lot of venues.

30. Seems necessary to get one’s news from a variety of sources.
    Diversity!!!
    For example, here’s a site that while partisan includes lots of news that might otherwise fall under the radar (or at least, MY radar)…
    For example:
    “WH spokesperson ‘reminds’ us Biden ‘fixed’ the economy”—
    https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/355147

    Imagine missing an important item like that!

31. I wonder what they will do when their daily visits drop off as all those who were there from the beginning but refuse to pay decide to spend their time going to other websites? Is anyone really going to miss Allahpundit’s seeming hatred of conservatives? I don’t bother with any of them now

32. I’m purturbed by the degree to which Salem Media has absorbed starboard commentary. If you have a critical mass among their ownership, directors, or management for whom it’s just a business, it can be lost in short order. Someone bought out Drudge, though neither he nor the current owners have never admitted this. By a number of accounts, the younger Murdochs would like Fox to take the path of the old broadcast networks, but are facing resistance.

    In re Hot Air, I cannot figure the point of employing Allahpundit to write for them. A plurality of the posts are contributed by him and he’s clearly hostile to Salem Media’s clientele and their worldview. He cannot function as an alternative voice in a salutary sense because he’s too much of a sophist to persuade anyone to take his commentary seriously.

33. Their “reason” is an excuse and in my experience a lie. The claim that they want to eliminate trolls and bots is an excuse to censor comments critical of their authors or pieces.

    I used to be a frequent reader and commenter at both “Bearing Arms” and “Townhall.com”. I’m not shy about calling out conservative outlets when they spread incorrect information or, even worse, employ the same illegitimate tactics that the left use in support of a position.

    Because our positions are correct and are supported by the truth, we do not need to resort to logical fallacies, take quotes out of context or misrepresent the positions of our opponents.

    But I digress…My point is, about two years ago my comments started disappearing or being marked as potential spam. Not all my comments…the ones supporting their positions and writing were left alone, only the ones expressing criticism were being “detected” by their spam system.

    I swore off all of the sites associated with that group as soon as I noticed the pattern. “Conservative” media that considers itself above criticism is not conservative at all; I don’t trust a pixel displayed by their sites because they have demonstrated themselves to be unworthy of such trust.

    For the record: I have never issued a threat, resorted to name calling, foul language or insults to make a point on one of those sites…an excuse people who can’t handle criticism commonly use to hide critical comments: claim the comments were “abusive”.

    This comment is representative of my writing style and tone. I can disagree without being disagreeable and that is what I endeavor to do. The only way a comment of mine could be considered “abusive” is if the recipient of the comment considers disagreement to be abusive.

    It doesn’t surprise me that the Townhall properties (or whatever media group actually runs them) have devolved into only allowing comments from subscribers. They only want to provide a platform for sycophants and are not open to any form of legitimate discussion.

34. I cannot speak for others, but I generally don’t frequent any place that does not have comments — and particularly those that don’t allow me to comment.

    I am not saying I remember them and refuse to read anything, but if you link me there, and there are no comments, or if I have to be a paid member to comment, I won’t generally read links to other pieces there, or go back to look again on my own. I will only read the linked article, then leave. It will not enter my “main rotation” of sites to check, ever. All visits will be peripheral.

    They can do what they want, I won’t give them any grief over it. It’s just a question of whether they want my eyeballs to be reliably on their site.

    ——————-

    Moreover, I think closing down comments means you wind up speaking to the choir, and creating just as bad an echo chamber as anyone on the left prefers — because, face it, no one from the left is EVER going to join you just to comment. So you will never hear anything anyone on the left has to say in response to your assertions. And that’s just as bad when the right does it as when the left does it, even though at least the right-person will wind up blundering into whatever the left has to say due to its ubiquity in the merdia.

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