Hi, all. I wrote this to see if we can generate some discussion about potentially changing the Missourian’s and Vox magazine’s commenting systems. Currently, each requires a commenter simply to log in to the appropriate web site, type in the box, and hit “submit.”
There’s been some discussion among a group of editors about moving our commenting to the Disqus system, which allows users to log in once and comment across multiple web sites. Joy Mayer also has a capstone student who had asked us to add a Facebook “like” button, which is trivial, to the sites; and also to use commenting from Facebook.
I’m tentatively against the change to comments, for these reasons, which I had sent in an email to Joy, Jake Sherlock, Nick Jungman and the capstone student involved:
Either solution (Disqus or Facebook) would duplicate existing functionality, and would thus replace our current commenting system (unless we want two commenting systems running at once, which sounds nightmarish).So commenters would have to have a Facebook account (or an account on a social media site supported by Disqus) to be able to comment. And there are plenty of people, my wife being an example, who don’t have an account on any social media site.Also, we’d be handing over control of the commenting to a third party; comments would be subject to the commenting policy of Facebook or Disqus, not ours.That all said, we can certainly implement Facebook or Disqus commenting if the newsroom’s ok with the tradeoffs, but I’m going to probably wait to see if there’s a consensus on that.
Joy responded as follows:
Poynter did a piece on some news orgs using Facebook Comments.
The bottom line seems to be that the number of comments goes down but the civility and level of discourse go up (because it links to an established online identity).
There is an option to use Facebook Comments but still allow people to log in in other ways if they prefer. From the Poynter piece: “However the use of real names is not a required component of Facebook comments. The system enables users to sign-in using AOL, Yahoo, and now Hotmail accounts – all of which allow screen names. The option to require Facebook-only sign-ins can be selected by the site owner.”
So, at this point, I’m going to throw it out to the community. There are basically three response paths I see:
a) keep the current system
b) use Disqus
c) use Facebook
Which do you like, and why?
I don’t have experience with Facebook Comments, but I’ve implemented Disqus on a few sites and there’s a lot to like about it.
Let me say first that ceding so much control over the Missourian’s comment data could have serious repercussions, and it’s not a decision that should be made lightly. Is there a mechanism for extracting our data should Disqus go out of business? Will our reader’s personal information be safe? These are important concerns.
But there are nontrivial advantages to using Disqus for our comments, including:
A much more robust commenting system than the one we currently run, and seamless access to future features. A short list of what’s available with Disqus that we don’t currently implement: threaded comments, avatars, ‘like’ buttons, email notifications for new comments or replies, the ability to hide comments or threads, and a leaderboard of the most ‘liked’ or ‘disliked’ commenters within a community.
Furthermore, Disqus comments are implemented in Javascript and load asynchronously with the page. That means that our page-load times will no longer be constrained by the speed of our comments database; the comments will load after the page does.
Having comment code that runs client-side also gives you access to all sorts of cool features, like realtime comments (“Five comments have been posted since you loaded this page. Show them?”) and being able to post multiple comments without having the page refresh each time.
There are technical advantages to offloading our data, too. We would never again have to worry about maintaining or upgrading the database code that stores the comments, or the password and username retrieval system. We wouldn’t have to worry about supporting new or deprecated browsers, and we wouldn’t have to worry about how best to implement new CSS3 or HTML5 features that are coming down the pipeline over the next few years.
I don’t want to sound like a Disqus shill, and like I said, there are serious concerns with a change of this size. But there’s also an argument to be made for offloading some of this stuff to the people who can do it really well, and not trying to keep it all in-house.
Not sure what I think.
If the outcome is to lower comments and raise civility, then I don’t think we need it. Compared to most sites, in my opinion, our civility level is quite high.
The functions Kyle describe are good. I’m not sure that many of the advantages listed really affect us. (Are we really getting significantly slower page load times because of the volume of comments? It doesn’t seem like we’re at that level, but I’m not a techie.)
Personally, I think the e-mail notification would be the best function in terms of promoting more comments.
I don’t think we’re getting significantly slower load times due to comments, because we just don’t have that many comments on most articles. But there is some advantage to asynchronous loading.
I don’t think an outcome for us would be lowered comments, since we have (fairly successfully) defended our real name policy against trolls. But you make a good point in re civility.
Of the advantages that Kyle offered, Tom seems to like email notification. What else does the community like? They included:
* email notification
* comment threading
* avatars
* reputational ranking
* hiding comments
* realtime comments
E-mail notification is a useful feature that I always enable on sites where I comment.
I am mostly interested in making comments more social. People should be able to share their comments on Facebook and Twitter. A “pingback” style feature that notices when a story is linked via social media and adds that to the comment stream would be hugely interesting, too.
A third-party system would make that easier to achieve, but it might facilitate our own experimentation and research to keep the comments in-house and take advantage of the social networks’ APIs to make this happen.
I like Disqus. Please, no wall of cats.
Of Rob’s list of stuff we like about Disqus:
* email notification
* comment threading
* avatars
* reputational ranking
* hiding comments
* realtime comments
Can any of these be accomplished through django in a reasonable time frame?
Depends on what you mean by “reasonable.” The support in Django (the code library) for commenting is extremely sparse. We could do that, but not for at least a couple months, because Noah is backed up with three or four other major projects.
I’ve never commented on your site before, but I heard about this discussion via Twitter, so I speak as that kind of user who “stumbles” upon a site or discussion I like (rather than a dedicated follower of the site).
As a user, it’s easy to leave a comment here on the current system. But it’s also easy to leave a comment via Disqus or Facebook because I am a Facebook user. In addition, those platforms allow me to publish my comments to Twitter and/or Facebook, which I often like to do. The result is that more of MY friends will hear about the discussion and may choose to add their voices. Since many of my friends ONLY use Facebook, making it easy to cross-post comments is a way to pull them out of that site and on to yours. (Adding a “Like” button to your site would do this to a lesser extent.)
In short, I think switching systems opens you up to more people stumbling upon your discussions through social networks and could make the readership and commentators more diverse than they are currently. I like the sites that I find that are using Disqus because I know the comments are tied to real identities and the conversation will be more civil (not that incivility seems to be a problem here).
Those are my two cents. I’d post them to Twitter if I could.
Thanks, Jeff!
I’d tend to defer to Joy on this one, since she has done all the extensive research on what factors improve engagement, and, as other Mizzou alumns like Doreen Marchionni tell us, engagement is quite an important factor when it comes to trust and credibility of news sites online.
I recently showed my students some data gathered by PostRank on Mashable: http://mashable.com/2009/12/18/postrank-tour/ Now, obviously Mashable is a bit of an outlier, because hello, it IS a site about tech and social media. But look at how much higher the engagement is off-site (Facebook, Twitter) vs. on-site (comments). To me, that’s an argument to at least consider using a commenting system that is more social media friendly.
I don’t have strong feelings on Disqus vs. Facebook – I guess personally I like Disqus a little better because I like to comment using my Twitter account.
But for me, I REALLY prefer not having to take the extra step of entering name, mail, and website. Is it that hard? No. Usually these things are saved or auto-filled-in, though sometimes for whatever reason mine aren’t. But one extra step is a lot for a busy person. I’ve unscientifically polled my students on this, and they all said they prefer commenting using social media vs. a normal commenting interface.
Thanks, Carrie!
At Mashable we used to use disqus, and had a lot of issues with it. It was constantly down or giving us errors. Sure, Mashable is a big site with lots of traffic, but I’ve heard this complaint from other disqus users. I think Facebook Comments seem to have gotten a good reception and can really drive engagement and traffic, and also authenticity, something that a lot of news sites are looking to improve. Of course, each have their kinks.
Thanks for the comment, Vadim. So you’d lean towards Facebook at this point?
I find the comments interface on the Missourian site to be clunky and limiting (sorry Noah) and it doesn’t let me use my online handle. So, I’d be all for moving to another commenting system.
I do a lot of commenting on a lot of sites, so I wind up using both Disqus and FB comment systems. I strongly prefer Disqus to Facebook. In terms of interface and use between the two, I think they are nearly a wash, although Disqus has a more robust allowance for text formatting, which I like.
An important difference is that Disqus does let me use my online handle instead of my real name, which allows me to build my unique digital profile. There’s only one h4×354x0r, but there are a dozen Derrick Fogles. My handle isn’t anonymous by any means, but I believe it does provide some level of “security by weirdness” between me and other knuckleheads out there. It takes a google search on my really goofy handle to find out who I really am, if you don’t already know.
I don’t like Facebook comments, because I almost always DON’T want my posts to show up in my facebook feed. I rarely use facebook to spout political garbage (most of what I post on discussion boards); I use it to connect on a more personal level with family and friends. Unchecking that stupid “post to my” box every time is really annoying.
Twitter is much more of an anonymous free-for-all, where my followers/ees run the spectrum. If it were trivial, I’d probably start sending my frequent Missourian diatribes to my Twitter feed.
So, count my vote for Disqus.
Thanks, Derrick, appreciate it. No reason to apologize to Noah. The Django library is clunky in general in how it handles comments, and IIRC about a quarter of the Python code for the entire site is taken up in the comment functionality.
I’m still sorry Noah has to deal with it
agreed
I would go with Disqus Comments, based on my experience with J-School Buzz. JSB readers can choose which social media profile they want to attach to their comment: Facebook (most common), Twitter, Yahoo or Disqus. Almost everyone in our target audience has an account set up with at least one of those websites, so the system probably doesn’t exclude anyone.
The Missourian’s site is ripe with trolls, a problem for any news site. Disqus is helpful for dealing with bad commenters because it allows you to block IP addresses that have proven to be a pain in the ass. You can also create a list of words that will get a comment automatically red flagged and is held for review by a moderator.
It’s not just that Disqus is a great commenting system, but the system now in place on the Missourian’s site is awful. While the Missourian asks for a full name, it’s largely an honor code for giving your real name in the registration form. It’s also a huge waste of resources, based on my experience. When I commented on the Missourian article about the RJI assault, my username had gotten messed up and a Missourian ACE had to manually fix it. Also, we have enough accounts created on different websites already, plenty of users don’t want to create *another* website account they might only use once.
It’s great to see the Missourian isn’t waiting until the Junit Fairy arrives to improve comments
Thanks, David, for the feedback.
I, too, would defer to Joy and her research. I would love to see an increase in the comments we have to any and all stories. But I wouldn’t want to decrease civility or in any way risk the credibility of our publications.
So much deference! Ah, the pressure!
Thanks for all the great ideas, folks … especially from those of you who aren’t normal followers of the inner workings of the Columbia Missourian.
There are big pluses and minuses to Disqus and Facebook comments. The real benefits with Facebook comments are the pulling in of comments actually made ON Facebook, and the use (and display) of real identities. We could decide whether to allow folks to log in in other ways (which I think we’d have to, to not exclude folks who aren’t on Facebook). It’s awfully nice with Disqus, though, to be able to choose which profile to sign in with. Like Carrie, I prefer to sign in with Twitter most of the time, and keep my Facebook activity for people I actually know in person.
Both platforms bring more functionality, and a social premise, to commenting.
I found this post, which makes some great points.
http://www.damondnollan.com/2011/03/facebook-comments-vs-disqus.html
Vadim mentioned problems with Disqus stability. Has anyone else experienced that?
Interesting comments all around, but it reminds me of folks arguing about which model of car is the best — lower mileage, better view, more comfortable seats, four doors, stick shift vs. automatic transmission, four-wheel drive, front-wheel and rear-wheel drive. All of the comment options offer something good and something not so good. I prefer commenters to use their real name (as much as we can possibly make that happen). I almost never read comments anywhere if the commenter isn’t readily identifiable — whether I agree with them or not.
I want to be able to curate them for civility. I want them on our website — I think having them in one spot builds our “community.” I like Jake’s suggestion to beef up django options to make that happen, if possible. I want a comment section that doesn’t drive the ICE box crazy with constantly monitoring more and more sites.
Some of the comments about Disqus and its unreliability make me more than a bit nervous. We are all used to technical problems, but I have a theory that the more you deal with tech issues while trying to work with journalism issues, the more errors that occur. It’s a lot like the theory of multi-tasking — it sounds great, but the neuro research proves it’s a really a way of wasting time in a lot of different ways and the results are often less than your best — inferior work compared to what you would have achieved if you finished one task at a time.