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Needless hand-wringing

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Illinois

* The Peoria Journal Star, which has a history of allowing some ugly, rancid coments on its site, writes about anonymous commenters…

A male teacher from an area high school stood accused of having a sexual relationship with a teenage female student.

The news story, in its online version at pjstar.com, drew the collective scorn of a group of people that seemed gleefully eager to blast the teacher with comments on the Journal Star Web site. Online editor Jerry Smith watched as anonymous rumor followed anonymous rumor. Invective followed invective. Hate piled atop hate.

Smith pulled the plug.

“I took down all the comments and made it impossible for any new ones to be added,” Smith said. “I’d had enough. It was all way over the top.”

* I was shocked when I read that piece. Why allow even one hate-filled, rumor-mongering comment? One just leads to more when commenters figure the green light is on, and that will likely lead to a flood.

Comment policing can be a pain, but plenty of bloggers seem to accomplish it without too much trouble, and they’re mostly one-person shops. Counting my intern, Kevin, we’ve got two sets of eyeballs trained on comments here, but even we can’t be around all the time. Commenters do a pretty good job of restraining themselves here, but it wasn’t always this way. I moved to a WordPress platform mainly so I could block and filter the goofballs.

Instead of whining about nasty anonymous commenters, just ban them from posting. And crack down on the idiots right away, rather than let things get out of hand.

It’s really not that difficult, and it’s worth it if you want to run a respectable shop.

* The Tribune’s public editor explains why that paper shut down comments on some stories, including political stories…

Earlier this week, the Tribune shut down comment boards on its Web site for all political news stories. It also took down comments on an opinion column about Muslims, and on a story about the Illinois governor and a story about a violent crime in which a child was killed.

Those are the latest on the list of volatile topics — including race, immigration and rape — that bring out anonymous writers who are so nasty, obscene and racist that the boards were beginning to read like a community of foul-mouthed bigots.

One writer started a rumor about an affair between two candidates for local office; others made salacious allegations about candidates and corruption.

Frankly, I thought the Tribune pre-approved comments on political stories, because when I’ve commented about a factual error in the pieces the comments have never appeared.

* Billy Dennis has this observation about what happened after he got tough with the morons…

Another effect is that fewer comments are being made here. And my hit counts and page views are down. That’s not making me happy, but I’m hoping the improved quality and trustworthiness of the comments translates into growth over the long haul.

That’s exactly right. Quality over quantity is the way to go. Some will complain about “censorship,” but what they’re really whining about is that somebody finally told them that their idiotic rantings are unacceptable. You don’t want people like them around anyway, because they lower the level of discourse.

For the life of me, I can’t imagine why newspapers like the PJ Star can’t figure this out. Who would advertise on a website that allowed such craziness?

posted by Rich Miller
Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 11:14 am

Comments

And, Rich, you Do a good job! Why I myself have been spiked several times - made me think about what I wrote and what was subsequently perceived. No complaints here, you run a good shop.

Comment by A Citizen Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 11:29 am
Is it really surprising that page hits and comments are down? People like that get their kicks by being obtuse and obscene and repeatedly checking and rechecking all the comments to get into online arguments. If page hits are what you’re shooting for by all means let the comment trolls have their way with it. But if they make your page on of their regular hangouts then you can forget about intelligent debate.

Comment by Learning the Ropes Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 11:33 am
It also helps to be judicious about what stories you allow comments on. A newspaper or news blog need not allow unlimited comments on absolutely every story.
The SJ-R, for example, doesn’t allow comments on stories of crimes or accidents involving local people, probably because they discovered that such comments nearly always end up falling into two predictable categories: 1) expressions of sympathy and encouragement (which are good, but can be posted elsewhere in many cases) and 2) rants about who or what was to blame. Unfortunately, family members or friends of an accident/crime victim who read a newspaper blog looking for the first type of comment often have to wade through a lot of the second type as well.
I assume that Rich is applying the same logic in not allowing comments at this time concerning the NIU tragedy.

Comment by Bookworm Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 11:42 am
A friend of mine that runs a online forum equates it to her living room.

If someone were to come into her living room and make the same or similar comments, she would toss them out of her house.

Same goes for the forum. She’s staked out her piece of the ‘net, and pays for it. Commenter’s don’t have a “first amendment right” to speech in such a forum.

And frankly, it drives me nuts when something is deleted or scrubbed and the person making the comment comes back bleating about their rights being violated.

Comment by Anon from BB Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 12:00 pm
===A friend of mine that runs a online forum equates it to her living room.===

I look at it more as my tavern. A commercial establishment, rather than my home. But, to each his or her own.

Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 12:07 pm
It also probably has something to do with the intellect of the average poster. Not to specifically pick on them, because it is just an example, but look at the blogs on ESPN.com after a game. There are some pretty goofy comments.

Suffice it to say, the average blogger that is interested in the inside game of politics in Illinois is probably a bit more sophisticated than the average person that reads and blogs on a regular newspaper website. That might make the job of policing the comments a little more difficult.

Comment by Trafficmatt Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 12:17 pm
Trafficmatt, you make a good point, but you also don’t see the stuff that’s held in moderation and then deleted. lol.

Still, I imagine we attract a better type here.

Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 12:22 pm
One of the worst offenders by far is the Reader. Their comment sections on their stories is like an electronic bathroom wall. It completely detracts from the credibility of the article and the publication as a whole.

They simply cannot understand that freedom of speech does not equate to a license to libel and lie.

Comment by Anonymous Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 12:38 pm
The Argu/Dispatch has the distinction of running the worst comments ever on their online paper. You can say anything! It’s a virtual hatefest for some local politicians. I don’t know why they even have a disclaimer because they don’t use it. I try not to get my news there because the comments are so distracting (and distorted).

Comment by John Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 12:58 pm
John, evidently you haven’t read some of the Pantagraph’s online commenters… if Rich established a “Worst Newspaper Blog Commenters” award I would give it to them hands down

Comment by Bookworm Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 1:06 pm
Evidently you have never seen qconline which is part of the Dispatch. This is the worst blogsite I have ever seen!

Unclassy, vulger, and inappropriate.

Comment by Truth Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 1:30 pm
You should see what these sore losers that lost elections are doing where we are from.
They should make everyone give an email address when they post, you’d lose about 3/4 of the cowards that post vulger comments right off the top~

Thanks heavens this blog has more class!
Great job Rich Miller~!

Comment by Truth Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 1:32 pm
One man’s idiot is another man’s Einstein. Some of your past comment deletions were really questionable…that if the pain level of the truth was too high those posts were yanked, which bugs me.

Comment by Crimefighter Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 2:02 pm
LOL. Any time someone claims to be speaking “truth,” I tend to back away. But you made a valid point. Some of the deletions are probably based on my perceptions. But, this would be my blog, not yours. See the connection yet?

Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 2:06 pm
Capt. Fax:
While you are an on-line god, places like the PJS have no sources and get little news unless it is left like an abandoned baby in the paper’s parking lot. I think they allow the comments so they track computer addresses and try to make the posters into sources and/or advertisers.

Comment by Reddbyrd Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 3:36 pm
lol

Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 3:39 pm
I think an important point is being missed here. It is the anonymity that empowers people to make outrageous posts. Eliminate that, you get a much different level of discourse. Rich, I know you disagree with me.

Comment by steve schnorf Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 6:14 pm
I disagree with you, Steve, because the discourse here is far above any other political blog I’ve ever visited. So, that really disproves your point, even if the occasional anonymouse might tend to support it.

Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 6:29 pm
Rich, You are right about the overall quality of the commenters here (though, as you said, we don’t know the quality of the stuff you red line). I wasn’t speaking to Capitol Fax Blog specifically, but especially to the various newspaper blog sites. Here, if you’re too stupid, people just ignore you.

Comment by steve schnorf Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 6:45 pm
Rich, if you look at the Blog as a tavern, when is dollar pitcher night?

Comment by Arthur Andersen Tuesday, Feb 19, 08 @ 7:39 pm
===when is dollar pitcher night?===

Every night is dollar pitcher night. Where’ve you been? lol

Comment by Rich Miller Wednesday, Feb 20, 08 @ 7:11 am
Since you’re fishing:

How is it that newspapers print the names of accused before a court has even rendered a verdict? False accusations and framing never, ever occur, right?

Why do most people assume annonymity is only used for bad things? Recall the Federalist Papers? How about Thomas Paine or Ben Franklin? How about newspaper editorials? Why should we discourage any citizen from sharing their views by requiring names? Aren’t ideas more important?

Why are blogs and suggestion boxes so popular compared to newspapers, which are in steep decline?

The Supreme Court has been very clear that discrimination based on gender and race are not acceptable, so that serves as a very good blog guideline.

However, should professional journalists who want to protect freedom of their press from being shut down or restricted by government be imposing similar restrictions on citizens?

Isn’t the best solution to free speech more free speech, instead of banning it?

Comment by Anonymous Wednesday, Feb 20, 08 @ 7:19 pm