Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Comment Policy

I have recently been taken to task by one of my fellow bloggers over a perceived capricious rejection of comments here.

That comment was mistaken. I invite and relish respectful discourse on the topics I post on. I welcome dissent. I welcome principled debate.

Some have suggested that blogs are an open forum. I disagree with that, blogs are the province of their creator, for better of ill. The creator is responsible for the blog in total including the tone and policies. The policies should however be made clear the readers and especially the commenters.

My rejection of comments here is not capricious, I read and consider all comments before allowing them. I have only rejected a few comments. Fortunately that is easy because not many people leave comments because not that many people visit my site.

Of the few comments I have rejected, one I considered spam and the rest were obviously duplicates. In at least one case I went to considerable effort to recover a comment I had erroneously deleted.

I do demand decorum and respectful language. Ad hominem attacks will be deleted. Some may disagree with my position and limits. That is their right and I respect that, but elsewhere.

I will endeavor to inform individuals of the reasons for deletions, if their comments allow me to email them. If anyone posts anonymously and their comment does not show up in a couple of days, I invite them to email me, my email is in my profile.

I also comment on an number of blogs. Mostly those listed in the New Orleans Blog Roll. In a number of recent cases I have left an on topic comment which have not shown up on the blog. I wonder why. It may well be technical difficulties of the kind I experienced that caused someone to question my posting policy.

I invite anyone who has a problem with any of my posts to contact me and explain why they have a problem. My email address is posted in my profile. I will endeavor to reciprocate.

I also invite anyone who reads this to comment on the comment policy either here or elsewhere.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mominem, I can't imagine anyone having a complaint about comment moderation being enabled, and please feel free to delete any comment I duplicate. I can assure you, if it happens, it is inadvertant. It's your blog and you can do what you want. Harumph.

seajane said...

Just a note to let you know that there are lurkers here -- lack of my commenting doesn't mean your viewpoint isn't getting out there!

Thanks for your good work!

Anonymous said...

Golly, Jane, I hope you're still lurking. I went to your blog, which is quite interesting! I wish you had commenting enabled (even if it's with moderation), because I would have stopped in, set a spell and spoken right on up. ;)

Anonymous said...

you probably get read more than you know.
I for one really don't know what to say, so I just read

bayoustjohndavid said...

If you're referring to me, I thought I apologized. I tried to make it clear that I find it somewhat annoying because of not knowing if the comment gets seen or whether it will show up in time for a response, but usually it's not a major issue. There are a few bloggers that seem too selective--either they only take the time to look at and approve comments from names that they know, or they only post comments that they either approve of or find easy to disparage--but anyone can figure out who they are.

Basically, I was expressing my curiousity about why people use it along with the fact that I personally don't like it. Unfortunately, I alluded to you, as the latest example, at a time when I was posting about some things that I was very angry about. I apologize again.

I still think that's it's better leave it open and go back and delete the truly objectionable later, but that's a matter of personal opinion.

mominem said...

I was actually referring to bayoustjohndavid in the comment about taking me to task. I felt that misunderstanding, coupled with several recent instances of my own comments failing to appear on other blogs, warranted me making my feelings and policy clear.

No criticism or animosity toward anyone was intended in my comment.

As I wrote I invite anyone who notices a comment not appearing to contact me privately and I will respond.

I still believe recent posting problems may be due to blogger issues. I experienced a problem with another forum last year which was caused by overloaded servers and flaky software.

NOLA radfem said...

I just created a comments policy at my blog this weekend. There is so much abuse out there. I don't think bloggers have to let hateful comments onto their pages. Their pages are THEIRS, right? Their work? There's the rest of the intertubes out there for anyone who disagrees with you.

Just my two cents!