ACTUAL SITE NEWS: Over the next few days, I'll be migrating our Comments server from JS-Kit/Haloscan to either Disqus or Blogger.com itself, because we now have to do something.
Echo appears to have remigrated all of our comments back into Blogger, making that a viable option, but my sense is that Disqus is a better platform overall. If we do move to Disqus, we are going to be losing previous threading as well as anonymous comments, apparently (but can thread moving forward), but on Blogger we'd lose the ability to "like" each others' comments.
Thoughts? Clock is ticking.
Hate Disqus.
ReplyDeleteFacebook comments? We'd keep threading and liking, and gain avatars and traffic generated from our comments showing up on our walls.
ReplyDeletenoooooo. Hate Facebook commenting, primarily because you lose the ability to comment anonymously (or pseudonymously).
ReplyDeleteBut lose anonymity/pseudonymity, and I'd rather preserve it.
ReplyDeleteBesides anonymity, there's an issue with allowing third parties to access your data -- that's why I never ever use Facebook apps or use FB info to log in on any other site.
ReplyDeleteHave never used Disqus, so I got nothing on its merits, but just so I understand: does the above-mentioned concern over loss of anonymous comments, as with threading, refer only to imported comments from the past, and not comments going forward?
ReplyDeleteAnother question that may help or may complicate: how well would either of the choices currently under consideration work on mobile devices? Although not for the present comment, I'm more and more frequently accessing the site and commenting via iPhone - the current situation requires the extra step of going from the mobile version of the site to the web version, because commenting on the mobile version appears to be a good way to ensure you flush your comment into a black hole, never to be seen again.
1. Under either format, we'd have anonymous and threaded comments going forward. I know Disqus won't honor either in the import; I'm unclear whether Blogger does.
ReplyDelete2. I think both are mobile-friendly.
Also, Facebook commenting would require that people have Facebook accounts, which is where I bid you all Godspeed.
ReplyDeleteThere's a parallel universe where your mobile comments come out of the black hole and appear to the startled residents of an alt-planet as the pronouncements of an inscrutable god.
ReplyDeleteHow much do people really care about the ability to like comments? Because that doesn't seem like enough of a reason to not just use the Blogger commenting system, which is more versatile overall.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. Missing out on "liking" is not really missing out at all, to me.
ReplyDeleteI like liking things. Not sure it is a dispositive issue, though.
ReplyDeleteThreading is more important than liking, I think. I suppose we could all just "like" in a stand-alone comment instead - although that will probably get old very fast.
ReplyDeleteI vote for Blogger, simply because I already have an account with them and don't with Disqus.
ReplyDeleteAnd I hate Facebook with every fiber of my being.
ReplyDeleteSo if we vote for Blogger, does that mean I won't have to write down all our book and podcast recommendations in the next week? If so, Blogger!
ReplyDeleteEither that, or in a big pile of pneumatic tube cylinders on the other side of the island.
ReplyDeleteI've come to appreciate that the current system throws phone-based comments down a well. So by the time I get home someone else said what I was thinking or I realize my comment isn't worth the effort and I move on. Keeps my interactions down to one or two a week. I prefer that.
ReplyDeleteIt may be moot but you can mobilely access the web version by ending the url with /?m=0 instead of /?m=1. Then comments don't disappear.
ReplyDeleteThough if anyone could help me figure out a way to get to the web version through Google reader, that'd be great.
Or it won't matter next week. So.