Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Advice needed

As you may have noticed I've got some rather nasty trolls around at the moment. How do you deal with people who have the time to post at the rate of one a minute (all in all caps of course)?

Should I switch to Haloscan for comments? Should I abandon blogger altogether? Could I manage the comments better through blogger. Or is the only blogger solution hand moderating the comments?

10 comments:

  1. Well, we moderate over at MTG. It is a little more work because you have to check and approve comments, but we feel more in control of the blog, so we think it's worth it. In principle, I would prefer not to censor, but in practice it's difficult to do that and maintain a reader-friendly blog.

    Do you think you attracted them from your stint at Alas?

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  2. Comment moderation; eventually they'll get bored and give up. It actually doesn't take that much time; I think there's an option where you can approve all the ones you want to approve of at once.

    I have no problem with mocking, deleting, or banning trolls, myself. The Internets are a big place. It's not like they have nowhere else to go. And generally it's not like they're exactly contributing much to the discourse, not to mention my good mood, so: off they go.

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  3. I'm not aware of any other option than moderation with Blogger. I've never done it because I didn't want to deal with the emails.

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  4. Yeah, I've gotten used to way too much email, anyway, I guess.

    But like I say: you don't have to do it through email. You can go directly to "comment moderation" (from the dashboard) and do it all at once. It means it might be a bit longer for the real messages to show up if you can't log in too often, but most people understand that.

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  5. Using the Word Verification feature is usually fine. Most spamming is done by programs, which are prevented from spamming by the word verification. Any other spamming is done by real people who have to take the time to type out the letters for Word Verification, which drastically cuts down on the number of spamming comments.

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  6. I've had to resort to comment moderation, since I've had nasty trolls too, who like to call me all sorts of unpleasant names. Do they have nothing better to do? They must have very sad lives.

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  7. I just don't read my comments, unless I'm feeling extremely bored, or unless I see something go through my mailbox from somebody whose opinion I think is worth paying attention to. But this is not a happy solution, and it is giving into the trolls. Their purpose is to drive people off the net, and abuse them until they give up or close down their comment sections in disgust (vide Span). But if you're not willing to wallow in a sewer or to moderate, then there's little other option.

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  8. sorry I dont have any techy skills and am posting to support your ongoing blogging courage and heart :)

    one point i would like to mention without distressing is perhaps my own past experience with being targetted by trolls sadly ...

    please please make sure your real world safety is as GOOD as online ...

    tis devastating to discover in such a *small population* as found downunder nz ...is that there can be some real real nasties - ones who will not just track in cyberspace - but also into your home i.e. depending on how much they trying to silence etc etc

    take care and keep on keeping on :)

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  9. Wow, I actually find it quite funny that this guy can accuse someone of being sexist and a "feminazi" in the same breath. I mean, if you're going to use a word like "feminazi", I think you pretty much forfeit all right to accuse anyone of sexism. And wasn't it the first rule of any undergraduate discourse that the first person to accuse the other of Nazism or fascism loses the argument? Trolls, eh? They can't even find an original way to insult anyone.

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  10. I've done (and seen done) comment moderation for a short stint. If they can't see their comments they usually get bored and move on.

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