Pet Peeve #3,129: Restrictive Comments

I can’t tell you how frustrating it is to read an interesting blog entry and want to comment or join in an on-going comment discussion only to find that you can only comment if you have a Blogger, Google, or Yahoo 360° account. (The worst ones are even more obscure or require registration with the website.)

The absolute last thing I want to do is sign up yet another account where I’m going to have to remember yet another sign-on name and password — because likely my usual sign-on has already been taken and it’s not a good idea to re-use a password at more than one site.

To be clear, I already have to remember the sign-on and password for at the very least one email account, my online bank account, my work and/or school computer, each of my credit cards online banking accounts, some of my utility bill accounts who still refuse to send electronic bills to my bank but allow me to pay online through their own website, my own blog(s), and so on. So, if I encounter a blog which requires me to register to comment, I’m highly unlikely to do so…and I’m highly unlikely to go back no matter how good the writing is, because ultimately, I want to participate and connect.  If I want to just read opinions, I can read the newspaper or the A-list bloggers.
I think it’s ridiculous of a blogger to think that their readers are only Blogger readers or only Google readers or only Yahoo 360° readers. This is particularly naive if the blogger is participating in memes, webrings, and other means of connectivity to bring readers to their websites.

The worst type of offenders to me are those participating in memes specifically with the intention of increasing readership and commenting on their site. To me, if you are going to restrict such comment participation to only one type of readership, you shouldn’t be participating in such an open meme.

tags: pet peeves, bloghopping, meme, commenting, registration

7 comments

1. on December 7, 2006 at 1:16 pm

   Becky said:

   Amen sistah! I have signed up for all those things for the very reason I want to join in or leave a comment, but maybe I should have been protesting w/you!

2. on December 7, 2006 at 1:38 pm

   wil said:

   Unlike your blog, the authors at the venues you cited haven’t the ability to create filters to eliminate comment spam. At least in my case, I am interested in what real commenters have to say, not what some bozo selling viagra wants me to read.

   Choose a generic commenting identity and password and use it for all websites which require registration. Use a “Hotmail” address and just watch the freaking spam pour in. Then you might recall why there’s registration in the first place.

3. on December 7, 2006 at 1:52 pm

   LunaStone said:

   AMEN!!!

4. on December 7, 2006 at 4:45 pm

   Laughing Muse said:

   I griped about the same thing in my T13 this week. (Well, that and some other gripes. It’s a relatively disjointed list this week.)

5. on December 8, 2006 at 10:12 am

   Sparky said:

   hmm, I think Im going to have to just tolerate the anonymous spam as opposed to being restrictive

6. on December 8, 2006 at 10:30 am

   n. mallory said:

   Wil, I appreciate what you’re saying; I do. I’ve spent years combating spam. I don’t think there’s any universal way to eliminate the anonymous spam; certainly there’s no filter that works 100%.

   However, I do think it’s a big tease to invite people to your website as part of a commenting meme and then impose restrictions on who can comment. I almost feel like I should be warned somehow that my experience is not going to be 100% satisfactory — particularly since I start out every Thursday trying to read and comment on as many of the Thursday Thirteens as I can and I feel my time could be better spent reading just the ones that want to play along with the comment and link sharing.

   But that’s my 2cents. I’m allowed that in this country still.

7. on December 9, 2006 at 3:20 pm

   Jenny Ryan said:

   Oh man, this drives me crazy too!

   I used to have that on my website, but then one of my friends wrote me and said basically what you’ve said here.

   So I changed it, and now I have lots of wonderful people like you who stop by and say hello. Much better that way!

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