by human or robot?
In my first year of blogging, spam comments were quite a nuisance, or shall I say a menace. Then comment approval, various filters in my blogging program as well as turning off comments in older posts made things quite a bit easier. But some nasties still make it into my email for approval, only to be deleted – so why do they bother as they never make it into the blog?
I’ve come to realize that these minutes are precious to me. I am seriously considering setting up comment registration with TypeKey. It is free for everyone, even if you don’t have a blog. It requires registering only the first time. I know it’s a bit annoying, but isn’t it a great way to find out if the commenter is a human or a robot? If everyone did this we might eliminate the spambots!
So, dear readers and commenters, what do you think? Have you used comment authentication on your blog? Are you pleased with it? Are you turned off by having to register at someone’s blog before commenting? Will I turn away my commenters by doing this?
May 28, 2006 in Blogging by Marja-Leena
I use it now, and have not found that it deterred other commentators from my blog. It does keep spam out very handily–and bear in mind, spam is just as annoying to commenters as it is the the blogger him/herself. I strongly suggest you use it and soon.
I’m also contemplating setting up my blog to prevent anonymous commentators from leaving comments, but am not quite there, yet.
Hey, Peter! I had to go back and check out your comments setup, thinking you had switched to TypeKey! It’s Blogger – it annoys me when some blogs allow only blogger account holders to comment. That was the first question I had of TypeKey, that it be free to anyone to register as commenter. Your sign-in is not really a registration though, so I hope that will not be a deterrent. I’m also wondering whether to stay with comment moderation as a second level of control.
By the way, I fiddled with “commenter”, “commentor” and I see you also use “commentator”. I knew I was too lazy to go check the dictionary yesterday! My spell-checker did not like my preferred “commenter” – another difference in Canadian and American English ?
Actually, I think that “commenter” is one of those words that doesn’t exist until we need it, and passes off the radar screen of the language as quickly as it is used.
“Commentator” actually means someone in media whose business it is to offer opinion on various subjects. It doesn’t really quite jibe with commenting as we would think of it blogspace.
I personally never leave comments on blogs that require registration. Just lazy, I guess.
To me, a commentator is someone, e.g. on a news program, who delivers commentaries. Someone who leaves comments is a commenter – that’s just simpler and more logical.
I should add that I understand your impatience with spam. After less than a month of requiring all comments from new commenters to be held for moderation, I’ve already gotten tired of that and installed an open-source anti-spam program that seems to be working pretty well.
Oh Dave, I’d hate to lose you as a commenter! You wouldn’t make an exception? I too usually would not register, but have done at some favourite bloggers. It’s actually painless, you just do it once.
That’s what I thought of commentator. Okay…now I HAD to check the dictionaries. Dictionary.com has commenter, even giving commentator as one definition, but does not recognize commentor even though my spell check preferred it. Hmm.. Both my newish Oxford English and ancient American College have commenter, so I’m going to correct my post! Spelling is one of my strengths, but the darn spell checker threw me off! Now I’ll not trust it.
I agree with you on this. I hate having to delete automated comments left for approval. It does take time and is very inconsiderate as much as it is annoying. I will follow up on what your readers say. I don’t have many readers now but know that it’s only going to get worse as my site ages.
BTW.. love your blog. Is there a way to link to it and vis-a-versa?
Thanks!
~nancy
If it doesn’t get much more complicated than this, I’m OK with it. Your “thing” here always asks “Remember personal info?”, but it never does.
Spamblocker at Vuodatus has worked pretty well, but it can be penetrated tho.
I don’t think your readers will shy away for a little registration.
Hi Nancy -thanks! Of course you can add a link to my site on your website (just capture it from the top of the main page). I’ll come by and visit yours asap.
Thanks for the support, Sikuri – I think I may go for it! I can always just try it out for a while.
I don’t mind registering – as a TypePad blogger, TypeKey keeps most of my info anyway. I registered once with Blogger so all I have to do is enter name and password to get in. (Btw, on your comment box I always have to re-enter my info despite clicking the “Remember personal info” button every time! It doesn’t keep it!
I used an approval-first method on TypePad for awhile, then took it off as I wasn’t getting much spam anymore. You can always experiment.
Thanks for the feedback, Leslee! I’m going to give it a try.
Several people have mentioned that “remember me” does not work – I’ll get it checked out.
Battling spam is an ongoing problem I cope with when managing an online forum. I guess since Anita’s blog is now set up so you have to register, if you did the same then I might as well! I think with devoted readers, they’ll do it. People really are lazy and I’m a prime example. My blogger blog doesn’t make you register but I don’t like how the comments feature is set up. I like Leslee’s suggestion of experimenting.
Thanks for writing in, Erika! I am going to give it a try, and hope my readers are faithful (and not too lazy).