July 7, 2013

I had to shut off access to the comments today, so here's a poll.

The Althouse blog with the comments off is...
  
pollcode.com free polls 
Posted by Ann Althouse at 6:17 PM
Tags: ,

4 comments:

Ann Althouse said...

La la la.

"Comments on this blog are restricted to team members."

7/7/13, 6:20 PM
Ann Althouse said...

If you hit the view button, you get to a page where people actually can view comments.

That will demonstrate to you what the problem was.

Remember that video the other day about the hippo enclosure, the one where each fresh pool immediately became the hippo toilet?

7/7/13, 7:44 PM
Ann Althouse said...

At the comments over there, Freeman Hunt says:

"Suddenly it is clear why the comments are off. Enjoy the break!"

Thanks. I will miss your comments, and the comments of many others.

Please blog at your own blogs and link to me. I notice where I'm getting linked, and can link to your blogs to include you here.

Awkward perhaps, but maybe healthy to be more outwardly directed.

Please, good commenters, email us, and show us what you are writing on blogs or just send comments and I can add them in post updates, as I did before I let Posner push me into having comments.

7/7/13, 7:48 PM
Ann Althouse said...

Aridog emails:

"It is your blog to administer as you wish. I’m sorry too, because I think this decision is a mistake and will reduce the intriguing forum that was to just another opinion blog. I gather there is no alternative for discrete banning. I will still read, but with less interest because I won’t see how what you say impacts a crowd of mostly bright folks, far smarter than me in many instances. I’d also hope I’m not counted among the abusive comments, in as much as I usually try to comment in good faith and support the effort to sustain the blog per se.

I have a vague idea of why this seems necessary…the recent re-arrival of a previous “ostentatious” commenter who has a blog of their own and has made it their business to denigrate both Ann Althouse and Meade personally, over the past year, and in fact in one flaming post cited me, as “Aridog,” as a primary example of a racist on a racist blog….which I learned of through another blog site. This guy knows my name and has exchanged cordial emails with me, and should know I am hardly a racist, let alone either of you. I decided upon seeing that flame job that he was not of sound mind and I did not respond, on his blog, or elsewhere where it was cited, or on Althouse either. He’s scroll over material, due to that evaluation, just like a couple others on the prior Althouse blog as far as I am concerned.

Finally I am sorry that there apparently isn’t a systemic way to just block offensive commenters, by nickname or ISP or both, in the Blogger system. I am peripherally involved, as a contributor, with another blog using Blogger and we are so small we don’t have the problem. Our little blog is an offshoot from a much larger blog [at the time, much smaller now] that was taking offense to any dissent, so about 10+ of us went our own way to keep in touch without a lot of hassle [we also use emails a lot between each other, as you said you once did]…a collection of engineers, foreign service officers, redneck nurses, Canadian conservatives and such. Given that Blogger doesn’t permit such discretion [as far as I know…which isn’t much]. My database experience is extensive, but not website related per se…more ODBC functions to join on several global Db’s and such for analysis. I fully understand the decision to cease allowing comments once the offensive level reach such a volume that it impugns your, and Meade’s, own reputation and respect in general. The post I cited above involving racism is a perfect example … when the author decides to return and denigrate your hospitality directly.

Best of luck to you all. Have a great summer."

7/7/13, 8:09 PM

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