December 29, 2006
Moderating comments.
If you want to know why I've started moderating comments, it has nothing to do with the Reason Magazine attack. I'm up to fending that off. In fact, it's just great the way I've been -- essentially -- authorized to take off the itchy, stuffy gloves I've been wearing for the last few weeks. I'm moderating comments because of one individual -- and regular readers know who it is -- who is a longtime abuser of the comments section here.
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17 comments:
The person (who need not be named) has ventured into Deb Frisch territory by calling you at home and stalking you on your blog. I tried to engage this person in conversation and they cannot be civil when someone has a different opinion from them. Have you engaged a restraining order against that person yet?
I'll be good. I promise I will.
I like, however, that the Reason arguers think it's about them. So self-important. So victim-y.
Clearly, this is the place to be online today.
Why don't you just publish her IP address and let the your readers shut her down?
Sorry you were attacked and had to moderate. Reading about your encounter was unpleasant enough, so I'm glad not to have been there! I'm a Libertarian for civility in conversation. A civil Libertarian, one might say. Here's wishing for more transideological understanding and a happier New Year.
...and now she's over at my blog causing trouble.
Her IP address, by the way, can be found by checking my sitemeter. Ameritech.net is her domain name.
the NYTimes ran "abuzz"...at the onset a superb blogging spot that alas was ruined by the cut and paste. Not the case here but the seeds are in place.
Simply paying attention to a miscreant will force the broomsticks to multiply and carry yet more water to fill the pot.
Try the intellectual approach before you resort to scissors.
Ban the loser, I say! (I hope it's not me! :))
Ann,
Sorry to say it, but after reading the comments here and elsewhere more carefully, I think the Libertarians had the better of the argument. We think of civil rights in different ways, but do care about them. That's no reason to burst into tears. What they said is not surprising to anyone familiar with Libertarian thought.
Please take a deep breath over the New Year's weekend and think this one over. The nastiness on all sides does no one any good. And good luck stopping the troll.
It seems some may not know this: Blogger does not provide the tools necessary for banning by IP address, so that's out.
Blogger does not provide the tools to ban by user-name or registered email address, either.
All that Blogger allows are the options to require a Blogger ID to post comments and to enable comment moderation.
I've heard that it is almost impossible to get someone banned by Blogger itself, the only way to prevent unwelcome comments without moderation.
Unfortunatley, when moderation is off during a siege like this, some of us have seen how it is possible for one person to create havoc by posting dozens of irrelevant, highly personal, and often harrassing posts to various threads within the space of minutes.
I guess it is the blogger equivalent of a sustained denial of service attack.
Thanks for filling us in on the rather unfortunate facts, IR...
Just switch to haloscan - where you can ban by ip address.
who is this individual and why does she have a problem with Althouse or this blog?
it only takes a few reprobates to undermine the whole post/blog system when it is based on common decency and reciprocal respect
Isn't that true!
but your present difficulties are the immediate future for popular blogs that don't toe the "progressive" line.
True, most of the foul-mouths around here are theoretically "progressives." And the DailyKos comment sections I've read were almost all sewers, but that holds true for most Little Green Footballs comment sections I've read and even many Reason Hit & Run comment sections I've read as well.
Perhaps it is a political junkie thing.
I've noticed a lot of the old commenter crew has dwindled as the jerk commenter factor has increased. Unfortunate.
Never wrestle with a pig.
You will just get dirty, and the pig actually likes it.
Trey
Some of these posts touch on an issue I've thought a lot about lately. There are tons of Internet forums out there today, and a lot of participation. I'm talking about just about any place where a comment can be dropped. Back in the early 90s, before the web was big, there was pretty much just Usenet, home to maybe a few hundred thousand people discussion a few hundred topics. Now there's millions of people playing, and thousands of outlets, of all sorts - Usenet (still), blogs, tech support forums, chat rooms, and so on.
My first question is whether there's enough people mixing it up now to see some trends in the way discussion is held. The biggest arguments happen over religion, politics, economy, and philosophy - it affects everyone greatly, so it's easy to have a strong opinion and feel motivated to defend it. How many people are doing that online now, who previously were only exposed to their local knitting groups and coffee tables?
My second question is what those trends will be. The more people talk about stuff, the more they learn not only about the stuff, but how to talk about it. How many people didn't know what ad hominem and non sequitur meant before they got into an online discussion? How long before everyone knows what a sophistry is? L-D debate? Parliamentary procedure? How long before a common debate structure emerges, tailored to online discussion, so that you can spot a "newbie" within two comments?
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