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It's a question of where you want the conversation to happen and whether you want to encourage this conversation in the first place. There are plenty of (succes
by Udo 15y ago
It's a question of where you want the conversation to happen and whether you want to encourage this conversation in the first place. There are plenty of (successful) sites that act merely as a megaphone for whatever the author has to say, while he doesn't care about what random readers think. Meanwhile, lots of blog authors pray for some kind of feedback, some kind of legitimate comment that never comes.
Providing a comments section or forum builds a community around information sources that are already valuable and/or have a high reputation. It seems a little short-sighted to miss this opportunity to build a relationship with your users that goes beyond satisfying their immediate needs. People have no loyalty to their information sources, they'll switch when something better comes along - but they do hesitate to leave a community, even a stagnant one.
- wiljr 15y agoGood points. I think the conversations should be happening regardless of the site. If I receive a comment on H/N, I want to reply in the easiest way possible FOR ME so we can carry on the conversation. Right now, I have H/N hooked into Engag.io, so I can follow all discussions in one place. That's easy. Too many places to moderate comments is too difficult. This difficulty only increases as your stories are published more broadly. From a site / comment manager perspective, is it quality or quantity that drives the decision to keep comments open / closed? I look at it like an actor - when you are starting out, you'll take all the publicity you can get. When you're on top, you've accomplished being noticed, now you want "better" publicity. Or, something like that.