A lot of great conversation goes on in comments that shouldn't be stuck behind the fold. Publishing these back to traditional blogs is a great way to bring attention to great content. It needs to happen more often.
That's why we've been trying to make it even easier.
Announcing Reblogging on DISQUS
Now on comments throughout DISQUS, you can find a reblog link where you can publish a quotation of the comment to your blog. This quote is cited with the original author, the blog where it originally appeared, and a link back to the original comment to give the discussion full context.
At the moment, we're supporting publishing to Wordpress, Movable Type, TypePad, and Tumblr with more platforms to come.
So next time you see a comment that everyone really needs to read, give it a whirl. We're excited to see more good content bubble to the surface.
arunjacob
· 1 year ago
Centralised comment systems like disqus could provide some solution to what you are looking at. Its easier to put some features into these tools.
Another issue is that currently if you have a good post, a lot of great responses are not actually comments to that post, but would be separate posts written by people on their own blogs. This is so that people can maintain their "reputation score" better if they post a view as their own blog post rather than as a comment. This basically decentralises the discussion. You need something like techmeme to track it, but you would miss out on some great comment on an obscure blog.
Again here, systems like disqus can solve the issue if I am able to auto-repost my comment onto my blog, as well as leave it as a comment on the original blog post. With all my good comments in disqus also adding to my reputational score
edythe
· 1 year ago
Great post. I agree. And often when you read a (soft news) story in a newspaper online, the comments are half the good of it.
Emil Sotirov
· 1 year ago
Fred... do you mean something like what we do on Aidpage? See my current blog there: http://architect.aidpage.com/ ... notice that all comments are included in the main feed.
This is also visible on the home page of Aidpage (www.aidpage.com).
In our older versions of Aidpage (since starting it in 2005), we even had this option when posting a comment - "Post this as a new page also so I can expand on this later..." (or something to that effect)... and when a page was created in this way... there was a note at the top saying "This page was started as a comment on that page (link)..."
We killed this feature for no good reason. I always thought that conversations were by their nature hypertextual - meaning that every reply in a conversation could be a good starter of a new separate conversation.
Cory Levy
· 1 year ago
I am working on fixing that problem. Brainstorming with a bunch of people. Your tweets and blog posts get me thinking!
Dewald Pretorius
· 1 year ago
Awesome thoughts. I'd also like to aggregate comments into one or more blog posts. Not only does it make great content more visible, one can also build your own blog content through your efforts of commenting on other people's blogs.
I gave some thought to building a WordPress comment aggregator plugin. Don't think it's going to happen. It would make much more sense if a service like Disqus could make that functionality available.
Emil Sotirov
· 1 year ago
And here is a classic example (on Aidpage) of a strong commenter who doesn't make a lot of blog posts. She has 1,032 comments across Aidpage... and only 9 posts on her own blog - http://app-ekikaseven-1.aidpage.com/...
gregorylent
· 1 year ago
the conversation is the blog ... i have written this here before
a platform that puts several friendfeed type conversations right on the front page
gregorylent
· 1 year ago
and i would use my disqus avatar, but the verify my post button seems to be asleep
gregorylent
· 1 year ago
and doesn't go under the reply that has been clicked
Daniel Ha
· 1 year ago
Needless to say, I agree quite a bit. I've given a lot of thought to what our "mission statement" is. When I say it, it varies from person to person and even from day to day. But your last paragraph, Fred, put it more powerfully and succinct than anything I've ever said.:
What's the difference between a great comment and a great blog post? Nothing. What's the difference between a great commenter and a great blogger? Nothing. At least in theory. It's time for practice to meet theory.
Perfectly said. This is exactly why Disqus and other similar services are existing. I get excited when people begin to realize this part of it.
RacerRick
· 1 year ago
Daniel, can we get a nice javascript widget that displays our comments?
Daniel Ha
· 1 year ago
This could be useful.
In the meantime, you can create a widget from the RSS of your comments on your profile.
MikeSansone
· 1 year ago
Great point! I suggest to folks that if one of their comments on a blog post is getting to be more than two paragraphs, build on that comment (or simply copy&paste) into a blog post of your own. It extends the conversation outwards.
Matt
· 1 year ago
This is why pingbacks are much more compelling than trackbacks.
willcole
· 1 year ago
This is a great point. I also think that all messages are equal. We built a messaging widget on CHALQ that gave the same tools (rich text editing, image video etc...) to all messages. It doesn't matter if you are making a blog post, sending a personal message, writing on a wall, or making post to a group message board. Finally what the widget did was allow you to 'broadcast' your message to any venue you wanted. So your in depth comment could be submitted to the blog you're commenting on and also be made into a blog post at the same time. This doesn't quite fix your issue of allowing the blog owner to promote comments to the main page but could be a good start.
Jeremy Wright
· 1 year ago
Fred, we're actually working on this (ability to abstract comments, including referential elements / conversations) here at b5, and working with the teams at SixApart and Automattic to extend this functionality. It's a fairly core issue, though, and one that we see as being beyong just the individual blog.
Glad to hear we're not the only people thinking this way!
Would be happy to walk you through our thoughts if you'd like :)
Fred Grott
· 1 year ago
Fred,(always did like that as a first name:)) it sounds like you have a VC/Angel funding/Seed capital idea. if services Disqus, Seesmic, and etc are Web 2.0 enabled via api it could be done as a CMs/blog mashup platform.. Use say something like Ruby on Rails combined with datastore APIs instead of database servers and you could have it up and running in 4 months.
Tish Grier
· 1 year ago
Hi Fred,
When I recently went thru a long spate of writer's block, and could only comment, my friend Amy Gahran suggested I try coComment to keep track of it all those comments and to post them back on my blog. I haven't tried it yet, but it seems to be a viable option to letting all those long comments slip away. For compulsive commenters, this is probably a good thing. Another friend of mine just copies the urls of the blog links he leaves comments on, then at the end of his commenting run, creates a post. This gives his audience a way to go back to the blogs he's been to (that may also happen with coComments--I still have to try it out.), so that system spreads a bit of linklove along with creating a post he can use to go back and see if there are follow-up comments.
As for long comments from other people on my blog, sometimes I bring them out of the comments and into a post with a bit of commentary from me. Usually when someone leaves in the comments a great link to one of their blog posts or an article they may have written, I'll pull that out of the comments and put it on the front page as an update to the post. Or even use it in a follow-up post. This then sends some traffic back to the commenter.
Personally, I'm going to give the coComment thing a try this week. I've broke the block for the moment, but it's a nasty elusive critter, and who knows when it will come back and squash my blogging!
Infact it is on the same premise as the headline fo this post, i started with my blog called featuritis.com Take a look at my about page, which i wrote up almost 3/4 months back but haven't yet made this page public for reasons of uncompleteness... http://www.featuritis.com/about/
It's just to say, i agree to this and is a way to go...
greenskeptic
· 1 year ago
A button to reblog or upload to the commentors blog on disqus would be cool. Should be possible for disqus subscribers...
I like the idea. Not all of my comments are blog-worthy, but hate seeing those that are being lost...
vruz
· 1 year ago
-
macbeach
· 1 year ago
I frequently comment on blogs that are more popular than my own (just about all of them) so that I can get my ideas out there. I generally don't copy those comments to my blog unless I think they are truly inciteful or I fear that the comment might get deleted (I've had comments deleted for simply disputing the facts in a product review), not to mention that some systems just don't handle comments very reliably.
It would be nice if some new technology would make this all work better, but right now, as most of the previous comments above demonstrate, there are too many different companies all trying to solve this in a way (each requiring a separate registration of some form) that suits their own marketing plans.
FPGA
· 1 year ago
What you are using here "disqus" or similar is the solution !
fredwilson
· 1 year ago
I use disqus on this blog
scabadone
· 1 year ago
What you're talking about sounds similar to what the folks over at Lefora are trying to do.
SamJacobs
· 1 year ago
What I want is centralized identity management for all content that I create on the web. Aggregation of every piece of content created including blog posts, comments, Tweets, Facebook status, Gmail status, etc. I suppose Facebook has the most succinct means of getting to this universality and maybe Disqus can address something like it.
It would help a lot of things including an individual's recognition in the new social web/micro-celebrity environment. Any one individual would have much more Google juice if they could aggregate all their various macro- and micro-content creation in one place and then use that as the linchpin for search engines, web recognition, public profile, etc.
miketempleton
· 1 year ago
With things like FriendFeed, Disqus and OpenID continuing to gain in popularity, I think we are getting closer to that state. The thing that I love about Disqus is that I can track all of my comments across the web, including any replies I receive, without having to get an email from every blog.
Also, I like the OP's idea about being able to reblog a comment, much like how you can use Twit This to Twitter a link or TwitPic to Twitter a photo. All we need are for Wordpress, TypePad, Blogger and the rest of them to create toolbars or bookmarklets that fire up your blogging platform and include a link to the comment for you in the beginning of the post. The way that Disqus syndicates comments and assigns relative permalinks would make it easier for a blogger to link back to an original comment.
Denar
· 1 year ago
Good thinking :) acutally, there's a grain of truth in it. Keep up the good work.
Rula
· 1 year ago
I trying to come up with the right Greek word or phrase concerning post-post modernism. I think the age has not evolved into a cohesive form. It is part Babel, part global consumerism, we have producers, suppliers, manufacturers and an abyss of consumers, and few people saving for that rainy day brought to you by Burberry. People are being suckled at the teats of consuming, with the faint backlash of cookie cutter concern for the ecology. I think that the lusting after the new will collide with demand based on depletion of raw materials in order to escalate perceived value until it becomes real. When this happens, we will war or whore. ..people do not care what their government does as long as they can buy and be satisfied, if only temporarily. .what is the greek term for this?
kathy
· 1 year ago
I am a huge fan of the Huffington Posts option to allow you to blog your own comment right into blogger...genius!
Awesome thoughts. I'd also like to aggregate comments into one or more blog posts. Not only does it make great content more visible, one can also build your own blog content through your efforts of commenting on other people's blogs.
I gave some thought to building a WordPress comment aggregator plugin. Don't think it's going to happen. It would make much more sense if a service like Disqus could make that functionality available. ---------------------------------------------------------- john
I had been hovering around ur site for a while.. I find ur contents quiet interesting. I enjoy my stay here in ur site...
website design Dubai
· 8 months ago
Commenting has truly been the fuel that has fired readership for my blog and opportunity for me. It is also part of being a responsible blogger in general.
If one is an expert, I guess they may just want to keep their "wisdom" on their own blog, but the true conversation participants are those who contribute to the discussion wherever the blog posting is.
Brett
· 7 months ago
Thats a very interesting thinking.. Bookmarking your website :)
Cheerzzzz
Bio Genetics
· 7 months ago
As for long comments from other people on my blog, sometimes I bring them out of the comments and into a post with a bit of commentary from me..
All Comments
We think so too.
A lot of great conversation goes on in comments that shouldn't be stuck behind the fold. Publishing these back to traditional blogs is a great way to bring attention to great content. It needs to happen more often.
That's why we've been trying to make it even easier.
Announcing Reblogging on DISQUS
Now on comments throughout DISQUS, you can find a reblog link where you can publish a quotation of the comment to your blog. This quote is cited with the original author, the blog where it originally appeared, and a link back to the original comment to give the discussion full context.
At the moment, we're supporting publishing to Wordpress, Movable Type, TypePad, and Tumblr with more platforms to come.
So next time you see a comment that everyone really needs to read, give it a whirl. We're excited to see more good content bubble to the surface.
Another issue is that currently if you have a good post, a lot of great responses are not actually comments to that post, but would be separate posts written by people on their own blogs. This is so that people can maintain their "reputation score" better if they post a view as their own blog post rather than as a comment. This basically decentralises the discussion. You need something like techmeme to track it, but you would miss out on some great comment on an obscure blog.
Again here, systems like disqus can solve the issue if I am able to auto-repost my comment onto my blog, as well as leave it as a comment on the original blog post. With all my good comments in disqus also adding to my reputational score
This is also visible on the home page of Aidpage (www.aidpage.com).
In our older versions of Aidpage (since starting it in 2005), we even had this option when posting a comment - "Post this as a new page also so I can expand on this later..." (or something to that effect)... and when a page was created in this way... there was a note at the top saying "This page was started as a comment on that page (link)..."
We killed this feature for no good reason. I always thought that conversations were by their nature hypertextual - meaning that every reply in a conversation could be a good starter of a new separate conversation.
I gave some thought to building a WordPress comment aggregator plugin. Don't think it's going to happen. It would make much more sense if a service like Disqus could make that functionality available.
a platform that puts several friendfeed type conversations right on the front page
Perfectly said. This is exactly why Disqus and other similar services are existing. I get excited when people begin to realize this part of it.
In the meantime, you can create a widget from the RSS of your comments
on your profile.
Glad to hear we're not the only people thinking this way!
Would be happy to walk you through our thoughts if you'd like :)
When I recently went thru a long spate of writer's block, and could only comment, my friend Amy Gahran suggested I try coComment to keep track of it all those comments and to post them back on my blog. I haven't tried it yet, but it seems to be a viable option to letting all those long comments slip away. For compulsive commenters, this is probably a good thing. Another friend of mine just copies the urls of the blog links he leaves comments on, then at the end of his commenting run, creates a post. This gives his audience a way to go back to the blogs he's been to (that may also happen with coComments--I still have to try it out.), so that system spreads a bit of linklove along with creating a post he can use to go back and see if there are follow-up comments.
As for long comments from other people on my blog, sometimes I bring them out of the comments and into a post with a bit of commentary from me. Usually when someone leaves in the comments a great link to one of their blog posts or an article they may have written, I'll pull that out of the comments and put it on the front page as an update to the post. Or even use it in a follow-up post. This then sends some traffic back to the commenter.
Personally, I'm going to give the coComment thing a try this week. I've broke the block for the moment, but it's a nasty elusive critter, and who knows when it will come back and squash my blogging!
http://youtube.com/watch?v=IIOlNZCYfco
Take a look at my about page, which i wrote up almost 3/4 months back but haven't yet made this page public for reasons of uncompleteness... http://www.featuritis.com/about/
It's just to say, i agree to this and is a way to go...
I like the idea. Not all of my comments are blog-worthy, but hate seeing those that are being lost...
It would be nice if some new technology would make this all work better, but right now, as most of the previous comments above demonstrate, there are too many different companies all trying to solve this in a way (each requiring a separate registration of some form) that suits their own marketing plans.
It would help a lot of things including an individual's recognition in the new social web/micro-celebrity environment. Any one individual would have much more Google juice if they could aggregate all their various macro- and micro-content creation in one place and then use that as the linchpin for search engines, web recognition, public profile, etc.
Also, I like the OP's idea about being able to reblog a comment, much like how you can use Twit This to Twitter a link or TwitPic to Twitter a photo. All we need are for Wordpress, TypePad, Blogger and the rest of them to create toolbars or bookmarklets that fire up your blogging platform and include a link to the comment for you in the beginning of the post. The way that Disqus syndicates comments and assigns relative permalinks would make it easier for a blogger to link back to an original comment.
acutally, there's a grain of truth in it. Keep up the good work.
greek term for this?
See my post about it here:
http://socialnetworknow.blogspot.com/2008/12/ea...
I gave some thought to building a WordPress comment aggregator plugin. Don't think it's going to happen. It would make much more sense if a service like Disqus could make that functionality available.
----------------------------------------------------------
john
SEO
If one is an expert, I guess they may just want to keep their "wisdom" on their own blog, but the true conversation participants are those who contribute to the discussion wherever the blog posting is.
Cheerzzzz