NO Comment !!!
Our local Pulitzer Prize-winning, blessed-by-the-Pope twice-weekly newspaper has announced they are ENDING anonymous commenting. Now, if you want to say your piece on their award-winning writing, you must comment via your Facebook profile. THAT, explains their editor, will ensure we know WHO exactly is commenting.
I hate to break it to these guys, but Facebook isn’t the best vehicle for transparency. I mean, Barack Obama’s Teleprompter has a Facebook profile.
This is all part of an international trend by drivebys. Some are ditching comment sections altogether due to low participation. (Hint: you need to write something worth a damn in order to inspire people to comment.)
Others are limiting the sections, like The Pilot, or eliminating them altogether because people are just getting too mean. (*Somebody call a waaaaaaaaaaah-mbulance.* )
I think we’ve struck a good balance here with our comment section. I am a benevolent dictator here. I allow posting under aliases IF you make it clear to ME who you really are. Sometimes, I will let an anonymous poster avoid revealing themselves to me if they are pretty entertaining / humorous or really offer up interesting / valuable information.
Anonymous posters ARE NOT allowed to attack anyone else personally. If you are going to criticize someone, have the guts to put your real name to it. I do it ALL the time.
Our spam filter automatically flags and quarantines posts with links or profane language in them. The quarantine gets reviewed at the end of each day, and wrongly-quarantined stuff gets allowed.
Disagreeing with me does not necessarily earn you a blacklisting. (Cussing me out, threatening me, or discussing my mama is another thing altogether.)
We also like to keep comments relevant to the post they are attached to. If you want to make a suggestion about a future story, have a conversation with me, or just comment on something else altogether that hasn’t been posted on, click on the “email us” button at the top of the page.
I think our commenters add to our site’s offerings. Occasionally, even I learn something from these folks.
Facebook has engaged in widespread censorship against conservatives, including this site and quite a number of other conservative sites. It is an insult to conservatives to limit comments to those through the leftwing filter Facebook. Personally, I have always despised the leftwing politics of Zuckerburg and Facebook itself and therefore have nothing to do with it.
While a liberal newspaper like that in Moore County may like the liberal censorship of Facebook, what is really galling is the conservative sites who mindlessly limit their comments to those through Facebook like the Washington Examiner and Eric Erickson’s new Resurgent site.
Does anyone really read the Pilot? Misses (or refuses to print) half the news in Moore County. Why waste the time or money…even free online isn’t worth it. It’s the joke of Moore!
Sorry, just can’t resist. Went to Pilot website and their lead story is warning people about the approaching hurricane in NC. Uh, think that has passed guys.