Keyboard Heros , The hilarious comments section of websites (2 Viewers)

[manamongkids]

Yes, very random topic, but I always find myself scouring through a few websites that always leave me scratching my head. I visit Boston.com regularly through the day just to see whats going on in my area. I visit ESPN.com for sports news, and Yahoo.com is my homepage for work because we use Yahoo Messenger for comm throughout our organization so I often get sucked into reading many pointless articles about some news subjects and pop culture.

I honestly want to know, what/who are the individuals who constantly comment on these websites. Dead serious, if you are one of them, you are essentially the scum of the earth.

We live in a world of outrage, everyone wants to be offended by everything. You have one side of the argument where the topic at hand is always talking about free speech and their 1st amendment, but the same goes true for those commenting on these 'click bait'articles and their comments section.

What does the average person look like who comments regularly? Are they deliciously white trash and just sit home watching Jerry Springer all day with nothing better to do?

There are so many niche forums (like ours) who have open debates about their respective topics, Reddit is outstanding for a majority of their discussions, ie. TV shows, pop culture, technology, etc.



Anyways, give me your thoughts on anonymous commenting and commenting where you are forced to login with some social media (ie ESPN makes you login with Facebook) or comments sections in general.

 

[Ben]

we use Yahoo Messenger for comm throughout our organization

Wait, wha? Who do you work for, the Apple Dumpling Gang?

As for the comments sections, I'm convinced that there must be a mentally-disturbed individual somewhere who opened 27 Facebook accounts and just prowls the internet arguing with himself 24/7. There is no other rational explanation.

 

[manamongkids]

Wait, wha? Who do you work for, the Apple Dumpling Gang?

As for the comments sections, I'm convinced that there must be a mentally-disturbed individual somewhere who opened 27 Facebook accounts and just prowls the internet arguing with himself 24/7. There is no other rational explanation.

lol i work for a company that has work at home agents across the country, Yahoo msg is just what our company has used since mid 2000s and just never changed. I work in the corporate office not remotely

 

[jbutler]

As for the comments sections, I'm convinced that there must be a mentally-disturbed individual somewhere who opened 27 Facebook accounts and just prowls the internet arguing with himself 24/7. There is no other rational explanation.

it's sad, but not surprising or difficult to believe imo.

 

[p5woody]

I just found my new signature!

 

[jbutler]

there are actually great comment sections out there, though. there are two ways of getting a great comment section: (1) keep your site sufficiently under the radar such that only those who care enough about the reporting will take the time to comment; or (2) moderate the ever living fuck out of the comment section.

without fail, the worst comment sections are on the most popular sites. just look at youtube, the huffington post, etc. but even sites that attempt to cater to a more sophisticated audience suffer at the hands of the idiots. the comment sections at slate aren't nearly as bad as youtube, but they are bad enough that i never bother with them.

meanwhile, sites like gawker and jezebel, which i read multiple times through the day, have developed practices and algorithms to determine which comments display most prominently and those systems have worked very well imo. i often spend much, much more time reading comments on jezebel than the actual article.

i definitely come down on the side of moderating a comment section. ta-nehisi coates moderates the comment sections on his articles on the atlantic and they (both the articles and comment sections) are often fantastic. here he is (audio interview - but very worthwhile) talking about his practices on On the Media.

there was also an interesting art project of a book that came out a couple years ago called Night Moves which essentially reprinted selected parts of the comment section under the youtube video of Bob Seger's song of the same title. i remember hearing an interview with the "author" (curator?) who noted that the song has certain qualities which bring out wistful nostalgia, happiness and regret in ways that encouraged commenters to say something meaningful about their relationship to the song.

 

[Mr Tree]

it's sad, but not surprising or difficult to believe imo.

Love this.

I saw a stat I loved a few years ago. A survey was done and something like 85-90% of the participants identified themselves as above average intelligence.

Now think about this. If you think of intelligence as a bell shaped curve there probably isn't a fantastic difference between people in the 30th to 70th....hell maybe even 25th to 75th percentile as the big leaps happen as outliers on the curve. So a person in say the 35th percentile is probably pretty close to "average intelligence." However at the clip described people in the bottom 15th percentile were identifying themselves as above average intelligence. These are probably people who need assistance tying their own shoes, but yup they are above average intelligence.

 

[manamongkids]

is it a sickness that i enjoy reading comments but the thought of actually commenting makes me sick to my stomach?

Butler, isnt Jezebel essentially a feminist website?

 

[jbutler]

Butler, isnt Jezebel essentially a feminist website?

yes. it's gawker's sister site (pun intended), but has more critical political coverage (it's not branded for this, but i've found it to be true) on issues of interest to liberals, so it's a good resource for us lefties who like the gawker media style. my wife's politics align basically 100% with jezebel's writers, but she doesn't read it because she can't stand the gawker tone.

 

[grandgnu]

As for the comments sections, I'm convinced that there must be a mentally-disturbed individual somewhere who opened 27 Facebook accounts and just prowls the internet arguing with himself 24/7. There is no other rational explanation.

Damn, you caught me, you caught the Tater