Rebutting the arguments against story commenting

March 26, 2008 by Kurt
Filed under: commenting 

Inspired by Steve Outing’s recent post entitled, “If user comments go crazy, be thankful; seek more,” I wanted to generate ideas about rebutting the arguments against them.

Yes, there are some newspapers out there that haven’t implemented story comments yet. And there are journalists who are concerned about having story comments. I asked some of the members of the WiredJournalists social networking site to offer some of their favorite excuses — and their replies — to mix in with some of my own.

Sources won’t want to talk to us

Someone agrees to talk to us about the mortgage trouble they got themselves into. We write a story about the mortgage crisis; readers savage the source. Eventually, nobody will want to talk to us.

The answer: Our terms of service won’t tolerate personal attacks. The discussion happens anyway; let people talk about it openly and you might be surprised about how self-regulating the discussion can be. Sources can also comment. They’re part of the community too. So can reporters.

It will sully our brand

The answer (from Howard Owens): “Well, that’s a complex business discussion about what brand means on the web (not much) compared to other factors, but the main issue is — news is a conversation, and you’re a part of it whether you like it or not. You can either host the conversation yourselves, and thereby benefit from the page views, or let others (such as Topix) host it for you and watch them steal your business.”

It’ll take too long to manage

Maybe. It will take some time. No question about it. But we also need to give the community the tools to help police itself. And we really can’t afford not to do it. Increasingly, our audience is demanding to be active participants (see graphic on this page) in the process and, as Outing says, story comments are the very baseline as a means of engaging readers.

Discussion often turns foul

Says Zac Echola: “Yes. That’s the nature of the Web. Hell that’s the nature of reality. People can be idiots. Let them be idiots. Your community will weed them out.”

What about libel?

Honestly, not an issue — at least, not under U.S. law, so far. See Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.

Readers will savage our reporters

Reporters don’t have to put up with personal attacks any more than other readers do. Write a policy that forbids it and delete offensive posts. But discussions about the substance of a reporter’s work are fair game. Give reporters permission to engage the discussion — professionally. And tell them to get a thick skin.

Advertisers won’t want their ads next to comments they don’t like

Another from Zac: Advertisers don’t want their ads next to stories they don’t like, but that doesn’t stop you from writing the story. Advertisers care about their returns on their investment not your content. More page views and better targeted advertising leads to more CPMs and more clicks/conversions.

Why do we want to do this anyway?

See the answer above about the growing audience that doesn’t want to be passive participants. Readers will want to watch how the discussion develops. Even if they don’t write, they’ll read, to test their opinions against those of others. ”I just think it’s something we have to make work,” said Shelley Acoca, The Miami Herald’s editor devoted to reader exchange, in this recent story on the Herald’s site. “This community really benefits from the discussion, particularly on things where we don’t agree with each other.”

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Comments

  • Hi Kurt -- Thanks for letting me know about the blog. There are a bunch of interesting points and possible discussion topics in this post that I'd love to jump into, but maybe I'll just take on one thing and get back to work.... On "Sources won't talk to us," I think it's worth considering how one defines "personal attacks." The definition debate can take any organization a long way.

    The debate is a bit of a proxy issue. Until now, we hadn't had to confront the reality of the exposure that our reporting creates. Our work essentially turns sources into semi-public figures, putting them on local or national stages. Even for local reporting, the Web makes the national stage a far more real possibility than in the past. While we used to head back to the newsroom and onto the next story, the interaction that allows personal attacks on sources is now providing a reality check on the effects and interpretations of our storytelling.

    Counter-argument #1: One can argue about whether sources, especially "average people" sources, are semi-public figures. That argument can get a ton of words, but it ultimately requires you to draw an actionable line. How do you justify allowing criticism on national leaders or celebrities that you cover but not allowing criticism of townspeople that you cover? Do you draw the line on income, location, Google ranking? When does someone cross that line in either direction? I haven't seen an actionable approach yet.

    Counter-argument #2: One can argue comments aren't reality -- that we just get the loudest or most trigger-happy people replying -- so the personal attacks aren't valid. That's a fair argument in some areas, but overall it's a generalization and attribution error. Different kinds of stories attract different kinds of reactions. Same with different kinds of interactive presentations. If you're soliciting with a straight-ahead, "react now" mentality, for instance, you're going to get people responding in kind. But if you're soliciting in a more community-oriented environment, that community is going to factor into the responses. Once you break down the generalization and show how different interaction scenarios exist, our role in managing the environment becomes far more clear.

    The best fallout from these arguments is that we expose the proxy nature. We get closer to the root issues, beyond the sources, beyond the commenters. To get at the roots, the only possible response is to be proactive. For personal attacks, I think that means drawing clear lines on reaction and moving the newsroom focus to how we manage the reality and humanity of storytelling and conversation. The resulting discussions are harder and more unfamiliar at the reporting and editing end than at the Web architecture end, but we need to have them if we're going to move ahead.
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