How can newspapers solve the open comment dilemma?
Posted by Jean Yves Chainon on April 13, 2007 at 2:32 PM
The News&Observer notes newspapers' ‘hypocrisy’ in requiring print letters to be signed and letting online comments be anonymous. Should free comments on all online stories be allowed at all? Washington Post reporters are complaining about the frequent abuse of this policy. Here’s a look at the commenting options for newspapers, still in the works.
Should all published comments be signed, or anonymous for that matter? "There's a feeling that on one side, if you make people use their names, it squelches dialogue," says David Feld, newsobserver.com editor. "On the other hand, if you allow people to be anonymous, it encourages mischief." The Observer’s point is valid: why should gratuitous slander – more so anonymous – be allowed on the newspaper platform (online) when it would never be published on print? “Readers justifiably ask: Is that not a lowering of the newspaper's standards,” reports the Observer.
"You're starting to see some of the language you see on neo-Nazi sites, and that's not good for The Washington Post or for the subjects in those stories," says Post reporter Darryl Fears.
On the other hand, many editors and readers now agree that interaction (not its abuse) actually benefits the newspaper’s quality – its audience numbers anyway. So how can newspapers encourage discussion while monitoring it?
Manual editing and approval of comments, though it may be an option for smaller publications, is simply impractical on a larger scale. “Washingtonpost.com Executive Editor Jim Brady says he does not have the resources to screen the roughly 2,000 daily comments in advance,” writes reports the Post’s Howard Kurtz. Brady has already assigned one staffer to specifically delete offensive content.
But as users increasingly comment – and increasingly abuse comments – will there be two, five, ten full-time staffers? This solution seems hardly viable.
According to some, there is an easy compromise, somewhere in between free comments and none. Newspaper websites can implement an “open this story for comment” option and let the journalists, or editors, decide whether to activate it when they publish a story. Of course there remains the difficulty of choosing which stories to open for comment: the more controversial stories, which tend to prompt abusive comments, are also the ones that benefit most from public discussion.
This option could therefore lead to more subtle forms of censorship or editing, depending on the stories that are left open for comment.
Perhaps another solution would be the development of automated software that accurately locates and blocks ‘unhealthy’ comments: this seems to be the solution currently considered by Brady. But again, the selected keywords and elimination process can lead to abuse on the part of the censors. And slander is neither necessarily obscenely phrased nor detectable by an automated program.
A mixture of human overview backed by tracking software could certainly optimize the search for inappropriate material.
If nazi, racist, intolerant and other such extremist slurs were widespread, then surely newspapers couldn’t live with commenting options. Fortunately this isn’t the case though, and newspaper quality is increased by discussion, provided destructive comments can be limited.
"The medium allows for readers and journalists to engage in conversation, and to say we're not going to take advantage of that doesn't make a lot of sense to me," says Brady. "I'd rather figure out a way to do it better than not to do it at all."
Any other ideas?
Source: News&Observer – Washington Post through cyberjournalist.net
"You're starting to see some of the language you see on neo-Nazi sites, and that's not good for The Washington Post or for the subjects in those stories," says Post reporter Darryl Fears.
On the other hand, many editors and readers now agree that interaction (not its abuse) actually benefits the newspaper’s quality – its audience numbers anyway. So how can newspapers encourage discussion while monitoring it?
Manual editing and approval of comments, though it may be an option for smaller publications, is simply impractical on a larger scale. “Washingtonpost.com Executive Editor Jim Brady says he does not have the resources to screen the roughly 2,000 daily comments in advance,” writes reports the Post’s Howard Kurtz. Brady has already assigned one staffer to specifically delete offensive content.
But as users increasingly comment – and increasingly abuse comments – will there be two, five, ten full-time staffers? This solution seems hardly viable.
According to some, there is an easy compromise, somewhere in between free comments and none. Newspaper websites can implement an “open this story for comment” option and let the journalists, or editors, decide whether to activate it when they publish a story. Of course there remains the difficulty of choosing which stories to open for comment: the more controversial stories, which tend to prompt abusive comments, are also the ones that benefit most from public discussion.
This option could therefore lead to more subtle forms of censorship or editing, depending on the stories that are left open for comment.
Perhaps another solution would be the development of automated software that accurately locates and blocks ‘unhealthy’ comments: this seems to be the solution currently considered by Brady. But again, the selected keywords and elimination process can lead to abuse on the part of the censors. And slander is neither necessarily obscenely phrased nor detectable by an automated program.
A mixture of human overview backed by tracking software could certainly optimize the search for inappropriate material.
If nazi, racist, intolerant and other such extremist slurs were widespread, then surely newspapers couldn’t live with commenting options. Fortunately this isn’t the case though, and newspaper quality is increased by discussion, provided destructive comments can be limited.
"The medium allows for readers and journalists to engage in conversation, and to say we're not going to take advantage of that doesn't make a lot of sense to me," says Brady. "I'd rather figure out a way to do it better than not to do it at all."
Any other ideas?
Source: News&Observer – Washington Post through cyberjournalist.net
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I think that all of the papers that didn't wait for official announcements should be ashamed of themselevs. Not even the family members are reliable because they could have overheard something and not the whole story. I think that they should all apologize and not try to blame it on someone else. Its your fault take responsibilty for your actions.
What do we want? Thousands comments every day, flamewars, non contextual thoughts. No, we want strong relationship with our readers. That means : people speak under their real name or profil. It's about open identity and transparency and trust not technology. In return reporters and editors should react to readers comment in the same way.
Easy to say ...
I think there are two good solutions readily available. Either allow anonymous commenting and simply moderate all the comments, or require registration. Even with registration, if it is free, you cannot be sure people will provide genuine contact information.
I think if online media outlets want to maintain quality and encourage building a quality and sustainable community, they must decide where their views on what constitutes a community lie. Then, they must stick firmly to a strategy for growing that sort of community.
A balance must be struck between many factors: cost, time, effort, pricing structure and keeping a community growing. My suggestion is to allow commenting only by registered users. Charge for membership, but go low. Balance is key, but so are long-term strategic goals.
The amount of comments do not reflect the number of readers. Certainly, there is some correlation, but it is not the same thing by any means. Segment the sites' visitors into readers and members. Allow everyone to read in order to keep traffic and ad revenue up. However, if people want to comment on articles, use message boards or whatever else, then require a paid registration.
As I said, I would go low. If I had 10,000 registered users and charged them $1 per month to access the site, I earn $120,000. for a year's subscription. That's enough to hire someone whose job would be to moderate comments, answer posts, and continually ask the community what it would like to see in the way of improvements.
Even at half that yearly membership fee you would be doing good. Remember, if they were commenting for free before, you were already covering the cost of that bandwidth, so what you are making now is gravy. $40k for an employee leaves you $20k left for site or infrastructure improvements, more marketing, or community building. If however, you were getting that $120k, well...
If nothing else, charge them $1 or $2 for a year's subscription and you still make more than you were. They had to pay with a credit card or PayPal, so you can verify identities, hold them accountable and require personal information be on tap. This will clean up the posting, keep it on a decent level of civility.
If you can keep readership levels the same or growing, you can get away with keeping the cost of paid membership really low. I intend to put my own ideas in action soon with a public journalism site. I will allow anyone to read and access content. However, those who want to be contributors, comment on content, use the forums, etc., will pay a really low fee to do so. It will accomplish two things, however. It will keep the dialog clean by doing away with anonymity, and people are more likely to put a greater effort into their writing when they are having to pay to do so.
Did you ever meet a woodworker who just had a workshop full of tools, never paying for the means to make the works of art that were the end result?
It shouldn't be any different in communities. If you are allowing commenting on articles, that is why you are doing it, after all, correct? Or, are you doing it just for traffic? Deciding which of those two options is the one that will work for your business model is the first thing to be done.
I believe people will pay to be part of a community, to contribute, and to help preserve the quality of the community of which they are part. Everyone likes to feel special and be part of something that adds to their sense of self-worth.
I'm willing to sacrifice phenomenal growth for slow and steady any day---since I am an advocate of living economy principles which state that it is better to make a "living return" in order to create a better standard of life in a community rather than a maximum return.
I have based my upcoming network of sites based on that very principle. You can check out the site that inspired my own thinking in that direction here:
http://livingeconomies.org/aboutus/principles.
It boils down to the same thing it always has. You have to create a value in the minds of members of any community. If you do, and it is fair, you shouldn't have problems if you are practicing sound business, such as income stream diversification and keeping infrastructure costs low and so forth.
But first, figure out if you are building a community or just trying to keep traffic high without offending readers.
Just my two cents worth...
Why not let the users do the work for you?
Just make it easier for an offended user to deal with the problem than complain about it.
Give them a "Flag as inappropriate" link next to every stinkin' comment. After two/three/whatever flags, ship off to a bin for review and off the main site.
I've used this technique recently and it is surprisingly a) thorough and b) accurate.
More details here: http://dummied.org/archives/2007/3/1/the_path_of_least_resistance_again/
A few notes since I wrote that entry: The primary concerns were advertiser-based — that's why we don't have comments on the bar photos anymore ... it wasn't really a failing of the technique.
Bar-hopping photos are a specialized case that encourages anonymous meanness, but I think this technique would work very well on simple story commenting. Photos, however, probably require more vigilance.