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FacebookMy 5 Pet Peeves with Reading Blogs (mostly surrounding comments and feeds)
March 9th, 2008 | Posted in Blogging 17 Comments »
I have five short, simple pet peeves when it comes to reading blogs.
1. No email notification for follow-up comments.
When I leave a comment on a blog, I want to be notified if the author replies. About 70% of the blogs I read lack this feature. If you use WordPress, you can incorporate this feature through the Subscribe to Comments plugin. I’m not sure how to do it Blogger, but I have seen it done (see the following image).
Without this follow-up, I have to periodically revisit your blog to see if you’ve responded. Since comments I leave are often sporadic and added quickly, chances are I won’t remember that I even made a comment. Without this feature, blogs become less of a conversation and more like a guest book that I’m signing. (Blogflux has a service called Commentful that helps track updates to a site, but it’s a lot of effort to add blogs to watchlists.)
The only disadvantage to follow-up comments in spam. If spammers get through and I’m subscribed, I may get some spam emails. I once set my wife’s blog up with the Subscribe to Comments plugin, and when she started getting spam comments, she was horrified to learn that the previous commenters automatically received the spam comments. Still, with good anti-spam tools like Akismet, this isn’t such a concern.
2. No ability to add my own blog link in the comment ID and be notified of follow-up.
In the above image, if I select the Email follow-up comments option, I’m forced to select my Google/Blogger identity. Since I don’t use Blogger, it shows my minimalist identity. As you can see, there’s not much there except a link to my real blog.
If I select the Name/URL option, I can customize my name and URL in the comment ID, but can’t receive follow-up comments. Drats!
To add to the confusion, when I select the Email follow-up comments option, the first thing Google sends me is my own comment. Uhm, does Google know what the word “follow-up” means?
3. Truncated post in my feed.
If you use a “read more” tag with your post, often the full post doesn’t come through in the feedreader — just the excerpt. This can really be tough for people like me who read feeds on a Blackberry.
You can get around this truncated feed problem in WordPress by using the Full Text Feed plugin (I’m happy to hear this plugin won’t be needed in WordPress 2.5). If you’re using another blogging platform, I’m not sure how to get the full feed in the feedreader.
Usually I just skip over truncated feeds because it takes about 10-15 seconds to load the original article on a BlackBerry. Sorry. That’s my passive aggressive response, because typing a reason as to why I’m not loading your original post takes too long and is impossible to do without loading the original post (which would defeat my point).
It feels good to vent. These pet peeves have really been frustrating me lately, and they are especially common on Blogger blogs. I have a couple of more pet peeves, so I’m getting them off my chest now.
4. Undescriptive or Misleading Titles
The most annoying title of the week goes to this post by Paul Stamatiou: How I Got a MacBook Air for 15 Dollars. (Sorry, Paul.) With a title like that, it’s hard not to click it and see what the deal is. At least in the first paragraph Paul makes his confession:
The title is a bit misleading but it draws upon the minimum monthly payment on my credit card: $15. Of course I won’t be paying $15 per month forever, but it makes for a nice title.
The real post title should really be something like Why I Put a MacBook Air on my Credit Card with a Minimum Payment of $15 a Month. (I’m kidding.) Generally I want a title to clearly reflect what the post is about. This can save me a lot of time scanning feeds. Of course we want catchy, clever post titles. But c’mon people. I only have so much tolerance for random, vague creativity. 
5. No About Page or Contact Form
Sometimes I really like to know who I’m reading. This is pet peeve #5, so it’s not that big a deal, but have you ever wanted to contact someone “offline” and haven’t been able to? I end up leaving a comment on their latest post, even though my comment has nothing to do with the post. So I have to preface the comment with something like, “Sorry that this has nothing to do with your post, but I didn’t see any other way to contact you.” If you’re looking for a way to incorporate a contact form in WordPress, I recommend the Dagon Design Form Mailer. Or simply put your email address somewhere.
Without a contact form or email address, I usually expose my own email in the comment I leave. And then most likely they don’t have any follow-up features for comments, so I have to periodically check back for replies.
Any time one site commits two or more pet peeves, the frustration quadruples rather than following a linear escalation. Sites that commit all five pet peeves should win some type of award.
What are your pet peeves about blogging? Surely I’m committing someone’s pet peeve with my own blog.
It feels good to vent. These pet peeves have really been frustrating me lately, and they are especially common on Blogger blogs. I have a couple of more pet peeves, so I’m getting them off my chest now. …Read the whole thing here.
incorporate this feature through the Subscribe to Comments plugin. I’m not sure how to do it Blogger, but I have seen it done (see the following image). Without this follow-up, I have to periodically revisit your blog to see i Get more informationhere
Mission accomplished.
On point 1. I’m all for email notification (will check out that WordPress plugin!) as long as it’s OFF by default. Let ME choose to follow a discussion. Gee guess that’s a pet peeve of mine that you break Tom!
Agree on point 2.
And point 3 is a definite no-no. I’ve stopped following blogs because they don’t offer full feeds, I’ve contacted the authors and been told that it’s about privacy and stopping people ‘reusing’ their content. Which is nonsense and is a shame.
Gordon, just for you, I’ve unchecked the Subscribe to Comments box by default. I figured … why not.
People reusing my content is nonsense? EVERY day I find another scumbag scraping one or another of my sites. I keep full feeds because I like to read full feeds, but it is an increasing problem that might send me to truncated feeds or blurbs.
In fact, pet peeves 2-5 all relate to comment spam, splogs and all around baddies. Akismet kills tons of my comment spam, but I still have to wipe up the hand written crap that ends up on my blogs. I’ve been tempted to remove the ability to link to a URL from my comments just in an effort to stop the comment spam.
In short, this list of your pet peeves is a BLESSING to you. There is so much to read out there. You can’t read it all. If a blog hits one of your pet peeves, STOP reading them. There is plenty more out there to read and if they’re good enough, you’ll be willing to go back and continue the conversation.
By the way, I HATE the notify me of comments via email. If I don’t remember to return to finish the conversation, I must not have cared enough about what you had to say.
Hmmm I think I might agree with your last point Laura, which is why I prefer the email thing to be off by default. If I care enough about the conversation I’ll turn it on, but don’t make me turn it on for a post stating “Hey it’s my birthday” where all I’ve got to offer is “Happy Birthday”. LOL
As for my content being reused elsewhere, I guess I’ve either developed a thick skin or not really noticed my stuff being used much.
Laura, you have an interesting perspective on this. I haven’t noticed whether my content is being “scraped” onto other sites like yours. Occasionally I see topic aggregation sites that grab an excerpt or something. I assume that’s similar to the content theft you mention?
Re the notification of comments, hmmm, hadn’t thought of it that way. You do have a point. I sometimes leave a comment to let the author know that I read the post. People are really motivated by comments. Even if they are trivial, it lets the author know that he or she isn’t writing in a vacuum. Someone is reading it. For those types of comments, the email follow-up seems unnecessary.
Hey, thanks for reading my blog.
Hey Paul, I feel bad for singling out your post like that. Sorry. You do have excellent content on your blog and I’m a regular reader. I hope you didn’t take it too hard. Keep up the good posts.
Thanks Tom! Now THAT’S service… I might even come back and visit again
And I’m sure Paul will be able to handle it… (Hey Stammy, I was in 9Rules too for a while, how goes it!)
I agree that comments subscription should be optional, not default. Not because of spam (which is just a fact of life) but because you get all the comments to a post, not just the author’s response to your comment, and nothing irks me more than an unsolicited email/phone call (except for ones from super-cool people with whom I would love to be friends).
But one problem with Laura’s good point about (not) caring enough to return for the response, is that I might care deeply about a response to my comment, but that doesn’t mean I have time/energy/brain power to remember to check back once a day for three or four days. (esp. now that I’m reading feeds in a reader and don’t usually go to the site at all.)
A couple months ago I got my first email response to a comment I had made. At first I was confused (who was Kelcy?). And then I realized it was a great way to respond personally to someone who’d taken the time to leave a personalized comment, and so sometimes I do that now. It doesn’t further the “public” conversation, but I think it’s a good way to connect with your audience (esp. if they’re more ‘friend’ than ‘audience’).
Is this totally unheard of on ‘professional’ blogs?
Tom – great post. I’m ashamed to say I’ve never really read your blog, I just assumed it was too technical for me. But there’s some great stuff here (I mean for me, obviously it’s all great for you). Can’t wait to see you and your family next week!
What do you think of blogs that’ve been around for awhile… but have no comments feature altogether?
[quote]Any time one site commits two or more pet peeves, the frustration quadruples rather than following a linear escalation.[/quote]
Starting to sound like the Ted Kaczynski –
Take a few deep breaths… count to 20…. (KIDDIN)
Thanks for the information, i did not realize about point 3 as i din’t read feed at all.
will use the plugin you suggested.
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I learned a lot from this entry and will definitely save it in my bookmarks. Thanks for the effort you took to delve into this issue so deeply. I look forward to future posts.