Discussion Blogiquette
Posted on:: November 19th, 2002
Having discussions attached to my blog entries is new to me. What’s the etiquette about replying?
For example, on the discussion attached to my blog entry about using Movable Type, Miasma posted a thoughtful message about the importance of categories. I learned from it, but I don’t have questions or a comment. Had Miasma sent me an email with the same content, I’d reply with a hearfelt “Thanks!” of some sort. Thank-yous appended to every thoughtful discussion entry would be noise. So, what’s the netiquette? Is it OK not to acknowledge the time and thought someone has spent?
Where’s our aptly-named Emily Post?
Wow. I hope you don’t lost sleep over stuff like this.
My suggestion: don’t sweat it.
And, no, I don’t think it’s expected for you to reply publicly with thanks to a good post. You could, however, click on the person’s email address and send them a personal note of thanks.
It depends.
If it is something that the rest of the the world would benefit from (of course, we’re dealing with bloggers here, so it’s ALWAYS something that the rest of the world would benefit from), then it wouldn’t be a bad idea to reply in comments.
If it’s just a personal “thanks, I never thought of that”, then email would be good.
I’ve found that responding to comments publicly keeps discussions going in the comment section. People like it when they see that the blog owner reads his or her own comments and takes the time to respond.
David, an email sent to the person who commented on your post, would actually make him very happy. It goes to show that you really take the effort to acknowledge his comment, even if it is just a ‘thank you’.
However when the commenting system gets busy with too many comments, it would not be practically feasible to reply via email to each one individually. So a short ‘thank you’ within the comment would be good.
If you are worried about adding ‘noise’ via too many thank-you comments, you could append all into one … something like ‘Thank you Gina, Tom, John and Mary’. Even though you are generalising your thank-you’s, people appreciate it because they know their comment has been read and has added value. That’s what matters. And next time onwards, they will actively participate in further discussions thus creating an atmosphere for healthy discussion within you blog.
see, look at all the time you get to spend with comments now!
Do we say thank you in face to face conversation when someone makes a comment?
Heck if I want a thank you I will ask for it.
How bout a thank you?
Thank you, Peterme, Franenstein, and Kiruba. But, Jonathon, just because you *asked*, you don’t get one. :)
I’ve had comments that were so well written and interesting that I have pulled them out and posted them on my blog just in case people missed them. I am always really pleased at the number of comments I get on the blog as I reckon I must have had some sort of impact if people are going to take the time to write a reply.
I would like to point out that because MT will email you comments, it makes sending email replies to comments pathetically easy.
True Frankenstein. That is a feature in MT that I really like. Choice. Makes civility and etiquette a bit easier as a blogger.
What the feature is in MT ?
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