To those engaging with Rep. Roberts

61 diaries since joining March 30, 2010; 0 comments n/t (4.00 / 1)

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by: elwood @ Sat Aug 27, 2011 at 22:15:52 PM UTC

Hmm (0.00 / 0)

Interesting thought; I think you'd have to take it case by case. I can imagine someone having a certain expertise and getting few comments and not needing to reply.

But Rep. Roberts tends to throw bombs and really ought to engage a bit more, in my opinion.

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by: JimC @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 03:06:39 AM UTC

Coming from another part-time contrarian, (4.00 / 1)

more often than not, it seems that the comment section is just not a good place to try to discuss disagreements. From what I recall, this generally leads to a lot of angry responses, and not much to show for it. Not to mention the obligatory "Why are you arguing about this in our PROGRESSIVE COMMUNITY??" etc.

There are definitely exceptions-- both individuals who break the pattern and comment sections that, for some reason, take a different path. But it's common enough that I try to avoid doing it.

But aside from that, I wasn't aware that there was a norm here requiring commenting.

I don't see why there should be. Blue Hampshire's set-up already seems to handle this situation just fine: don't promote the posts to the front page. Is there a need for any action beyond that?

Be fiscally responsible: nhecon.blogspot.com

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by: Will May @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 05:28:38 AM UTC

Maybe not - (0.00 / 0)

This diary highlighted the odd situation: Roberts never responds, so if you want to engage, it's futile.

To my mind it has crossed from a difference in degree to a difference in kind: he isn't simply an infrequent commenter; rather, he uses the site as a one-way broadcast medium.

Is that a problem? Certainly in theory.

a) Our community moderation mechanism relies on the ability to rate comments. Posting diaries with no comments avoids that - dKos added automatic tip jars to prevent that as a tactic.

b) If lots of posters adopt this approach, it will change the site from an interactive community into a service for posting monologues.

But maybe not in practice - other posters haven't taken the same approach, with the exception of a few cases (often commercial) who have been banned as trolls on other, clearer grounds.

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by: elwood @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 13:42:46 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

first i've heard of this guideline (4.00 / 1)

i don't post comments on my own diaries very often because i try to say everything i need to say the first time.  and i almost never engage in internet "dialog," although i'm happy to provide occasional one-time comments on some diaries.

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by: kite @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 12:02:15 PM UTC

Fit of pique (4.00 / 1)

There is a sense in which the comments section is just a place for people to say things which they don't care to exert the effort to make those comments into a stand alone article. Now we learn, that there are those who are annoyed that their typically less time intensive responses are "dissed" by the writer when he doesn't respond to them. You have the right not to read the article as many do no longer with Roberts just as he has the right not to read your responses nor answer them. To place some guilt upon him because he doesn't live up to some of what are evidently widely understood rules (though not published) is underhanded at best.

My view is that after reading several of his comments I have seen no new information or ideas so like with other things I quit reading them as have some others. To me it is the same thing as answering the phone with caller ID. There is no requirement that you answer the phone. It is a social agreement to some but I see it as a request to speak to the caller - if you want to. Nothing may be made of the refusal. It is just your fit of pique if you are annoyed.

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by: xteeth @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 12:19:40 PM UTC

This wildly misstates what I wrote. (4.00 / 1)

I gather I am "those who are annoyed their typically less time intensive responses are 'dissed' " and seen by you as in a fit of pique.

Those characterizations have no basis whatsoever in my comments here.

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by: elwood @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 12:32:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

For whatever it's worth... (0.00 / 0)

The BH account "TerieNorelli" has been used to post several diaries, but only one comment.  That single comment was an addendum to her own diary.  

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by: TimothyHorrigan @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 15:22:05 PM UTC

"Several" < 61. (3.00 / 2)

There isn't a crisp line that has been crossed, but several miles back one WAS crossed, IMO.

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by: elwood @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 15:24:28 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

And there's a reason that diaries that are basically (4.00 / 3)

press releases rarely get front-paged.

If you came to a community to speak, repeatedly, and then never took questions, soon there'd be no reason to for the community to bother to show up to listen.

That's what I take the point of this diary to be, and I agree.

birch paper; on Twitter @deanbarker

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by: Dean Barker @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 16:48:56 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

What it means to be a community blog. (4.00 / 4)

One of the most valuable aspects of a community blog is that it provides a space for people to get a full-length article onto readers' radar without the personal prominence it takes to get it printed in a newspaper.  Major elected officials do have that prominence, and when they post here, it's different. That said, several have commented--Paul Hodes comes to mind.

I'd be okay with a diarist who only comments on her own diaries, but I do think that in a community blog like BH, posting a diary is starting a conversation, and it is reasonably expected that diarists will participate in that conversation.

If we didn't have that expectation, it wouldn't be a community blog; it would just be a blog with many authors. The core concept requires members of the community to read what the others write and respond to it.

I, for one, find it rewarding to engage in comments on the (relatively few) diaries that I write; feedback is proof that somebody read it.

--
Hope > Anarch-tea
Twitter: @DougLindner

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by: Douglas E. Lindner @ Sun Aug 28, 2011 at 21:45:37 PM UTC

[ Parent ]