I like to think of comments as more “discussions” than anything else. I’ve reminisced in past posts about the days of “guestbooks” and as such they were probably more akin to the label of “comments” than the comment style of modern “discussion” styled blog forms. 
When I leave “comments” on posts I find interesting, I hope to find a response when I return. Although I am really only responding to the original “mastermind” of te article and a response is not expected, this exchange is what makes comments fun for me. In some cases, I have used my comment to a good post as an actual post here at my site. That kind of “snowball” effect is what gets ideas going around the web. In hopes of fostering this type of commenting, I’ve enhanced a few features here at Riley Central to get readers into the discussion:
- An incentive and recognition of commentators through a “Monthly Top Commentators” location in the left sidebar. This posts the user’s name, a trackback to the user’s url given in the comment, and the number of comments she/he has made on the blog. I salute these 10! This serves as my informal “thank you!” every month.
- A summative block of “Recent Posts” that posts all the above information along with a link to the post next to a snippet of the user’s comment. I was inspired to include this “pat on the back” to readers through getting recoginzed time and time again on[This Eclectic Life]’s instriguing system over there. I want to recoignize readers the same way.
I invite more readers to discuss here. Readers get a link back (twice possibly!) for every discussion joined in through leaving a comment.
Hi. I'm Damien Riley, MA.
5 Comments
Honestly I don’t know how I feel about that.
Every several months I put something in my about me about welcoming readers, and understand why people might not feel comfortable commenting
When I had the blog redesigned I purposely didn’t have “recent comments” on the sidebar.
But I have a quirky blog :)
I can understand why quantity of comments is important to most bloggers
Excellent post–and yes the link gets me back :)
Thanks for that! It would seem that bloggers go through phases of clarity on plugins (myself anyway). Sometimes I will be sure a plugin is just what my blog needs and that I want. Others, I look at what I’ve done and think: “Why the hell would I have wanted such a thing?” So . . . features can come and go in flux but I agree with the widely written notion that reader-centered features are a good idea in most cases. The recent comments and top commentators “recognition” and “link/trackback” displays foster reader pings and promotion. That’s what I am thinking today anyway :) Thanks for your thoughtful comment pia.
I have so much to learn. I tried to find a comment feature like Shelly’s where her comment goes with the readers comment in the same square. I found two plugins and they aren’t doing what they show on the example (which wasn’t even that). But I am having fun! I love going back and reading comments and many times I write a comment and realize there is a post there and save it - but at first I wasn’t saving the link to the post the comment was on - and that is an important link to put in the future post!
Love the changes you are making.
Thank you. It’s exciting to see the evolution of your blog on Wordpress!
I have to say I totally agree with the concept of comments being used as discussions - for me that’s where the enjoyment comes. I’m happy to say that most people are the same (at least in my experience)!
As far as plugins go, I know you’re already using it, but the Subscribe to Comments plugin must be one of the most useful plugins ever. There’s no way I could go back to all the sites I visit to see if there’s been a response.