I don’t tend to read liberal web sites, but the conservative sites I follow get a lot of vile left wing trolls.
Comments rarely offer anything useful. I’d just as soon see them shut down.
Very few comments actually illuminate or honestly debate the issues. It just devolves toward name calling, halfwitted “wit” and nasty remarks.
It doesn’t matter what the politics of the site is. Conservative sites have the same issue – but the remarks support their worldview, so they accept it.
If conservatives could actually debate the issue, the comments would have remained open.
Definitely true facts can be very Politically Incorrect.
Why no option for “both”?
Seriously, what kind of advertising can you get for a site where the phrase “secret Kenyan Muslim” appears often in the comments section? Hobby Lobby can only float so much…
Yeah… I occasionally read the Dallas Morning News and Houston Chronicle comment sections, and they’re like the SDMB political or social issue threads, only with about half the intelligence and twice the nuttery on both sides, combined with some truly hateful bastards who come in and say asinine things just to get a rise out of people.
IIRC, the CNN comments were much the same. And any commentary regarding my alma mater or its football program, even on boards more or less restricted to alumni are even more disappointing, as these people are ostensibly educated and rational people, but they seem to be the same brand of frothing angry retard that populates everywhere else on internet comment boards.
Like others have said, this will give you a rather dim view of humanity.
There is this thing on the internet called “trolling.” It involves people deliberately posting inflammatory or intentionally stupid statements in an attempt to get a rise out of people.
Trolling is unpleasant to everyone but the troll. Unfortunately, trolls will flock to any anonymous forum, and it takes an incredible amount of manpower to keep separate trolls from real commenters.
Newspapers are in the business of reporting, and generally don’t want to spend their time and money playing playground monitor, especially for a playground that is dominated by trolls. If the comments sections were bringing in more readers, they’d probably keep them. But as is, it’s basically them subsidizing a place for trolls to troll. What’s the point?
It’s not like there is a shortage of places to discuss news on the Internet.
Comments can be worthwhile - the New York Times site is a good example.
Of course, the Times has the bucks to pay for (good) moderation and limits comments to paid on-line subscribers.
The point is that it can be done.
Considering the source is Breitbart, we need to first determine if the report is correct. Are progressive news sources closing down their comment sections? Is it part of a general trend or just one or two sites? Is the closure rate for progressive sites different from non-progressive sites? Only after these questions have been answered and we’ve determined if the phenomenon exists, do we need to seek an explanation for it.
I think the problem is the comments sections allow people to post vile and bigoted comments onto their websites. Most organizations don’t want vile and bigoted comments to be found in their website content. They have the choice between policing comments or not allowing them at all. It’s far easier to control their sites content by removing the comments sections.
This seems to be another thing right wingers are building up fake outrage about; has there ever been a whinier group than the modern American conservatives?
I saw in today’s newspaper that a couple in my town with the surname Breitbart had a baby. I did a double-take when I saw the name.
They’re being shut down for BOTH reasons mentioned in the poll, as well as spam.
Some outlets require people to sign in using Facebook, so they won’t be totally anonymous, and it STILL boggles my mind what people will post.
Simple Political Incorrectness and Aggravated Political Incorrectness are serious crimes, and offenders should disclose their names.
They are afraid most Social Media will ban controversial speech.
Since when? I commented there a week or 2 ago (under another id) and I’m not a subscriber, just a registered user.
Leftists were at least as whiny when Bush was president.
I wish I could have voted both in the poll. On the Atlantic site comments can often show much more insight into the issue than in the article. But then they have mods for the jerks and sometimes the writers themselves will respond to comments.
Thing is anymore to me, reporting has gotten so bad that an article is basically written by some writer sitting in a cubicle in New York and he gets his info just off the web. News services dont send reporters out to sites to actually dig around and interview people and find out things first hand. So hence, the comments section can have better insight and I honestly think sometimes the writers get embarrassed by this.
The Atlantic does the same.
Now I wonder how many writers actually read the comments? Can they really take constructive criticism? Can they handle someone proving them wrong or showing more insight into an issue? Are there “slap your head and wish I’d thought of that” moments?
I’ve seen on the Atlantic times when nearly every commenter seriously questions the intelligence, eyesight, hearing, or intoxication level of a writer.
Oh well. Once back in the old west in I think Abilene a newspaper editor made a comment about someone and that person went in and shot him.
I often learn just as much from the comments as I do from the articles. The comments often correct or expand the article content.
I also learn that a lot of people are mean and ignorant, but that’s ok too. Valuable insight into different human minds.
Wired.com is annoying me by removing comments from many sections of their website. That’s ok, I don’t have to visit there.
Comment sections are typically filled with moronic nonsense, regardless of partisan intent. If you actually wanted to contact the author of an article because of some error or misconception, they typically all have contact info listed on the site. Or you can send them a message on Twitter or whatever. You’re probably much more likely to have them read your message that way that posting it in between the garbage in the comment section.
In this era of social media, anyone would be misguided to think they were going to “control thought” by closing article comment sections typically only read/written by idiots anyway.
Oh god, people are actually claiming liberals don’t want to hear the truth in comment sections so that’s why they are shutting them down? holy shit.