Seattle's Steve Kelley hates anonymous comments

[Inky_Wretch]

To the point that he cites them as one of the reasons he is retiring.

http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/mediawire/199712/seattle-times-columnist-cant-stand-commenters-retires/

 

[Boom_70]

Re: Seattle's Steve Kelly hates anonymous comments

He should learn how to box. It does wonders for your psyche.

 

[Elliotte Friedman]

Re: Seattle's Steve Kelly hates anonymous comments

Reader comments are awful. Which is why none of us should read them.

 

[I Should Coco]

Re: Seattle's Steve Kelly hates anonymous comments

It's not his only reason for retiring, of course:

Seattle Times sports columnist Steve Kelley has standard reasons for retiring at 63: “I find myself at a lot more games thinking ‘I’ve written this story 411 times now. Isn’t that enough?’” he tells Seattle Weekly contributor Rick Anderson.

However, I'll agree that the anonymous online comments are vile. They usually pile up on political and/or news stories, but occasionally, even here in Podunk, we get anonymous cheap shots at prep coaches, teachers, etc.

The worst part? Our paper has been told by lawyers not to remove nasty, libelous stuff because if we do, then whatever gets on our web site is "approved" by us.

I understand the legal reason, but absolutely hate it. HATE it.

The other alternative, of course, is to shut them all down. But our company (like most) is as desperate as a toothless meth freak for any drop of ad revenue we can still get, and those anonymous nutjobs crank up the click count.

 

[Riptide]

Re: Seattle's Steve Kelly hates anonymous comments

Kelley.

 

[Inky_Wretch]

Re: Seattle's Steve Kelly hates anonymous comments

Kelley.

My bad. Sorry.

 

[dooley_womack1]

It's not his only reason for retiring, of course:

Seattle Times sports columnist Steve Kelley has standard reasons for retiring at 63: “I find myself at a lot more games thinking ‘I’ve written this story 411 times now. Isn’t that enough?’” he tells Seattle Weekly contributor Rick Anderson.

However, I'll agree that the anonymous online comments are vile. They usually pile up on political and/or news stories, but occasionally, even here in Podunk, we get anonymous cheap shots at prep coaches, teachers, etc.

The worst part? Our paper has been told by lawyers not to remove nasty, libelous stuff because if we do, then whatever gets on our web site is "approved" by us.

I understand the legal reason, but absolutely hate it. HATE it.

The other alternative, of course, is to shut them all down. But our company (like most) is as desperate as a toothless meth freak for any drop of ad revenue we can still get, and those anonymous nutjobs crank up the click count.

I don't think that's quite the legal scenario. My understanding is you can have comment moderation and choose not to let a comment get in, but if you're going to let a comment in, you can't edit it.

 

[Versatile]

Reader comments are awful. Which is why none of us should read them.

Ignore readers at your own peril. You have to learn to read between the hate, but those comments can be illuminating. We're here to serve readers, and the less we listen, the more they turn away.

 

[dooley_womack1]

Reader comments are awful. Which is why none of us should read them.

Ignore readers at your own peril. You have to learn to read between the hate, but those comments can be illuminating. We're here to serve readers, and the less we listen, the more they turn away.

We're not here to ask readers if they want fries with that. We're here to inform them, to provide perspective. We're not here to bend to focus-groupery.

 

[Michael_ Gee]

If a newspaper wouldn't publish an anonymous letter, it shouldn't publish an anonymous comment. It's really that simple. I suspect that the amount of advertising revenue generated by comments reaches the low three figures annually.

 

[Riptide]

Reader comments, like SportsJournalists.com posts, do serve as a good look into a large cross-section of users, including the radical thinkers. You get a good look at the intensity on all sides of an issue, and it shows you how ****ed-up many people are today.

I read the comments for entertainment, but I also read them with concern.

 

[LongTimeListener]

Reader comments are awful. Which is why none of us should read them.

Ignore readers at your own peril. You have to learn to read between the hate, but those comments can be illuminating. We're here to serve readers, and the less we listen, the more they turn away.

How many readers are involved in the commenting portion? And of those, how many are in the geographic footprint where they would actually be relevant to advertisers?

What you're saying has been said for the past 15 years and has never been shown to be anywhere close to meaningful.

 

[Versatile]

Reader comments are awful. Which is why none of us should read them.

Ignore readers at your own peril. You have to learn to read between the hate, but those comments can be illuminating. We're here to serve readers, and the less we listen, the more they turn away.

We're not here to ask readers if they want fries with that. We're here to inform them, to provide perspective. We're not here to bend to focus-groupery.

We're long past the era when we could tell people what was important.

I don't think reader comments should be taken literally (with one exception: corrections; readers often are passionate about what they read, and sometimes that passion comes with knowledge), but to ignore them completely is to ignore the types of topics that could draw more readers. Website monetization isn't part of my job, but drawing readers is. If you run a feature story about a football coach and every comment is slamming or defending his choice not to use the option with the fast quarterback, well, there's a good chance your readers would prefer a story focused on why the coach doesn't run the option rather than a feature.

You can draw information without selling your soul.

 

[LongTimeListener]

If that was the genesis point for story ideas, Bruce Bochy would have been fired in May 2012 because Brandon Belt wasn't playing enough.

 

[Versatile]

If that was the genesis point for story ideas, Bruce Bochy would have been fired in May 2012 because Brandon Belt wasn't playing enough.

That's going about three steps further than I did. I bet a weekly Brandon Belt Watch would have done verywell on SFGate.com, though.

 

[Kolchak]

On YouTube, anonymous comments often turn to racial flaming. At the end of news stories at any site, they often turn into political bickering. Doesn't even matter what the story is about.

"Damn George W. Bush and those Republicans for the big business Angels being able to outbid everyone else for Josh Hamilton!"

"Damn Obama for the NHL lockout!"

On our newspaper's website, people get really pissed off if the sports reporter writes something they disagree with, often demanding he be fired for having a differing opinion. Yet they get even more pissed off if the reporter ever changes his mind!!!! It's a lose-lose.

But to hear the bean counters talk about web hits, you'd think we were making $1000 for every comment posted.

 

[Michael_ Gee]

They're not even counting the beans. They're defending a dream -- the impossible dream that Internet advertising revenue can save a newspaper.

 

[micropolitan guy]

The Times, and whatever readers it still has, will miss him. A very solid columnist with a lot of institutional memory of the Seattle sports scene.

 

[writingump]

If I'm not mistaken, it's the same Steve Kelley who was a Blazers beat writer for the Oregonian the year that David Halberstam followed the team around for his outstanding book. As for his weariness with anonymous comments, I fully understand. One of the great things about my gig now (freelancer for TSX and Southern Illinoisan) is that I don't have to click on a story and then read Billy Bob from BFE say that "your agin us and you should rot in hell."

 

[HejiraHenry]

I don't know why any newspaper has a comments section that doesn't require a llinkup with Facebook or such as that. Presto, problem solved.