‘More moderation is needed’ – bbmatt
NPR is losing potentially useful feedback. As a commenter, seeing a major news organisation choose to close comments impacts on one of the founding principals of the internet – the empowerment of communication for all.
One thing I think would benefit all publishers is to more closely moderate comments before they’re published. That’ll lead to better discussions and avoid the “garbage fire” of flame wars. Would a news organisation allow journalists to publish prior to proof reading and approval? Of course not. Why then would they allow comment to be approved based purely on a login?
NPR has said it will use social media to engage with users instead of comments, but responding to a story on social media certainly isn’t the right place for anything other than a brief statement. It’s an instant reaction, rather than any analytical in-depth response.
My perspective is: either do it properly (moderate), or close the comments. But remember, closing comments effectively diminishes the collaborative communication that the internet gifts us all.
‘A publisher should engage rather than preach’ – rickylee369
The Guardian is not just a home for good journalism, it is a meeting place for a community. It is a place, not only to learn information above the line, but to challenge conventional wisdom in the comments. There is no point in creating a debate if the platform for ideas is immediately closed.
Without comments, the news becomes passive experience for a reader like me. Why shouldn’t a publisher prefer to engage its readership rather than preach to it? Commenters have received a lot of negative attention lately, thanks to trolls. Publishers are more and more skeptical of us. First, the message was that a few bad apples were spoiling the fun, now it’s that there are not enough apples to make the endeavor worthwhile. To me, this feels like censorship.
It is not trolling that is a danger to society, but the stifling of all addition, criticism or justified acclaim in a world that needs new ideas more than ever. It would be a shame that its audience must remain mute.
‘The balance has tipped’ – BuckHucklebuck
In a way I can understand NPR’s decision. I’ve been commenting on the Guardian for several years and reading the comments on other sites, too. While there has always been a lot of – to put it politely – passion in debates, in recent years I’ve seen that the balance has tipped away from discussion between individuals into mob wars between sides. To have a constructive discussion is not the aim, it is either to sidetrack the discussion entirely or cloud the issue so that discussion becomes impossible. This has turned what could be a tool for disseminating information and deepening understanding into a platform that misinforms more than anything else.
Ultimately, however, I do not see the answer as closing comments or removing the forum for these views to be aired in. It is treating the symptom, not the diseases. Perhaps what the internet needs more of is models of “good” behaviour and a stronger set of common rules of engagement – something like the Guardian’s comment guidelines. How we get that expanded across the web, I don’t know.
‘There’s been a cultural shift’ – cbarr
I have commented a lot on the Guardian, and I mean A LOT. Oddly there aren’t too many I begrudge, excepting those that are slavishly self entitled or unduly unkind.
I am an avid commenter, and yet NPR’s decision doesn’t surprise me.
Comment sections, as a platform, initially offered something different when it came to the consumption of information. News no longer needed to be a passive experience, ideas could be exchanged and developed inclusive of content creators. Unfortunately, that was a process of diminishing returns. From my experience, the bigger the platform, the less engaged its comment community is.
Or, so as not to coin a phrase, a lot of places seemed to have reached peak comment. There’s been a cultural shift in how we think of them, in how they’re treated on news websites – I don’t know that I’d want them put on an article I had written.
