Let’s have a conversation about comments. With the rise of third party sites like FriendFeed it is getting harder to keep up with comments. If you are unfamiliar with FriendFeed the site is an aggregator to aid you in following your friends. If I placed my blog feed in FriendFeed my friends using the site would see my entries but they would also be able to comment on my entries in FriendFeed. Those comments would stay in FriendFeed and would not be posted on my blog. This is why I haven’t put anything in my FriendFeed account – I don’t see the sense in having comments on my content on another site. That would mean there are multiple conversations going on. There is enough of that with sites like Digg and Reddit but at least there is a benefit those sites give you – traffic.
Going through my feeds I noticed Dave Winer has a solution to this problem. RSS has a comments element built in. If a feed reader supports the comments element it will show an icon that, when clicked on, will take you to the blog owner’s page to make a comment. I like that. Correction, I love that. I hope all feed readers begin to support the comments element, especially online aggregators. I really think FriendFeed should refer the reader to the writer’s site, not allow comments within their site, especially if the RSS feed has the comments element in it.
I realized there is another layer of recognition needed. My RSS reader supports the comments element. I have no idea how long it has been supporting it. Unfortunately, I’ve never used it. I never even paid attention to the icon. While looking to see if my RSS reader supported the comments element (and feeling like a dumb ass when I realized it did) I noticed other icons I never paid attention to, like the ability to see who else linked to an article. I think the reason why I never paid attention to them: the icons are gray so they blend in with the text. Fortunately the RSS reader I use makes it easy to switch up the icons and I just might to enhance my user experience. Ironically newer icons added to the program have color.
Familiarize yourself with the interface of the applications you use. You may realize the program has ways built in to make you more efficient. Now that I know I can click to comments easily I will comment more. I don’t think some site owners realize how inconvenient it is to comment on their site. Two extra clicks can be the breaking point for someone commenting.
Check and see if your feed has the comments element. It seems WordPress has it by default. I looked at the ExpressionEngine blog and theirs have the comment element in it so it might be in ExpressionEngine by default as well. I have no idea about the other blogging tools. Check if your feed reader supports the comment element. Online readers might have to get with the program and add the element.