Do You Really Want to Get Rid of Your Comments?

May 12th, 2008

I recently read infomercials posted by Fred Wilson (here) and Howard Lindzon (here) on one of their portfolio companies - Disqus.

I just don’t get it.

Don’t get me wrong, Disqus provides some nice user interface features currently not provided by some of the conventional blog comment platforms. Perhaps more importantly, Disqus has helped underscore the increasing relevance of user generated content in social media. But why would a site owner want to surrender their data in return for threaded discussions and some other features? There are the technical downsides to comment replacement such as SEO implications and the lack of support of trackbacks and other features - Allen Stern (here) and Douglas Laskarr (here) do a great job of discussing these and here.

But more generally there’s the risk associated with turning over your data to a third party -– data portability, ownership, privacy, mining. What if their servers go down or they go out of business?Is it really worth it?

At SezWho we believe that it is possible to provide these capabilities without replacing comment systems, but by augmenting them with additional functionality. Rating/reputation, threads, filtering, and shared profiles can all be supported. However, it doesn’t end with just blog comments. In addition to comments our shared profiles aggregate blog posts, forum contributions and soon wikis, pictures and video. Blog comments are really just the start. As social media continues to grow the ability to connect and evaluate all forms of user generated content will become essential. Looking forward to your comments (btw, they’ll be safe and sound here on our site, right where you left them :-)).

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4.6 (10 people)
Posted by User ImageTedd Corman Filed in SezWho

11 Comments

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    gofree (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    I wonder where is my blog key while I get this script:

    Is 4829b41bd8d6e my blogkey? If so, can we use this for all blogs on the same and different domains?

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    		4.1 (4 people)
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    Jitendra Gupta (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    Hey gofree,

    Indeed 4829b41bd8d6e is your blog key. no, you need a different blog key for each blog (add blog from my account or register to add a new blog and get a new key for new blog).

    The script that goes with the key is as follows: 

    <script id="sz_embedded_script" src="http://sezwho.com/widgets/profile/js_output/BG/default/2.0/2.0/blogger/4829b41bd8d6e"></script>

    Did you not get the script in the original email? let me know.

    Thanks, Jitendra

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    		3.9 (3 people)
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    gofree (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    Hello,

    Thanks for your great help. Anyway, before getting your reply, I tried the key with another blog and it seems working though. Will I still need to add the blog and get its own key?
    Yes, I got the script.

    Regards,
    Gofre

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    		1.8
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    Alex (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    Right On Tedd!

    In fact that is exactly WHAT was the decisive factor for me to pick SezWho.

    I’m a strong believer that comments on my blog are not just an addition but a NEW and in many cases BETTER content then one generated by me. I value my commenters too much to surrender content generated by them to ANY third party!

    You guys provide a great service and as long as you don’t stray from this path - you will get more and more people joining.

    Alex

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    		3.8 (1 person)
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    gofree (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    Well, now I got the new key for the designed blog, but where can I change the old code to this new one?

    Thx

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    		2.6
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    Jitendra (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    Gofree,

    Can you give me the url of the blog you are talking about? Let me make sure that I give you the right answer.

    thanks, Jitendra

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    		3.7 (1 person)
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    gofree (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    At first set up, there a box to entered the code. But then when change needed, there is no way to change. Well, the blog is softwareloo.info

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    		2.6
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    Jitendra (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    Gofree, not sure why you are wanting to change the code…Is the current one not working out correctly. Let me know.

    Thanks, Jitendra

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    		3.5
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    gofree (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    The point is I was told I need a unique code for a unique blog url. As first I used the code generated for another blog’s url, but it works. Now just wanna know a unique code is still needed or I can just use that code first code fine?

    Thanks.

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    		2.6
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    Jitendra (Who am I?)

    6 months ago

    GoFree,

    I understand…Let me investigate and get back to you.

    Thanks, Jitendra

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    		3.5
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    qlco sbdqpilew (Who am I?)

    2 months ago

    fajvh obfq kfspqd nwbl bpyxwnrkh puxgb mazityr

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    		2.5

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