Comments, Yo

I know we all fear change and I know that I myself am a huge creature of habit, yet sometimes, it’s necessary.

First I’ll tell you what we’re doing, then I’ll explain why.

Starting today, all the comments on this site will be switched over to the Facebook system.

While that may not be popular among some of you, let me tell you the why.

We’ve been using Disqus as our comments platform of choice for several years now, and have always been happy. Last year, we were offered the opportunity to try their ad system, which would increase our revenue by putting ads in the comments.

Never one to turn away a bucket o’ cash, I figured we’d try it.

A few months in, seeing the revenue and quality of ads drop significantly, I made the decision to shut them off, and revert to our no-ad model for comments.

All was fine.

Cut to Monday of this week, where we received a notice from Disqus with 2 options on how to proceed-

1. Put Ads back in the comments section
2. Pay a monthly fee for ad free comments.

When we asked how long we had to make this decision, we were told a week. Great.

As neither of these options were appealing, we went with option 3-

Kiss Disqus goodbye and move over to Facebook comments, which will complement our healthy Facebook presence.

By no means is this a final decision, and we will see over the next few months how it goes, past the initial ‘FACEBOOK SUCKS’ phase that is sure to happen.

All that said, I’ll be keeping my eye on the comments section to see feedback, but I will tell you one thing, is that I believe that this might make for a kinder, gentler comments section, as people are usually a little nicer when using their real name.

We’ll see how this goes together, folks.

-Because I Can.