I'm Tie With D'Arcy Norman for Most Number of Comments on Cogdog Blog!

Kasha at Rest by Cogdog Blog

 

I've been a fan of Alan Levine's blog and work for years now.  And it's not because I love dogs, but because I've found some much value from reading his posts and enjoy his sense of humor.  I also like commenting there because, well, Alan has a great sense of humor.

So no wonder I tied for first place as one of the most frequent commenters on his blog.  Every year, Alan does a week of comment blogging and as preparation he reviews who has commented the most on his blog.   It's all about the reciprocity ...

I will take all my writing to blog via the comment space of other sites. This is the notion of “comment blogging” I found long ago, and something I hope helps to underscore the power and benefit of putting your energy into participating in the blogs of others, of making it an active social process.

I enjoy commenting on other blogs almost more than writing my own.   At one point, I thought it might be just procrastination, but it helps me "type out loud" and the comment usually sparks an idea for a post or deepens thinking.

This has gotten me wondering about the art of commenting:

• What are some of your bets tips for leaving comments on other blogs?
• If you are a blogger, how do you respond to your comments?  Via email.  On the blog thread in the comments? Both?
• How do you track the comments you left on other blogs?
• What are the best posts about commenting?

Comments

[Alan Levine]

Thanks Beth for your kind and generous words. Is it fair for me to comment your blog about commenting on mine? Of course!

Hoping maybe 2008 might be the year our paths can cross....

[Beth Kanter]

I'd say that's a great thing to comment about!

[Sue Waters]

I try to comment back on my posts - but time constraints mean that I often include the comments to several readers in the same comment. While email is an excellent method to supplement - time constraints limit it.

I normally track my comments using co-mment which has been really effective. But, mutter mutter, road testing cocomment has been on my to-do-list so have just signed up for an account. Must be worth considering is Alan uses it -- however mutter, currently have absolutely no b..dy idea of how to use it...cause co-mment is so b...dy obvious in comparison. Shame Alan isn't blogging for a week or maybe he would have clarified?

Of the top of my head - there are so many posts about commenting... I believe you have lots :) and Michele Martin wrote some excellent ones at the end of last year.

Mmmm now what does one do with cocomment? Well can add tags? Lets have some fun road testing :) (MUTTER)

[Beth Kanter]

Sue,

Maybe Alan will come back here and clarify? mutter mutter .. I tested co-comment a while back but ditched because of technical glitches. Maybe it i up to speed now. I need an extra month to catch up with myself... cheers

[Jeffrey Keefer]

Beth, this was a great post.

I always want to keep up with comments, but have found the comment tracking services to be a challenge to use, so usually do not track comments after I make them unless the person has a plug-in to their blog that tracks follow-ups. If they have this, I do track them and will reply with follow-ups.

One of the challenges for the commenting services is that they assume you always use the same computer, and have the ability to add the plug-in code to the browser.

Do you use any of these services?

[Sue Waters]

Well maybe this comment stream will be the true test of co-comment vs co-mment. My thoughts at the present is that co-mment is by far easier to use (http://co.mments.com/), and if you are working on another computer its far easier to drag the booklet for co.mment onto Firefox than install the Firefox addin for cocomment (http://www.cocomment.com/).

So it really gets back to the reasons why you want to track conversations. I want a quick an easy method of being part of the conversation; and being able to re-engage back with a conversation -- which is what co-mment allows me to do. Cocomment focus appears to be more on the community aspect of commenting -- which isn't a bad thing providing the community effectively interacts with your commenting. I have noticed that when you subscribe to RSS of cocomment it only inserts the name of the commenter if that person is using cocomment. That really sucks (sorry). Co-mment displays the name of the person - which is really good.

ROFL if Alan doesn't comment back then I think maybe co-mment should get the tick for being more effective than the cocomment that he is using. :)

PS Beth give co-mment a try - it won't use up much of your time.