If you’re a regular reader of the blog, you’ll notice that I’ve switched the Livefyre commenting system back on, after using the vanilla WordPress option for the last few months. I was one of the early beta users of the system, and loved the way it took blog commenting and turned it into a real-time chat (as this experiment and the subsequent results show). However, along with it not really fitting into the blog’s redesign at the time, there were…

This is a guest post by Danny Iny. Have you heard of comment trading communities? It’s a new fad that seems to be sweeping the blogosphere (or at least a few corners of it). Basically, the idea is that a bunch of people get together and agree to comment on all of each others’ posts. Some bloggers are experimenting with the idea, some love it, and others hate it. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. A short while…

Hi guys. So today was meant to be the third part of the 7 Days to Turn Your Blog Into a Social Media Hub series. This will appear tomorrow, as something’s been chewing on my mind today (and apologies to anyone who was expecting the Hub post). When I write a blog post, it’s obviously my point of view. Once it’s in the open, though, it then becomes a shared point of view with you, the readers – and your…

So it wasn’t that long ago I mentioned I was moving my comments system to DISQUS. The fact that the system was being used on more blogs, and also had social media integration with its Reactions feature that pulled stats from anywhere else your blog was being discussed, seemed pretty cool. Yet, lately, DISQUS seems to have had some continued issues. One is that the Reactions (the comments from Twitter, Digg, etc, that show up as trackbacks) seem to be…

This is a guest post following a great chat I had with Valerie Merahn Simon, and is a nice follow-up on my recent post about Twitter and blog comments. If you’re like me, you read a lot of blog posts. Many of them are good posts. Some you’ll even share via Twitter or email. But only once in a while will you be motivated to comment. Commenting is a contribution. It requires time and effort and thought. So why are…

If you’re a blogger, you’ll know how comments make a blog. They can take the original post into a whole new level altogether, with opposing views and discussions opening up some great viewpoints. Personally, I’ve used the comments on some of my posts (and those on other blogs) as inspiration for new posts here. I’ll add my comment on the original post, and then expand on it with a new or slightly different take. That then opens the discussion up…

When people think of reactions from blogs, they normally think of negative reviews or inspiring stories. Comments aren’t usually high up on the list of monitoring and watching what’s being said online. Yet they should be, as a recent post by David Henderson and the subsequent conversation in the comments section show. I won’t go too much into the actual blog post or the comments, as they’re both recommended reads and will give you a far clearer view of who…

A couple of days ago, I wrote about Fake-Twitter and concerns of how it could be misused. As a (partial) result, the site received an official takedown notice from Twitter and I received some of the most heated and angry comments ever from a post. That’s cool. People have opinions and sometimes these opinions are strong, and the comment section is where these opinions are allowed to be expressed. It’s one of the reasons that I have an open comment…

Google seems to be coming in for a lot of stick at the moment. Many Twitter users are aghast at the thought of Google buying Twitter, and their handling of popular blog tool Feedburner has come under fire (including here on this blog). Some of the criticism is justified, others less so. Yet is it any surprise that Google continues to come under fire when the company itself seems to go out of its way to upset the community it…

Recently David Henderson was kind enough to invite me on his blog to offer my views on traditional media and its relationship with social media. I’m really grateful to David for allowing me his space – he’s an incredibly smart person so giving up some of his real estate for my ramblings was particularly appreciated. Like any view, there will be some that agree and disagree. And, as I mentioned in the post itself, I’m far from an expert in…