No, comment filters don't work perfectly [LWN.net]

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 19, 2014 21:45 UTC (Wed) by louie (guest, #3285)
In reply to: Today's Debian technical committee resignation: Ian Jackson by seyman
Parent article: Today's Debian technical committee resignation: Ian Jackson

LWN's comment section, in the language of Jeff Atwood, is Jon's house (or in my earlier framing, it is Jon's party). To further quote Jeff:

[M]ute and ignore, while arguably unavoidable for large worldwide communities, are actively dangerous for smaller communities.

This is your house, with your rules, and your community. If someone can't behave themselves to the point that they are consistently rude and obnoxious and unkind to others, you don't ask the other people in the house to please ignore it – you ask them to leave your house.

I'm very sad that LWN has come to the point where Jon can't just leave the door open and let anyone into his house. But it is clear that it has come to this point. Jon, how can we help you fix this? Because as-is it is poisoning all the good work you've done here over the years :/

to post comments

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 19, 2014 22:26 UTC (Wed) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] (8 responses)

Don't know. We really don't want to be in the business of comment moderation, and, if we do have to do that, it will show elsewhere. There's no spare time for it.

Suggestions more than welcome.

I'm really hoping that things will get better if and when this whole systemd thing runs its course. As it is, we're all kind of exhausted.

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 19, 2014 23:19 UTC (Wed) by sjj (guest, #2020) [Link] (1 responses)

Maybe you don't / shouldn't need to think of building your own moderation. Have you looked at Discourse (discourse.org)? I don't have experience with it, but their heart seems to be in the right place... ("Civilized discussion. On the Internet.")

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 20, 2014 7:39 UTC (Thu) by joib (subscriber, #8541) [Link]

Presumably, as there's even a recent LWN article about it: https://lwn.net/Articles/609720/

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 19, 2014 23:20 UTC (Wed) by andreashappe (subscriber, #4810) [Link] (4 responses)

Would it be possible to add an easy way filtering (or collapsing) guest comments? Not long-term or in a permanent way in the database but rather like a ``view filter'' (for lack of better words)?

When a article seems to be collecting flames then I tend to mostly ignore guest posts (due to lack of time) -- my theory is that subscribers don't sh*t where they eat and move their asbestos/flame-related needs to reddit (:

but anyway, thank you for your work!

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 19, 2014 23:27 UTC (Wed) by corbet (editor, #1) [Link] (3 responses)

Filtering guest comments would be a useful feature. I'll look into what it would take to add that, it might not be that hard.

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 20, 2014 7:07 UTC (Thu) by peterhoeg (guest, #4944) [Link] (2 responses)

Have you considered opening up the source for the site?

Considering your primary audience, I think you would not have problems finding readers who would submit patches.

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 20, 2014 7:43 UTC (Thu) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link] (1 responses)

>>Is the LWN site code open source?
>Not yet. We do intend to release our code once it gets a bit more "ready," has had one more security audit, and when we are in a position to support it as an open source project.
>Unfortunately, we spend most of our time creating the content that makes up LWN, and trying to bring in enough money to keep food on the table (servers running, etc.), so it has not, yet, gotten anywhere near the top of the priority list. When LWN reaches a level that is truly self-sustaining, we certainly will spend some time to get that done. Thanks for your patience.

Right here in the: https://lwn.net/op/FAQ.lwn

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 20, 2014 13:49 UTC (Thu) by fb (guest, #53265) [Link]

I always found the instance of not opening up LWN source a little silly.

I mean:
- sure the code likely looks like crap. It is not as if we all don't write crap code.
- yes, there are likely exploitable bugs there.

Given the popularity of this site, it would surely get reviewed and cleaned fast, AND I would be more likely to get fancier features at LWN.

Hey Jon, please consider placing a git repository somewhere and announcing only for subscribers. Within a month, the code would likely get cleaned AND you would have enough material to write a few major articles out of the experience.

No, comment filters don't work perfectly

Posted Nov 19, 2014 23:27 UTC (Wed) by louie (guest, #3285) [Link]

The exhaustion doesn't surprise at all, but nevertheless I'm very sorry to hear it.