No comments?

Brehaut is doing something radical. He’s doing the blog thing without the comment thing. Comments do have a few problems associated with them, mostly the problem of worth; comments are generally not as worthwhile as blog posts (see brehaut’s post for more).

What I find interesting is the effects this alternate model would produce on blogging, if every blog adopted the no-comment philosophy. The main effect will be a spreading effect. Ideas contained in posts - Memes - will spread a lot quicker from blog to blog, as in order for discussion to occur, multiple blogs will have to be involved. This has advantages and disadvantages.

The main advantage is that people will become more connected, and come into contact with diverse ideas. For example, because of brehaut using this strategy, this has meant I have had to post here, meaning you have read it, and become aware of what I’m reading, and who I have contact with. Which is usually good.

The main disadvantage is that people may not care about what I’m reading. So far I haven’t really posted anything on this blog about it techy stuff, and maybe that’s what people want? So the spreading may be good for ideas, but this may add ‘noise’ to blogs, where the posts in response to posts proliferate, and blogs might end up losing their focus.

Don’t know if I’d make my blog a no-comments blog, but it’s interesting to think how it would be if it were different.