Friday, March 14, 2008

Some Blogging Questions

I'm not particularly obsessed with Technorati, but I did register the blog there and do check it to see who's linking to me, so you I can visit them in kind.

Only, I've discovered it's not all that accurate.

I get a better idea from checking my stats and seeing where people came from.

So why do we bother with Technorati again? Someone please help me understand.

Also, when you comment on a blog, do you like for the blogger to email a response to you?

I usually reply in comments but I've noticed recently that a lot of bloggers email me. So I was just wondering what you all prefer. I think replying in comments cultivates more of a group discussion, unless, of course it's a sensitive matter.

Those are my blogging questions for the day, help me out, oh wise ones.

7 comments:

Megan said...

I am not sure if you noticed but I like to reply in comments! :)

But this whole blogging thing is completely forgein to me.

Megan said...

Sorry to spam your blog but I thought of a few more things.

You asked how I wanted to be responded to, either way is fine. Sometimes it is nice to get the email because you might never check the comments of that post again.

More than anything like you said I like there to be a discussion going on.

You and I talk together back and forth so much it is hilarious!

Chaotic Hammer said...

You would think that since I work in high tech for a living, and build servers and manage web servers, that I would know about some of this stuff. And while I know the nuts and bolts underlying the technology, I don't actually know much about Technorati, or what its benefit is. Since I'm not particularly concerned with spreading my blog readership or promoting myself, I guess I've never researched it. (It would help if I actually got into the habit of making new blog posts on a regular basis, of course).

Regarding the e-mail responses to comments -- isn't that done in addition to leaving a comment on the blog? Or are you talking about personal e-mail messages to you only? I think it is normally an option you can select or de-select at the time you leave a comment (look on this page and notice the "Email follow-up comments to" checkbox).

That way, as Megan says, if you leave lots of comments on lots of other blogs, you can be notified in your e-mail that additional comments have occurred on a certain post, in case you forgot about that comment thread. You could still go back to the original thread and see the comments all lined up there, and leave another one.

But either way, yeah, I like to see ongoing "conversation" in comments, particularly if it's an interesting subject which can use a little discussion or back-and-forth, for the benefit of the audience.

Amy said...

Well, if you enable your email address in your Blogger profile and get comments left on your blog sent to your email, you can very easily just hit reply and answer the commenter.

So I've been receiving some emails in response to comments that were just for me. It's a bit more personal that way I suppose.

I wouldn't even know about Technorati, except that once Shaun asked us to link to him and then ping our blogs and that's how I learned about it and its supposed importance!

Krista said...

I think it's okay if you reply in comments to something that other bloggers might want to know about. a clarification or question perhaps. but I hardly ever go back and read comments after I leave one. Just no time. so I appreciate responses by email if they're warranted. just getting an email that says "thanks for commenting" though is kind of a waste of time.
I comment when I have something to say and if I don't then I don't. but that doesn't mean I'm not reading either.

Chaotic Hammer said...

Amy - Ah, okay. We are sort of talking about two different things. You are mainly talking about the owner of the blog receiving a new e-mail message for each comment left on his or her blog. I have that enabled also. And unless the comment was personal, private, or sensitive in nature, I can't imagine ever replying to the e-mail. It just serves to notify me that there are new comments. Particularly nice for comments left on older threads and stuff -- it's sort of like comment moderation without the long wait for the comment to appear.

I was talking about something a little different -- that is, requesting notification of new comments when I leave a comment (such as the "Email follow-up comments to" check box above "Publish Your Comment" in Blogger). This way, I, as a commenter, can see when other comments were left on the post. Not useful for most posts, but sometimes (like the lengthy in-depth comment threads that Seth likes to start) I can see this being useful. Or if I click a new link or wander away from the blogs I normally visit and leave a comment, I may want an e-mail message to remind me about it, and to see if the blog owner replied on the comment thread, since I might never "randomly wander" back to that same blog again.

Krista's thoughts on this are interesting. I often wonder how many blog readers simply have a reaction to the post and jot down a quick comment like she's talking about, and how many see the comments section as an ongoing discussion to be continued. Obviously I'm more of the latter. Doh!

Amy said...

CH,
I like you, regularly check the comments on my favorite blogs, but sometimes, I do have the comments emailed to me because I might forget to go back. It works nicely with gmail which doesn't totally fill up your inbox like, for example, replies to Shaun's threads do.

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