I find it increasingly apparent that I need to clearly define a commenting policy and establish a set of guidelines that I apply when moderating my comments. These guidelines are established to help new people understand what I believe to be acceptable commenting behavior on what is my own digitized person.
Controlling spam is everyone’s concern, and I do my part here by trying to keep a good handle on who get’s to leave a link to where. Since each link is a vote for a site, I will ensure to the best of my ability that all links you find on here are safe to visit, and not dead.
Consequently that also means that I will be moderating all new comments that come in.
Here are some guidelines that can help to ensure your comment isn’t deleted without remorse or regret.
- Leave a proper email. If I see an email address that bounces back at me, I’ll delete all comments you’ve ever made unless we make alternate plans for the future of your links here. I do this to ensure that in the rare case, if I need to, I can email you.
- Use a proper name. Either in the Name field, or in the comment itself as your closing line. I will no longer accept not knowing the name (be it real or imaginary) of a person leaving a comment. Besides, I think it’s just good etiquette to do so.
- Linking. I don’t mind linking within the comment itself when it’s relevant to do so. Just adding your link “just because” is considered abuse of my niceness, and will get your comment deleted. You get a nice benefit from the
- Comments from India, China and other non-English speaking countries are immediately suspect. I’m not going Nationalist on you, it’s just that if I don’t understand what you’re saying, it’s really pointless for me to allow the comment. No offense, I’d simply rather know what I’m doing or have a good chance at it. I speak English, it’s the only language outside of coding that I can use at the moment. Therefore this is an English only blog.
- I consider my regular commentators as friends. It is therefore acceptable for friends to comment however they like. I give them more leniency because they have taken the time to participate, and I know that anything they might do that is “wrong” is most likely in error. At least, they’ve earned the benefit of a doubt.
If you’ve taken the time to get to know me, and I you, thank you for doing so, feel free to do what you like. Mi casa, su casa. Just don’t piss on the carpet nor drink the last beer without announcing it first.
I prefer establishing long-lasting relationships with my commentators and always appreciate the time you take to leave a comment. I hope these guidelines will help you understand my position a little more, as well as send a message to those that don’t see their comments anywhere around here.
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Wayne John is a web developer in Southern California that shares his 25+ years of programming and web development experience freely and happily to anyone willing to learn. He also loathes speaking in the third person. If you enjoyed this post, make sure you 
I used to have a website that used to come under attack for the very same people (I think), but with a different strategy that went under the radar. They used some sort of way to get links to their website by using trackbacks, because when they trackbacked a post they got links to their site…and trackbacks were not moderated by the commenting software I was using. I had to clear out literally hundreds of trackbacks by hand…it was terrible.
I think I may have found a way to get rid of some of the spam we bloggers receive. So far, I’ve not seen nor heard back from a couple people (Commiserating and Thorpe) and I believe it may be due to something I did.
I’m sitting on the details for now to allow time to pass to see if they will be back and dump some junk on here or not…but so far, after what I did, they have not returned.
I’m hopeful and can’t wait to share it with you all if it actually does help to get rid of the unwanted spammers.
I am new to your blog Wayne, and I know how annoying it can be to get comments from India, China ect. One of my blog sites blog posts has over 1000 comments on it, I ended up having to just delete the post.
I agree with Manz about most of these kind of comments are on SEO type blogs.
See Manz, we know each other. Not IRL, but you and I have taken the time to get to know each other, and I’m more than happy to help you promote your business.
Scott (damn, feels good to know your name, even if it’s real or not), you don’t have to be from the US, I’m only saying that if it’s from a non-english speaking country, I’ll give it a little scrutiny.
It’s true, I probably don’t have as much of a problem, but I can only see things getting worse instead of better. Thought I’d try to stem that tide before I’m truly flooded.
so… as long as i’m from the US, i use a name (Scott), and my comments are not completely irrelevant… than I’m “safe”?
anyways… good to see that you’re implementing a policy, although, i do think that your site has a lot less spammy comments than many i’ve been to recently.
thanks,
scott
Get your movie reviews from GritFX – http://www.gritfx.com/g_b_wadricks_film.html
Read weird stuff by Max Drake – http://www.gritfx.com/g_b_maxweirds.html
I could go one…
[i][b]Yep, I’m just being my cheeky self! I had to leave a comment for you to delete
[/b][/i]
I’ve been fairly lucky with spam comments… only had to remove a handful to date. I see more of those kind of comments on SEO/ social network kind of blogs. You poor guys!!
Well said Lindsay. I know now why bloggers complain about this. It IS hard sometimes to distinguish what a real comment, and what is being taken advantage of.
Adam, yeah, made that up as I wrote it. But I’m sure it’s been said before, and who knows, perhaps I read that somewhere back in time and it stuck, only to resurface again here.
My intent all along with this was to remove the “check it out mango” speech below with a bigger and bolder “HEY!” type of message.
Maybe that will send a message to the spammers. Lighten up, be real, and you’ll get the link you want so badly. lol
“Just don’t piss on the carpet nor drink the last beer without announcing it first.”
Is that original? lol Kudos if it is..
Are you going to place a link to this post on your comment form?
I really like the idea of a commentators guidelines..
I completely feel your pain. I have had some personal issues that has made it hard for me to check on my blog for more than a week at a time.. When i went there, i have HUNDREDS of spam comments just for a few days.. and then there are those that make it through that make no sense.
At first I was having a hard time deciding to accept some, as they were ALMOST comprehensive thoughts – in the end, i try and find all of them and delete.
I have ONE post on SEO, and i am ALWAYS getting comments from INDIA SEO and blah blah.. at first i thought, well, they are trying to comment to link back,but its actually a decent comment, i will keep it.. then they just KEPT COMING BACK to that post
The thing is, if people stopped hiring these morons, it wouldnt happen anymore. People are greedy… its like hiring a theif to gather some new household items for your new house.. and not caring WHO they stole from.
Hey Fairy, I just want to know your name and not call you by Fairy. lol I know you’re on the up and up, it’s these other guys from India and those that are quite obviously here for a link and nothing more.
Holte, I’ve seen it increase over the past few months, so if that’s any indication of success, I guess I’m doing a good job. lol
Carolyn, you going to be in the So Cal area at all this summer? We throw pool parties.
Glad to hear you’ll keep the carpet clean, lol
Cyndi, it isn’t so much that but those that leave links for the sake a linking back to their own stuff without any applicable context to the topic, yeah, I think that’s just being abusive. Especially when you haven’t even taken the time to “shake my hand” first.
All of you are perfectly cool, and I don’t want this to come off as anything other than a way to announce to the spammers that they’ll be wasting their time, and to give them a chance to improve here.
Spammers need love too. I guess.
Hi Wayne,
This is very interesting. I’ve only been blogging for about 9 months, so I didn’t know it was cheeky to leave your URL on a strangers blog. Is it even if you leave a sincere comment? I always thought it was more a courtesy like leaving your phone number.
Cyndi
I suppose we can only slightly control this by changing our comment settings. We could restrict who could comment and who could not. This does not mean the problem would go away entirely, as people always find a way around everything.
BTW, I promise to never piss on your carpet, I am potty trained. However, you may have to force me out of your pool.
It seems success has its drawbacks. I hope your efforts to control the pirates, for want of a better word, is successful.
I’m just sorry that it comes to this. The problem seems to be getting worse and I’ve seen increasing amounts of spam from people with Blogger accounts. Unfortunately you can only report spam blogs, not spam comments, so if the spammer doesn’t bother to set up a Blogger blog then there’s nothing you can do.
It spoils it so much for everyone else.