Do you think comments below articles are valuable?

Do you think comments below articles are valuable?

  • Yes

    Votes: 143 62.4%

  • No

    Votes: 86 37.6%
  • Total voters
    229
Johnatan56 said:
The main reason you probably get as much traffic as you do is because people come back for the forum, and because people find generally helpful stuff on the forum, they'll follow the site. No matter the content you post, it will probably get clicks due to the habit of people to visit MyBB, over time you will lose it if any other competitor actually existed.
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This is simply not true. We obviously track our traffic daily and the news section is where all the growth comes from. We also track the stickiness of the news section, the engagement rates, and various other metrics. It is all positive.

The majority of Mybroadband’s visitors do not visit the forum. The read the news and leave.

We agree the forum is a really great place and an excellent resource, but it does not account for a big part of the traffic.
 
rpm said:
This is simply not true. We obviously track our traffic daily and the news section is where all the growth comes from. We also track the stickiness of the news section, the engagement rates, and various other metrics. It is all positive.

The majority of Mybroadband’s visitors do not visit the forum. The read the news and leave.

We agree the forum is a really great place and an excellent resource, but it does not account for a big part of the traffic.
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You missed the point I was trying to make, you need something to capture users, and most of those users who go to the main site will have visited the forum one time or another, or they had a friend that has done so. All they need is one thing to make them know of the site, and then you get a snowball effect.
 
Johnatan56 said:
That is most definitely wrong, comments definitely drive repeat traffic as people will go to the same news source again if they feel connected to it, via e.g. comments.
News24 and EWN succeeding despite not having comments has more to do with them being on the forefront of news, which makes up for it as people repost the links in other places they can discuss it.
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Can you give examples of news websites - local or international - which closed their comments and saw a subsequent decline in traffic?

I have provided examples of where it did not happen. I assume you have many examples to substantiate your claim that it has a negative impact?
 
rpm said:
Can you give examples of news websites - local or international - which closed their comments and saw a subsequent decline in traffic?
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So you completely missed the last sentence I wrote.
Johnatan56 said:
News24 and EWN succeeding despite not having comments has more to do with them being on the forefront of news, which makes up for it as people repost the links in other places they can discuss it.
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Should have been expected considering the quality of articles you allow to be published.
I have provided examples of where it did not happen. I assume you have many examples to substantiate your claim that it has a negative impact?
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Nice red herring there, well done.

I can point to successful sites that have comments, e.g. the verge, locally daily maverick.
 
Johnatan56 said:
You missed the point I was trying to make, you need something to capture users, and most of those users who go to the main site will have visited the forum one time or another, or they had a friend that has done so. All they need is one thing to make them know of the site, and then you get a snowball effect.
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This is, again, simply not the case. Most people visit MyBroadband for its news. They also subscribe to our daily newsletter and follow us on social media for news.

We track various metrics to see how we acquire readers, and the forum is a small part of it. We can see whether a person previously visited the forum before they read the news, and it is just not the case.
 
Johnatan56 said:
I can point to successful sites that have comments, e.g. the verge, locally daily maverick.
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But you claimed comments drive traffic. Can you show an example of a site where stopping comments resulted in a decline in traffic?

The Daily Maverick is indeed a good example, but for the inverse of what you said. After they closed their comments a few years ago, they showed growth - not a decline in traffic.
 
rpm said:
Eyewitness News has announced that it will close its comments section (more here).

Do you think comment sections add value? If so, why do you think big publishers are closing their comment sections?
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They used to, publishers are closing comments sections because comments and the moderation of them has moved to social media.

News sites do not have the manpower or resources to efficiently moderate the various emotive, racially biased, aggressive or politically motivated responses that their articles result in.

That said,

Comments sections that are not moderated are always doomed.
 
rpm said:
This is, again, simply not the case. Most people visit MyBroadband for its news. They also subscribe to our daily newsletter and follow us on social media for news.

We track various metrics to see how we acquire readers, and the forum is a very small part of it. We can see whether a person previously visited the forum before they read the news, and it is just not the case.
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You can't go back months/years for a user.
bwana said:
As opposed to dodging and ducking?
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The examples he gave were sites that already had a large market share before closing and get clicks because they're among the first to report local news.
rpm said:
But you claimed comments drive traffic. Can you show an example of a site where stopping comments resulted in a decline in traffic?
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Good comments help drive user engagement, clicks is not really a great way to measure success of a news site.
The Daily Maverick is indeed a good example, but for the inverse of what you said. After the closed their comments a few years ago, they showed growth - not a decline in traffic.
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And yet they have comments back and are doing better than ever?

Comments are not a bad thing, what is needed is proper moderation, the MyBB journalists being the moderators isn't really great as it's expensive to do, rather nominate community members and allow them to flag and remove users, same as on the forums.

Most sites removed comments on their site as they moved the comments to social media which is easier for managing users (not many would compromise their FB account compared to throwaway disqus accounts, but the anonymity means people are more likely to post their actual opinion).

And here:
www.poynter.org

The case for keeping comments - Poynter

From person-to-person coaching and intensive hands-on seminars to interactive online courses and media reporting, Poynter helps journalists sharpen skills and elevate storytelling throughout their careers.
www.poynter.org www.poynter.org
mediaengagement.org

Comment Section Survey Across 20 News Sites - Center for Media Engagement

We partnered with 20 U.S.-based news organizations to conduct one of the largest-ever surveys of online news commenters.
mediaengagement.org mediaengagement.org
 
Why I think they are being closed;

Politics are increasingly toxic so often the only thing you find in a comments section is hate and vitriol. Pick any South African comment section and its ''white this, black that'', ''bobbejaan'', ''boer'' , ''go back home'' and ''where are the whites in bafana?''. With the prevalance of bots to push an agenda and brigading, there is also the risk that a certain group may take over a comment section, effectively hijacking it, and the owners of said website or platform won't want to be associated with said ideology. Then we also have no-platforming, a growing trend of drowning out differing opinions and valid criticisms, so the comments section ends up echoing what the article/opinion piece said, so, so much for a debate.

So no, not much value.
 
Technically speaking even a poll can answer the question as its people commenting an answer, do they provide value? no. Do they provide entertainment? Hell yes.
Let me paste a picture:

1591303597264.png
 
I prefer not having something like the previous disqus system.
That was just a nasty experience.
I'm a forum member. I know most nicknames of the regular guys here.
I would prefer that the Articles could have proper links to the forum thread discussing it as well.
When I'm a bit high, like now, my motor skills are borked. So I have to double check what I do. Quite funny at times.

TL,DR
No comments below articles/main news site.
Clearer distinction of article forum threads.
 
MyBB is a exception to the rule since it has forums in the first place, you cannot directly compare it to other news sites.

Since it does have forums I see the disquss comments section as mostly irrelevant. The forums can be seen as the real comments section, this is why most people don't go there.... most people don't comment. @rpm

Anyone that has a bit of sense mostly stays far away from facebook comment sections unless it's a small throwaway rant..... bunch of utter nutters there ranting and raving as if what they say actually matters.
 
Generally as useless as the comments in this thread imho. Opinionistas!!
 
Comments below articles in other websites are valuable, but not MyBB.

The articles themselves are subjective and one sided without any pretense at impartiality or any attempt to get input from the other side.

In general only those comments that echo the article are allowed. Anything else is generally removed or only posted many hours later, after the debate has long passed
 
If you really want to know the value of comments, consider this thread, a simple topic with 80 diverse replies and a diverse range of comments on it. When the question was asked you had one side of the argument your head, ie. your opinion, then others revealed their thoughts about it and whether right or wrong, suddenly you thought about the topic much wider than just the statements of the person that wrote the article. Which is great, cos we know how the media sometimes has their own agendas, besides trying to generate income. Comments are like the democracy of opinions, where no comments are like the ANC's central command trying to tell you what to think while giving the Zuma spawn's smuggling op a boost..
 
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