One potentially nice thing about using this site is that it allows much more interaction with the readers than was possible before. The primary means for readers to interact is via comments. Comments allow any reader of you post to enter text and have it appear on the site. When used appropriately and judiciously they can be a lot of fun. How about we take a look.

What are Comments?

Any Post or Page might have comments but they have to be enabled. You can tell if a Post has comments enabled by looking at the bottom of the page. It should have a section at the bottom with a “Leave a Reply” heading. [I have comments enabled for this post, so take a look at the bottom of this page to see what I’m talking about. Feel free to experiment!].

Currently, we do not allow so-called “anonymous” comments so if you are not logged in to your site account, you will see a link giving you the option to do so. You do not need a site account to read comments that others have left on the Post however so any comment you put on a Post will be visible to everyone and will show you as the author. Something to keep in mind.

Once you are logged in, you should see a text area at the bottom of the page.To leave a comment, a logged in user just types something into the text area and clicks the “Post Comment” button. The comment will then appear at the bottom of the page.

Comments can be “threaded.” That means they appear in an outline format. A comment can be a reply to the Post or a reply to a reply (or a reply to a reply to a reply… you get the idea). Threaded comments allow for multiple “conversations” to happen on the page.

How to I enable comments?

Comments are automatically enabled for all Posts. They must be specifically disabled if you don’t want your Post to have the comment form. To enable or disable comments, you need to go to the Posts list. Hover your mouse over a Post and click the “Quick Edit” link that appears below it. A form should pop up that looks like this:

Click the “Allow Comments” box circled there. Note that you can disable and enable comments at any time, even after the Post has been published. You can also turn off comments after some time.

Curating your Comments (and Commenters)

Once comments are enabled, your job as the Post author has just begun! You can monitor all comments at the Comments page in the Dashboard. You can remove comments and edit your own comments. The current policy is to not allow anonymous comments and to not require comment approval. If we enable Comment approval, it adds an extra step where the author of the Post is required to approve it before it appears on the page.

Commenting can be tricky. It’s a good idea to keep track of what people are saying on your comments pages. Some people like to create specific policies for what kinds of comments they allow. My advice is to always turn off comments unless you a specifically want them. When you want comments, your Post should say what you’re looking for and you should keep an eye on the page. You should feel free to disable comments when after some time when it no longer makes sense to allow them.