At this moment I suspect that Darragh is going to win the Irish Blogpost of the Month again with his beginners guide on How to Comment on a Blog.
This entire point was sparked by a discussion on people feeling uncomfortable leaving a comment if they don’t blog themselves.
Nonsense. Your opinion is just as valuable even if you don’t have your own electronic soapbox to shout from. In fact, especially if you don’t have your own blog, as your opinion hasn’t been expressed before.
To make things easier, I’ve taken up Iarfhlaith Kelly’s kind offer of a rather obvious “comment here” style button (
) so its easy to see how you can have your say.
Remember as Grannymar said “comments are the lifeblood of blogs”. Please give generously.
Looking forward to hearing from you soon,
Will Knott
May 20th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
Will
Just leaving you some lifeblood
May 20th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
If it’s the lifeblood of a blog then many of my blog posts are dead as something-very-dead. Apparently my photoblog is visited by many people who I’ve met, some are friends and friends of friends, and some posts get posted around their offices but they never leave comments. At the camera club I hear, “Oh yeah, I saw that image on your blog the other day, it was great!” and I think, why couldn’t you have commented?
Sort of disheartening, especially at times when I’ve put a lot of effort into an image. Visitors from Google are notorious for not commenting.
We all like our egos stroked don’t we, eh?
May 20th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Hey Will, thanks for the link!
However I haven’t won any awards for anything. I see how that could be read – need to edit that.
Commenters are so important not only to keep the blog alive and the writer’s ego stroked but because the conversation can go to other parts and spark new posts, new ideas and new opportunities for the blogger to reach new people and a new audience.
I agree with Donncha as well – people say they read you, but don’t leave a comment. I’m as guilty, not just out of time restraints but I think saying “I read this” might put people off or think “oh that’s what you’re supposed to post”.
I hope the buttons help. That’s all my original post was about and I’m glad to see that they’re being used. I just have to remember to use them now – and stick up an FAQ!
Cheers again
Darragh
May 20th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
oops Sorry Darragh. I honestly thought you were the first.
Donncha, I’ve a suggestion that will sound horrible, but bear with me.
Make the image smaller.
Your text and then
comments and finally
The large version of the image
Until you left the above comment, I have rarely (once?) commented on InPhotos.org because photoblogs don’t seem to be, well, comment-able. It almost seems wrong to add a comment to the text. I’ve left comments in Flickr and Pix.ie, but not on the blog.
Something I’ll have to change.
May 22nd, 2008 at 8:50 am
Interesting idea, but can’t do it as the large image is hard coded in each image. I wish the Monotone photoblog theme came out when I started my blog. That’s a sweet theme for displaying images.
I guess people think that images in a post require a critical comment. The text of the post should probably encourage the normal conversation that happens on a blog. Have to think about that!
May 23rd, 2008 at 8:42 am
As I said on Darraghs post (which was very well written) Photoblogs do have this serious problem when it comes to commenting, Donncha is correct people do believe a critique is nesscessary on any photos we put up, yes for me I would love people to tell me they like the picture, at least that way I would know that any sort of photography skills I may be learning are actually working.
This is one of the reasons why I changed my blog recently to include some written posts with no pictures, and guess what my subscriber rate has increased and comments are now beginning to come in.
The only thing that scares me is that I am a photoblogger and I dont want to fall from that genre, a photoblog should be picture based, have I left the genre already.
May 23rd, 2008 at 2:44 pm
No need to be scared McAWilliams. Words can be welcoming. Using the picture to enhance (or contradict) the words is also useful
May 23rd, 2008 at 3:49 pm
[...] really has been the topic of the week. Will Knotts post got myself and Donncha talking in relation to commenting on [...]