14 Nov 2005

Passing Comment

I’m lucky to get a few weblog comments every now and then, but probably remove more than I let through. Many are clearly spam, so they’re instantly deleted and the commenter banned. Some of those left are abusive or completely irrelevant and also get the chop, plus the occasional ban for persistent abuse.

That leaves the lovely legitimate comments, plus a few tricky borderline cases. Someone makes a simple, bland statement that happens to refer to their web site, or puts a call-to-action in as their name. Ham or spam? I tend to be fairly harsh, so if something feels a bit spammy it goes, but I realise I’ll occasionally get it wrong.

So please don’t feel offended if I’ve removed an innocent comment of yours, and don’t be afraid to mention your own work if it’s relevant and of interest to other readers. Imagine you’ve turned up at the pub: you’re welcome to pull up a chair and join a conversation if you have something to say, but start wandering around shouting about how great your business is and everyone’ll think you’re a tosser. Turn up wearing a sandwich board advertising gambling sites or dodgy pills and the landlord’ll kick you out right away.