Protect Yourself from Bad Blog Comments
Peter Tan filed a police report regarding a blog comment in his blog. Jeff Ooi almost got himself into trouble by a blog comment as well. Rajan, Lim Kit Siang and other forums are having bad comments as well [ Politics 101 ].
I am not going to comment on the comments. As a WordPress blogger, I notice that most of them are not using WordPress.
Peter Tan and Jeff Ooi are using MovableType (MT) but not the latest version (3.2) that has better controls on comments. Lim Kit Siang blog is hosted at Blogger’s Blogspot and using Haloscan comment, which is even harder to manage. Rajan is using WordPress (WP) 1.5.2, but seems like he is not fully utilizing the power of WordPress.
Setup WordPress to Moderate Stranger’s Comment
In WordPress “Discussion Options”, there is a section titled “Before a comment appears:“.
Tick the checkbox of “Comment author must has a previously approved comment”. This will make sure that comments from stranger (who does not has previously approved comment) are helded for moderation.
You may also go to extreme by moderate every submited comment by ticking the first checkbox in the section. Personally, I do not recommend this.
Thought:
As a responsible blogger, he/she should always check the comments in his/her blog. It is recommended to use blogging system with advance control over blog comments, e.g.: wordpress.
Update: the case has been discusssed at blogherald. [ Thanks, Lilian ]
Hello Liew,
Say I have run into your blog now several times via technorati and other rss engines and links. Nice job ;-)
Comments can be tricky, on one hand their nice when people don’t abuse them however you always need to be aware of “bad” posts and such.
Say possibly you could help me with a question, I started blogging about three months ago and love the ease of use and the marketing power blogs offer. I have noticed some of these plugs that allow visitors to “book mark” this post at furl or del.icou.ous
Hey Liew. Very trroublesome lar to moderate all new commenters. Because it happens all the time.
Yvonne: it is better than getting yourself into trouble, right? :)
anyway, how come i am getting known spams when they have already been kharma-ed in WP ah?
Aik, ini macam promo WP pree aja, tauke? :D
Anyway, I do agree with you that WP does have good in-built comments moderation functions, unlike other systems where u have to utilise a third-party plugin to make it work.
– MENJ
Mossie `Ol Chin: are you using the latest WordPress version? Try to reset the spam database.
menj: ya, I am promoting WP :P
actually WP isn’t the only one with built-in comment moderation function, TXP (TextPattern) has the same built-in function as well. I’m not sure about other CMS, my guess is most newer version of CMS have that function built-in.
Lucky I have that third option checked. Anyway, not many comments to moderate at my blog because it is still new – I guess.
lol Yvonne, you think moderating comment is hard…look at kenny, he got 100+ comments and sometimes up to 200…i really wonder if he got so much time to spend on approving comments or he outsourced it?
Excellent advice CF. WP’s great commenting feature is one of the main reason (apart from categorising postings) I moved over from Blogger.
I use the Bad Behaviour plugin in filter out comment spam
I put in lots of unwanted words in the Comment Spam words including obscene words, items dealiung with race and religion and some common drugs being peddled in the Internet since mine is a medical website (hence inviting the usual pharma spam)
I doubt Kenny is on comment moderation. That would be crazy! lol!
I do agree with you that WP does have good in-built comments moderation functions, unlike other systems where u have to utilise a third-party plugin to make it work.