Currently I only leave my blog posts open for commenting for 3 months. I figure that I’m not a huge blog and most of the audience reading my posts are pretty timely. My older posts don’t get as much traffic, so it’s unlikely they would attract someone who wanted to comment.
But I do confess that one of the reasons I close my comments is to help weed out spam.
I get A LOT of spam and it’s really annoying because I also get commenters who are accidentally classified as spam, so I constantly need to check my spam comments to make sure everyone legitimate can get through.
I’ve been wondering lately if I should leave my comments open for longer or maybe not shut them at all, but you know when a spammer thinks they’ve hit the jackpot you can get HUNDREDS of comments on only one post. Seeing as I have three years’ worth of posts, I figure trying to catch all the spam would be like trying to catch rain with a tennis racquet.
So, what’s up, peeps? Do you close your comments, and if so, when? How do you deal with combing through spam for legitimate comments? Am I worrying over nothing?
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About Nemo
A lover of kittens and all things sparkly, Nemo has a degree in English Literature and specialises in reviewing contemporary, paranormal, mystery/thriller, historical, sci-fi and fantasy Young Adult fiction. She is especially drawn to novels about princesses, strong female friendships, magical powers, and assassins.
Topaz @ Six Impossible Things
I don’t close my comments at all – I considered doing it for a time because I was getting loads of spam, but in the end I simply installed a spam filter plugin, and now I just have to remember to check it every month or so. I figure, why even inadvertently close off conversation on older posts, right? I like to keep it an open book (so to speak ;)) so that new followers can explore + share their thoughts on posts as far back in the archive as they want.
Nemo
I might consider opening them for a bit longer.
Ashley
I only close comments on posts that I’m tired of getting comments on.
For example, I might publish a tutorial post, people will comment with questions, and I’ll help them. That’s okay for a while, but if I’m still getting calls for help SIX MONTHS LATER I’m going to be super burnt out. So I’ll close comments when I feel like I’m done with a post and I can’t keep helping people with it.
Nemo
That makes sense for the kind of blog you run.
Silvara
I don’t turn off comments on my posts. I have a spam comment filter, so all the spam gets collected in one place. I go through it once a week or so to be sure no real comments have been marked as spam, and then delete all the actual spam. Keeps the spammers from getting any comments on my blog, and keeps legitimate comments able to be posted.
I figure if someone wants to comment on a post, but then is not able to, they might not bother trying other more recent posts. Plus it isn’t more work for me, since I’d have to go through spam comments for current posts anyway.
Nemo
I’m considering trialling NOT shutting down comments for a few months and see if it even makes a difference.
Lola
I don’t close my comment at all either. I just have a few plugins to protect my blog against spam and hardly any of them get through. I don’t want to close comments, because what if someone wants to comment on an old post and they can’t? I don’t want that. So I just leave my comments open. Although spam certainly is an issue and one of my anti-spam plugins makes commentign slightly harder as now you have to click a box to say you are not a spammer, but it catches almost all spam and that’s worth it for me.
Nemo
None of my spam has come through – except this one person who kept trying to get feedback on his writing, but that was years ago and had to be flagged as spam. I think I’ll give a trial period of not closing comments a go and see if it makes a difference.
Rachelle
Closing comments is a good idea for several reasons. Most importantly is the fact that if you’re self-hosted, I guarantee that the hosting company you’re using has something regarding the use of server resources in their Terms of Service agreement. Unless you’ve purchased the use of a dedicated server, you’re on a server with tons of other people who have their own websites. So, if you leave the comments open indefinitely and become the victim of a spam bot attack, your blog will begin using up a ridiculous amount of server resources. Once you go over that limit, the hosting company has the right and will suspend your account in keeping with the TOS you agreed to follow. That means your blog will be shut down, and you’ll have to go through a whole bunch of hassle to get it unsuspended. Not only that, but you’ll likely have a mess to clean up in your MYSQL database that can lead to future problems if it’s not handled. While not every spam bot attack is not that bad, it’s a risk you’re taking for the small chance that someone might want to comment on an old blog post.
Nemo
My hosting company does have its own server dedicated to only book bloggers, but that is something I’ve not considered before and quite scary to think about. Well, leaving myself open to a bot attack is something I do worry about, which is why I close my comments at the moment.
AlyssaZ
I can understand why comments should be closed after a certain amount of time. I had a previous blog that got SLAMMED with spam comments. I have no idea what was going on! So far, so good on my new blog, but if it starts happening again I am going to turn my comments off up to 3 months probably.
My readership isn’t that big so I don’t mind leaving my comments on for old posts. If someone wants to say ‘Hi!’, I want to say ‘Hi!’ back 🙂
Lately, however I have come across a few blogs that don’t have comments on at all. THIS annoys me. I don’t typically just want to read people’s online journals, I want to read their blogs and have dialogues. I don’t follow any blog that has no comments. It seems rude to me. *shrugs*
Nemo
It’s not like I get a huge amount of comments in the first place, but I do worry about cutting of discussion on older posts, and of course I lean towards the ‘prevention is better than cure’ ideology when it comes to bot attacks.
Briana @ Pages Unbound
I think my blog is set to automatically close comments on posts after a couple months, but I can’t remember off-hand how many months it is. It seems to help weed out spam pretty well, as you mention.
Nemo
I’m currently running a test to see how much spam I get – all posts are set to open comments.
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