Thursday, September 6, 2007

May I Ask My Fellow Bloggers A Question?

It's about word verification for comments to your blogs. I very much understand about having COMMENT MODERATION. I didn't at first, and when I got a comment or two that was either really nasty or foul, I started it. Of course, it's nice to see one's comment instantly on a blog post, but it's kinda smart to do it to avoid any unpleasant messages.

What I don't understand is word verification. I mean I UNDERSTAND it, but am I wrong to find it slightly annoying? I know it's to avoid "non-humans" from leaving messages, but can't that just be avoided by using comment moderation?

One reason I hate it is because when I first started blogging, Google apparently thought my posting a lot each day meant that I was posting spam. Each and every time I saved something, I had to type in a word verification code. You have no idea how annoying that is. I wanted to scream. So I have a grudge against word verification. (To get rid of it, they LOOK at your blog and when they determine you're a real person, they take the word verification requirement off when you're drafting a post.)

My problem now is that sometimes it seems like the word verification interferes with leaving comments on other folks' blogs. Occasionally, after I type in a comment, it loses it (of course, always the most lengthy and complicated ones) or I never know if it was really sent, because the comment never shows up on the particular blog.

I suppose it could be that various bloggers just decided not publish the comments, but how could that be? (I know...I'm so full of myself.) Anyway, I'm probably just clueless about why word verification is a good thing.

8 comments:

Emily said...

Yes, I hate word verifications. They're getting longer and harder to read, each time.
I took mine off for a couple of days and I was flooded with creepy SPAM messages. They were really creepy.

Sue said...

Okay, so there's my answer. It's a pain, but it keeps off evil messages. I still hate it, though.

Anonymous said...

I don't mind it too much, but I've had some trouble leaving messages on other blogs. It sometimes asks me to go through the verification process twice, which isn't a huge deal, but it gets annoying. It must goof up other people too, because I've gotten duplicate comments from other bloggers.

Cynthia said...

Yes, Sue, it is a pain in the butt. I totally agree with you but like Emilie said, it really keeps away the spam.

Anonymous said...

I hate the whole moderation thing - I use Wordpress, so it's got a spam catcher. I understand the need for it though.

As for word verification, half the time I get it wrong because it's black on a muddled background. If I have to type it in, why make it all squiggly and hard to see?

Half of the time, I don't bother.

Sue said...

Hi Heather,

I make so many mistakes too. It's hard!

Jennifer said...

See, I took off the word verification because I felt it was pointless if I already had comment moderation up anyhow. When I turned it off I had a couple of days of spam messages which I easily rejected. After that I have had only a couple here and there and it's very rare.

Word verification is a PITA!

Sue said...

Hey Jen,

I know I'm probably giving myself bad luck here, but I haven't gotten any spam AT ALL lately (on blogger). And yeah, it IS easy to just reject the comment.

The main reason I hate word verification is that I like to preview my comments, because I make so many typos. And half the time I lose the comment after I've finally figured out what letters I'm supposed to be typing.