The End of 'Anonymous': Guidelines and Comments Area Fired Up, Ready to Go

In preparation for the end of "anonymous" comments tomorrow, I've updated our guidelines, put a note near the comment link and placed a link on the left about choosing an identity.

I appreciate all of the support I've gotten from our loyal readers and commenters. Please do not decide that this will keep comments down without giving it a chance...participate, use a Blogger/Open ID or be a little less than the word "Anonymous" by using Name/URL knowing it is really the same thing.

Tomorrow is a new chapter for BlogaBarbara but tonight is still young....

The Results from Super BlogaBarbara Tuesday

You may have noticed that I chose Super Tuesday for my post on whether we should do away with anonymous comments. A bit more clear than the Democratic primary, most of you seem supportive of my proposed change that you either use a Blogger ID or at least the "Nickname" section to make comments. Thank you for your ideas and support.

As there may be some education needed for some of you to know how to do this, I found the following Blogger Help page that goes over making comments in more detail.

I plan on switching over to the new format next Saturday, February 16th. Perhaps start considering some interesting names you could use for making comments...

Shall we end anonymous comments?

At the end of every year, I reflect on the months past and plan for the coming year. Many of us do this around our goals for family, work and anything else we are truly committed to in life. I did the same.

On the commitment I call BlogaBarbara, I have spent the last month considering something that has ironically also come up both in emails to me and in comments sprinkled through my various posts throughout the month.

What would happen if in order to comment on a post, a reader had to either use their Blogger ID or at the very least make a "nom de blog" which they would use whenever they posted a comment? This would allow people to continue protecting their identity if they chose but also allow them to create an online sense of self.

Commenters like Don Jose de la Guerra y Noriega, Timekeeper, First District Streetfighter and the like do this and it creates a more linear sense of who they are and what they are saying over time.

We don't get this sense of who our community is when we see a drive-by anonymous comment that disses a public office holder, a prior commenter or the subject of the post without much thought at all. If you had to be more responsible for what you wrote by simply taking on a pseudonym -- would you participate? Perhaps the real question is, would you value your participation more?

There are a lot of issues past the above in making such a change.

• How do I educate BlogaBarbara readers about this change?
  
• Do I need to not only change the guidelines but put a disclaimer underneath the link to the guidelines and at the end of every post for quite some time until everyone gets it?
  
• Will I need to indiscriminately not publish any comment from an anonymous that doesn't at least take on a nom de blog?
  
• How does one educate new readers as to this requirement?
  
• How do I teach all y'all how to do that?
  

I welcome your thoughts as I feel strongly that the nature of conversation on the blog needs to be elevated if BlogaBarbara is to grow and change with each of us as the years go by. I am committed to us as a community dedicated to people with different opinions able to speak their mind and still, perhaps more than occasionally, find common ground. I hope your commitment is the same.

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