Glenn Reynolds discusses comments at the WAPO

Washington, D.C.: Hi, my question is for Glenn and then maybe Jane would like to comment.

Why is it that most of the high traffic right-wing blogs don't take comments, while most of the left-wing blogs do?

From my perspective, it looks like the conservatives can dish it out, but can't take it, that they are uncomfortable subjecting their ideas to scrutiny on their own Web sites.

Jeff Jarvis: Heh.

Glenn Reynolds: I think that one reason has to do with media treatment. Charles Johnson, for example -- who does have comments -- has repeatedly faced media stories about his site in which comments made by his readers are directly attributed to him, as if he had written them. I certainly worry about that sort of thing, too. I think that lefty sites expect, and get, less of that kind of mistreatment.

I've never had comments. I get about 1000 emails a day, and I don't have time to look at those, post on my blog, AND moderate comments. And unmoderated comments raise a risk of the kind of thing I mention above, as well as possible libel and copyright issues. I've actually considered bringing someone in to do that, but that seems too impersonal.

I submitted a comment, but I think I missed the deadline for consideration (and besides they probably had a backlog of comments by then).

Dear Professor Reynolds

You wrote

"Glenn Reynolds: [snip] And unmoderated comments raise a risk of the kind of thing I mention above, as well as possible libel and copyright issues."

Are you familiar with the law. In this case the law makes it very clear that if people can post comments automatically, the organiser of the site is not legally liable for the comments. Thus there could be no libel of copywrite violation liability for you if you were to allow comments. Further you do not acquire such liability by deleting some comments. The law is very clear that such deletions do not make a blogger the editor of a comments section for legal purposes.

Of course this was fully discussed when Daniel Luskin threatened to sue Atrios (see
http://tinyurl.com/b45lz).

Professor Reynolds. What subject exactly do you teach ? Are you completely ignorant about the law or were you trying to pull a fast one ?

Why does Reynolds feel the need to deceive when talking about the response to a factual error.

Also it is ironic, given that Reynolds was invited by a MSM organ to help them defend themselves against angry readers and the two who showed the readers the way to get the Post's attention, that he begins his answer by blaiming "media treatment".
Sure Glenn participants in the discussion are going to be real convinced that the MSM is unfair to righties and just doesn't know it has a problem with liberal bias. Just ask Deborah Howell.

My guess is that he doesn't even notice when he distorts or appeals to the assumption that the MSM has a liberal bias.

Comments:
As much as I hate political discussions that focus on my team/your team arguments instead of the issues themselves, I have to agree that the entire point of public discussion of politics SHOULD be to develop, through dialog and sharing ideas, political and economic systems for the betterment of the nation in question.
Blogs that just rant, however, without allowing for EXCHANGE of ideas are pointless.

Plus, and perhaps more to the point... if a blog has it's mouth open but its eyes and ears shut, then its author is likely the same way. How well informed and intelligent can any such speaker be?

# posted by K. R. Robling : 11:49 PM

Now I welcome comments but there are so few to welcome. I wish that Blogger had a setting so that comments appeared up here with the post and I didn't have to pull them up by hand.

posted by rjwaldmann