NOTE TO READERS: I have no control over this, wordpress.com implemented it across the board. My advice until they fix it is to make sure you are running a modern updated browser, Such as Firefox. – Anthony
from the wordpress.com blog:
Post Comments Using Twitter and Facebook
Starting today, visitors to your blog can use their Facebook or Twitter account to leave comments. This saves everyone a few steps and gives visitors control over which identity they use. It’s a win for everyone.
See the new commenting screen below:
As an important touch, we let you stay logged in to multiple services. This means you can stay logged in to Facebook for convenience, but still leave a comment through Twitter or your WordPress.com account. Just click whichever identity you’d like to use, and the selected one will be associated with your comment when it is published. You’re in control of your identity, as you should be.
Depending on your theme, you may notice the comment area looks different than before to make room for these new features. We also intelligently choose to use a light or dark visual style for the comment box, depending on the theme you are currently using.
And since you know your readers well, you can now change the text above the comment box to be whatever you like. We recommend using the default we are applying to new blogs, “What are you thinking?”, as questions often encourage more comments, but you can change it to whatever you like by going to your dashboard, then Settings → Discussion.
We know you like comments and this will help you get even more. Stay tuned for better Twitter and Facebook integration features, coming soon.
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“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!”
“Change is inevitable, progress is not.”
And other GOM comments…
Best,
Frank
Actually, I believe this is not by Anthony’s choice, but rather something WordPress has decided to do. The same response setup is on ClimateAudit and The Air Vent. While WordPress is a great location to support the traffic these blogs receive, they also get to set how the readers interact with the blog. Me, while I have a Facebook account, I do not use it for blog posting. I only use it to keep track of some friends and people from high school, even after 28 years since graduation. It gave me a chance to reconnect to some old friends.
I heard one on tv tonight.
Twitter is for people who dont know how to shut the [snip] up….even when they`re on their own..
and they usually are.
Thought i`d save the mods time.
If you follow the right group of folks on twitter, you will get lots of links to interesting articles and photos that you might not have seen otherwise.
Most people’s twitter comments are like the comments at youtube or nfl.com, who cares to read that crap?
I don’t do facebook or any other social media as I am in the GOM camp.
The “space and a half” in the comments box is not an improvement.
Do these changes mean that it will look perpetually broken with a red X because I dont have a “Gravatar”?
R.S.Brown says:
June 10, 2011 at 2:26 pm
It is all numbers driven.
WP would ask ” What can I do to increase circulation numbers” and cross linking to social sites is the answer for them, and may be for Anthony as well.
It is certainly difficult to see the small text, impossible to check commas, full stops etc. Perhaps this is a Darwinian move to select out the sight impaired and skew the age group but I know that without Greasemonkey and spell-check ,I would be in big trouble.
I seem to remember something about Joe Romm being bashed for changing his comment system to Facebook?
[Reply: This was a WordPress change, not a WUWT change. ~dbs, mod.]
WordPress wants to be a social network?
That’s not the point of comments. Wrong tools, wrong philosophy.
The “new” system is not compatible with IE6 .. The “Post comment” button is not visible. As a result, I can no longer use MY system to post comments. For this post, I had to use another system.
Please provide an option so that it is still possible to post without having to purchase a new computer.
REPLY: Sorry about that but Microsoft doesn’t support IE6 anymore, you’ll need to upgrade to a modern browser to be in tune with the web these days. IE6 is now 10 years old. – Anthony
~dbs mod said: This was a WordPress change, not a WUWT change. ~dbs, mod
Oh, that explains it then…
In the beginning was the Plan.
And then came the Assumptions.
And the Assumptions were without form.
And the Plan was without substance.
And darkness was upon the face of the workers.
And they spoke among themselves, saying, “It is a crock of shit, and it stinks.”
And the workers went unto their Supervisors and said, “It is a pail of dung, and we can’t live with the smell.”
And the Supervisors went unto their Managers, saying “It is a container of excrement, and it is very strong, such that none may abide by it.”
And the Managers went unto their Directors, saying “It is a vessel of fertilizer and none may abide its strength.”
And the Directors spoke among themselves, saying to one another, “It contains that which aids plant growth, and it is very strong.”
And the Directors went to the Vice Presidents, saying unto them, “It promotes growth, and it is very powerful.”
And the Vice Presidents went to the President, saying unto him, “This new plan will actively promote the growth and vigor of the company with powerful effects.”
And the President looked upon the Plan and saw that it was good.
And the Plan became Policy.
Anthony, while I recognize that this isn’t your fault, I have to add my dislike to the new setup.
WordPress. a work or two in your ear……No thanks, leave me alone!
We’re not going to see any Weiners here, right?
NOTE TO READERS: I have no control over this, wordpress.com implemented it across the board. My advice until they fix it is to make sure you are running a modern updated browser, Such as Firefox.
I’ve sent in your complaints to WP support – Anthony
So is this a big problems or not for those of us with newer browsers and no eye problems? There are a lot of supposed improvements around I never use, such as texting. BTW, I notice “texting” isn’t in your dictionary, but probably should be. Anyway this post is mostly to try using the new reply system to see what I think of it. So far it’s not really much of a problem. I’m basically a GOM myself, but I think this is a tempest in a teapot.
You don’t have to use twitter or Facebook. It’s just a convenience for those who do. I’m using the WordPress login for this comment
I am glad that my typos are highlighted, though in American English, so I can correct them, into English English.
(It is still colour and sulphur to me).
Seems to work well from the Blackberry.
John
I thought the idea of making improvements to something was to leave it in a better state than you started with?
I’m having problems with cutting and pasting with the new system. Could be my problem, but I had got a grip of it with the old system.
There’s a nice German word for this sort of thing wordpress did: ‘schlechtverbesserung’ – which, iirc, means worse-bettermaking.
Why fix what ain’t broke?
Gawd – I dislike this very much, and as all the GOMs above remarked, I’m not twittering nor facebooking.
Don’t tweet nor use Facebook, I don’t even have a cell phone signal here. Seems like useless changes. Someone mentioned Buttbook above. I made a joke to a friend several weeks ago, that someone should start Buttbook for dogs. The owner could look for potentially compatible play/walk mates in a designated area. With butt pictures posted, the owner could ask their canine if the butt in consideration looked interesting. A digital scent synthesizer would be all that is needed to round out this social network.
Doesn’t seem to be a problem to me. (New Para.)
Just need to be sure to be wearing my reading glasses.
Personally, I prefer to prepare my prose in a program of preference, then paste it.
Tucci78 says:
Yeah? Well, the type font in this “Leave a Reply” box is at least two points smaller (even though it’s in a sans-serif font) than is the text in the body of the Web page on which it’s being presented. This makes it extremely difficult for me – an older guy with diabetic retinopathy – to enter comments in this space without suffering both eyestrain and typographical errors.
For some reason, web-based companies, and far too many web developers, have absolutely NO consideration for people with less-than-perfect vision. I’m in that business & I’ve been fighting that fight uselessly for many years.
For those of you complaining about FB & Twitter and privacy issues – there ARE alternatives. I’ve been personally involved in the creation of one. What I can tell you, though, is that nobody wants to bother with them, even if they’re better, simply because they’re not as big. And the tech media won’t talk about them – again, because they’re not big enough. And I guess most people would rather just whine about privacy than actually do anything about it. (hmm – seems a common theme there…)
As for the changes here – AFTER the change was the first time I’ve ever experienced a problem posting. I followed up an earlier post without reloading the page, and it didn’t post at all. Bad design on WP’s part. Put me down for a negative vote, too.
But, ultimately, WP won’t care. And we’ll end up continuing to use the service, and they’ll continue to do whatever they want.