That guy can sure hold a grudge. "I was only able to stop these idiots from commenting on my blog by stopping everyone from commenting on my blog, which is regrettable, but it's worth the sacrifice, because some of these people really were complete fucking idiots. I know, because they disagreed with me."
I remember that blog post. Instead of responding to the comments in his blog post (a la PG), he removed comments from his blog and started calling the posters names. The people posting on the site were trying to point out that his arguments were specious, and not very well thought out.
Several people argued with him on Reddit, including Avi Bryant (creator of Seaside), Slava Pestov (creator of the Factor programming language). He called them names and then deleted his comments later.
True, but sometimes I think people forget that not every conversation has to be a formal debate. One of the huge hassles of running a blog is that when someone thinks you're wrong, they think it's their right to enter into a formalized duel of wits. And if the poster refuses to participate? The harasser declares victory of the most complete kind. But what people seem to forget is that the burden of proof is not the obligation to argue.
I don't like blogs with comments either. Usually I want to say what I want to say, and if you disagree you can email me. I may or may not entertain further discussion, but I certainly don't feel compelled to give my site over as a venue to people who then organize specious an mean-spirited conversation. They can do that on their blogs, out of my tunnel vision.
> One of the huge hassles of running a blog is that when someone thinks you're wrong, they think it's their right to enter into a formalized duel of wits.
Well, the key is to not care what these people think. You are the person contributing valuable insight the the world. The commenter is just some troll with time to kill because he has nothing interesting to do.
I am very anti-censorship, and I never delete comments from my blog. This is amusing because if you search for my book, one of the top results is an unsigned comment on my blog saying how bad it is. I've thought about deleting it, but I don't care enough. The comment basically says "I didn't bother to read the book, but I didn't like it." There is no need to debate that. It is what it is.
It's nice when people like you, but it's also amusing when you find out that you've annoyed someone so much that they come to your own website to attack you. If you aren't pissing someone off, you're not doing anything worthwhile. :)
Anytime you have an opinion, people implicitly have the right to disagree. What's the point of just yelling into a vacuum?
By ignoring everyone, you're not just isolating your precious feelings from the trolls, you're also missing out on a fair amount of insightful feedback.
I remember that blog post. Instead of responding to the comments in his blog post (a la PG), he removed comments from his blog and started calling the posters names. The people posting on the site were trying to point out that his arguments were specious, and not very well thought out.
Several people argued with him on Reddit, including Avi Bryant (creator of Seaside), Slava Pestov (creator of the Factor programming language). He called them names and then deleted his comments later.
There's lot of irony in his latest post.