Why I Disabled Disqus’ Comment Plug-In

2008 July 11
tags:
by Teeg

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http://www.sucomments.com/wp-content/Images/Disqus/disqu.jpgYou may have noticed for the past couple weeks that I had a new comment system on my site.

I was trying out Disqus, a system that brings control of the comments back to the commenter. You see, just like I believe that NoFollow isnt’ fair to commenters, I also believe that you own the comments you write, although I am allowed full use of them when you post to my site. In the same manner, when I guest write a post on another site, I still own the article, but I am allowing them to use it for their own purposes.

I am no longer trying Disqus for a few reasons:

  1. I was getting complaints about it. People weren’t being allowed to comment on my site until they’d registered at Disqus (and yes, I had it set to allow anoymous comments).
  2. I’m working on an article where people can share their e-mail and get an invitation to kwippy. A quick search on Disqus didn’t show where I could access the e-mails, so I checked their forums. And couldn’t find a search feature. Yes, I can use Google site search to find what I need, but I’m sorry, that is something that should be easy to find.

To be honest, when I couldn’t find out how to easily access e-mails, I thought okay, I’ll just pause Disqus for right now, and go back and explore it more later.

There is not a way to turn off Disqus for a post.

So, I disabled it. And the comments from my last few posts went away too!

By this time, I was starting to realize this was not going to be a fast, easy project like I was hoping for.

Well, if my comments are on the Disqus site, I just need to import them, right? Right?!? crickets chirping

Of course not. This is a Friday that thinks it’s a Monday, so nothing could be that easy.

Disqus lets me export information in 2 formats: xml and rss.

Okay, good. Now to see which one WP needs to import the comments… … … …  What the heck is WXR?!?

Time to use Google…Disqus to WP points to…a discussion on Disqus where people have been asking for 3 months for an import feature. It’s promised for the END of this month!

Okay, calm down, TG, you just need a XML to WXR converter. Quick Google search and everything will be all better.

http://www.sucomments.com/wp-content/Images/Disqus/google.jpg

It’s not good when you go to the top results only to see Question Unanswered.

Time for another look at import options. Hmm, RSS (import posts from an RSS feed). Yay, this will work! I haz RSS feed! Wait, wait, that’s not what I want. Stop! (notices the small word POSTS not comments). Each comment turned into an individual post. Arrrrrgh!!!

So, there you have it. Why I am no longer using Disqus, and likely won’t be using them again for a while (at least until they actually have a WP converter). :)

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  • mkoenig
    I really didn't want to leave this message in your comment section, and I apologize for the intrusion, but I was unable to send you a private note. I kept receiving an error message from wordpress.

    I just wanted to let you know that IntenseDebate comments offer all of the features you're interested in per your post above.

    In addition, we're about to start testing our new version of our wordpress plugin that will have full data sync of your comments from IntenseDebate to your blog (along with a ton of other groundbreaking features). I'd love to fill you on how IntenseDebate has the features on your wish list. Please email me at michael@intensedebate.com to chat.

    Kind regards,
    Michael Koenig
    IntenseDebate
  • Interesting post... I was about to investigate Disqus (I actually have a tab open with them in my Firefox interface, waiting for me to take a closer look), but since it appears to be soooo complicated, I think it's too much for my limited experience.

    Too bad, because the concept seemed interesting to me. Oh well, I can afford to wait.
  • Undutsduraron
    Hi all!

    As a fresh www.sucomments.com user i just wanted to say hi to everyone else who uses this board :D
  • Hello Everybody! http://demya.com/images/smile.gif

    I've been lurking about here for a couple of days and finally made up my mind to join in. I commend the fact that y'all seem pleased to assist each other with your know-how, so I wondered if I could pick your brain for some online travel website opinions.

    To preface, I'm guarded about making reservations for things on the web anyway, but here's my situation. My children, husband and I are planning a vacation to Vegas the second week of July. Wholesome family vacation, huh? http://demya.com/images/smile.gif

    I understand that it'll be boiling hot, but I'm told that's when the cheapest travel deals are available.

    Anyway, another member mentioned Cheap Flights USA, so I've been utilizing their site to look for flights and vacation packages. But something has me perplexed. The thing is, they return flight results from Priceline, Hotwire, Airfare.com, etcetera anyway. So, what's the deal? Are Priceline and Hotwire teaming up? I may be reading into this too much but,seems to me that they would be opponents in the same industry for cheap flights. So, what do they gain by having a site show all of their flight results at once?

    Am I wrong?

    Christina
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