Comment Guidelines

[A gentle hint: Always read it over before pressing send.]

Any reader is welcome to comment on open posts. Indeed, that's half the fun and half the reward of a community like this. TOP gets lots of good comments and many great ones.

All comments are moderated, meaning, I read them. The goal is simply to keep the conversation pleasant, collegial, and helpful. I don't like "flame wars" and I don't permit them to get going in TOP's comment section. Despite this, there's hardly any censorship going on—I only disallow a handful of comments a month.

The basic guidelines will be familiar:

1. No ad hominem. Please don't be nasty or insult people, or phrase things in a way that will hurt anyone's feelings. Friendly, polite conversation among equals is the norm here.

2. Our Comments Section is not a forum. Your comment should be your response to the main post. Please respond to other commenters only if you're being helpful and friendly.

3. Don't promote. A little honest plugging of things you like, including yourself, is fine, but don't go overboard. And be aware that I don't publish comments where the name or "handle" is a company or business name, even if the comment is not promotional itself.

4. Try to refrain from political rants and provocations. Since I do, you should. Only fair.

5. No profanity. It makes certain search engines block us, and might get the site banned in schools.

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Typical problems

Escalation: When a "back and forth" exchange between commenters gets going, it's sometimes hard to stop, because whomever's comment I disallow first will feel muzzled and hence be aggrieved. I have to do it anyway, because multiple-episode exchanges, especially accompanied by escalating hostility, are something I want to discourage here.

Hijacking: Another type of comment I might occasionally disallow is something that I know from experience will probably hijack the discussion. I've been participating in inter-computer discussions since 1976 (Xtalk at Dartmouth College), so I've developed a sixth sense about what sort of thing is going to lead off down some unrelated tributary.

Drive-bys: I don't like what I call "drive-by comments," meaning quick, usually snide reactions written by someone who's apparently not a regular reader of the site, who might have come to a certain post through a search engine and just feels like lobbing an empty bottle over the wall before he departs so he can feel superior.

Put-downs: I don't like "you suck" comments, either, regardless of how they're expressed. If I suck, or one of our authors does, the critic is welcome to go somewhere else: the Internet is broad, and contains multitudes.

Imported arguments: I generally have an aversion to what I call "imported arguments," meaning long, complex, polarized, impassioned position-papers on certain issues that have been developed through long drawn-out disputation elsewhere. An example of this might be a post that mentions the Supreme Court drawing an 800-word comment about judicial activism. 

Demon rum: Another slight problem is that sometimes, folks write comments late in the evenings after they've, ah, had a few too many. These are not always easy to spot, but sometimes they are—sometimes very easy (!)—and in those cases I might just contact the individual in the morning and gently ask them to re-submit the comment. 

Bemusement: Oh, and very occasionally I don't post something just because, even when I concentrate, I can't figure out what the heck it means.

Haters: Lastly, I take a rather dim view of people expressing hostility or dismissiveness to photography, photographers, or the activity of photographing. That's what most of us are here for, after all.

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It's probably most helpful to think of TOP's comments as a "Letters to the Editor" section. Comments, and the people who write them, are the lifeblood of a website like this one. I'm just like every other reader of the site in this sense: we all like getting your input.

Thanks, and please keep all those good comments coming!

Kind regards, 

Mike/TOP's Majordomo and M.C.