Comment Policy

WP-reCAPTCHA
Users are required to negotiate graphical representations of two distinct words. The words chosen for interpretation come from the process of digitizing books. Sometimes the scanning technology converting the written word into its digital representation will encounter difficulties of interpretation. This is where people have the ability to lend a helping hand. By typing in both CAPTCHA images prior to submitting a blog comment, you’re helping computers to digitize our libraries of knowledge.
Akismet
Akismet represents the collected effort of hundreds, if not thousands, of individual blog operators. It has the ability to anticipate which blog comments are spam and it proactively deletes them. Where it is not sure how to handle a particular comment, it sets the comment aside for human consideration. Akismet is not always 100%, but it is always improving.

The ability for our readers to leave a comment expires 30 days after the appearance of the article. The reason for this is two fold: (1.) It provides an incentive for readers to subscribe to our rss feed, and (2.) it discourages spammers from commenting on those articles which gain in both popularity and in pagerank over time. Unfortunately, leaving comments open for an indefinite period of time is also a double edged sword: (1.) genuine comments cannot be left by those who “discover” a blog post after 30 days, and (2.) most of my time would be spent policing spammy comments on those blog articles in the past.

There is no “automatic approval” process for blog commenting. Each comment will be read. Where appropriate, a human being will approve comments.

Keep Comments Focused and On-Task

There should be some kind of thematic cohesiveness between the topic at hand and the comments that follow.

No Value Comments will be deleted. These useless comments most often appear as short one or two words, e.g., “nice post,” “interesting read,” and the like.
Some of the more sophisticated spammers will attempt to ask questions in the blog comment section, and will further attempt to link to their crappy websites. In most cases, questions will be denied from appearing. Consult a search engine or a forum when there are questions or objections, and report your findings in the comments.
All comments must be in English. Non-English comments will be denied. Comments that use poor grammar, have frequent misspellings, or have gross improper punctuation will also be denied. Wording reflects intelligence.
Vulgar, hateful, off-topic, and poor taste comments will be denied. Subjective interpretation applies here, but as the blog owner, I will err on the side of caution. There are other sites on the internet that cater to intolerance; this site is not one of them.
Self promotion links will be denied. If you want to promote your website or product, we do have paid advertising solutions.

Acceptable comments will make some explicit and overt reference to the article at hand. Doing so will let everyone know that the article was read and that the following comment pertains to and is related to the article at hand.
Acceptable comments leave the reader wanting to read more from you. If you leave nice comments that bait the reader with valuable information and insight, it is more likely that the comment reader will visit your site for more information.
Acceptable comments are about 50 words long or about 3 -4 sentences long. One worded comments are nothing more than SPAM.

Exceptional comments that contribute both to the blog article itself and to the larger community have the right to advertise their URL. Since these comments are exceptional, I’m confident that the URL will appear with tact and professionalism. Your comments will be interpreted as a reflection of the quality your website. (Thoughtless comments = trashy website. Great comments = interesting website).
After all has been said and done, I alone reserve the sole right to exercise my own discrimination when approving or when denying blog comments. This means where there is a conflict between your subjectivity and my subjectivity, my subjectivity will triumph.
This comment policy is by no means set in stone, and is likely to change over time.