Commenting Issues “Updated”

Hi friends! So a while back I was told people who wanted to comment… could not. This made me sad. Incredibly sad. So sad that I went to the WordPress forums and tried to ask about it. I got yelled at. A lot. That was not incredibly fun. It was basically agreed to be a glitch that WordPress needs to fix…

And/but here’s this update (which addresses specifically the need to be logged in to comment):

There is quite a bit of speculation here, and while I can’t address every single point, I’d like to point out that one of the many reasons behind this change was to provide greater control over your own identity within comments at WordPress.com.

Anyone who knows your email address could have easily linked their comment to your account in a way that was indistinguishable from you leaving it, and you would have no way of knowing it or stopping them. Now comments linked to your account are always going to be from you.

Here are a few more points to keep in mind, which should address the majority of your concerns:

1. To control what shows when you comment, you can edit your profile at Users -> My Profile in your Dashboard.

2. Folks can still comment just like before, but if they use a registered email address, they need to log in to prove that it’s really them.

3. This extends to both Gravatar and WordPress.com accounts, which actually are the same thing, the same user names and passwords. Folks who are sure that they do not have a WordPress.com account may have forgotten that they registered a Gravatar account years earlier.

4. If folks are still unsure, they can use the Forgot Password links at either http://wordpress.com/ or http://en.gravatar.com/ to regain access to their account.

5. Just as before, you don’t have to require your commenters to use an email address, it’s an option under Settings -> Discussion.

6. We’re happy to help people who are having trouble commenting, logging in, or resetting their passwords. Let us know steps to reproduce the problem and we’ll do our best to help the person or fix the bug.

You can see the thread here. That response is from a “happiness engineer” – I’ve yet to decide if that’s ironic or not. I also don’t know if people who were having issues do have WordPress, or gravatar, and/or if they were trying to use the email address linked to that.

Upon reflection, those people aren’t very good at communicating their issues. ;P But anyway, I hope that helps.

And if it’s something else… well, my foray into the WordPress forums wasn’t very successful. But we can hope the glitch, or whatever, is resolved soon. If you are one of those people though, I really hope you’ll try to work around it, and tell me what did or didn’t allow you to successfully comment.

I obviously want as many people to comment as possible, and especially for giveaways, etc, you know? You wanna win stuff! 😀

0 thoughts on “Commenting Issues “Updated”

    1. Limecello Post author

      Thanks, Mary, for working around it. Some other people don’t want to log in with twitter, etc though. :
      And… ah – if the email you were using for your blog is at all tied to gravatar (not sure if it is or isn’t) then WP will force it.

      Reply
  1. marymkirkland

    If I log in with my old Gravatar account this is what comes up and I don’t really care for it, so I’ll keep using my twitter account. I know others could make a new gravatar account or word press account and log in that way too.

    Reply
    1. Limecello Post author

      Hee – I love all your rodent pics, Mary!
      Also, though, not everyone is as awesome as you are, and willing to create different/new accounts though! (In fact, most people.) 😛 Fastest, and easiest wins, you know.

      Reply
  2. Mary Kirkland (@scarymary66)

    Yeah I understand that. The only real reason I made a Gravatar account all that long time ago was because I wanted to be able to change my avatar pic when commenting, not that it actually worked out that way since I hardly ever use it. Ah well, at least you recognized my awesomeness. lol

    Reply
  3. JoAnne

    I’ve had problems posting before because at times after posting my comment the “login” info would disappear.
    Usually I would go back to the link in the email and most times after one or two more tries I would be successful.
    Sorry to hear you got yelled at for asking an intelligent question.
    Hope things get better!

    Reply
    1. Limecello Post author

      JoAnne,

      First, thank you for your persistence in commenting!

      Secondly, ugh – I’m sorry it was so difficult for you. 🙁 I’m so frustrated because it shouldn’t be that burdensome, and worse there’s nothing I can do about it. (Which is yet another reason why I’m thinking a hosted site… I THINK that helps it?)
      At least I can control comments better/change the settings more, I believe.
      Heh. I got two people trolling me telling me my blog is going to get shut down. It was very frustrating.

      Reply
      1. JoAnne

        I enjoy your posts and guests. Love your sense of humor.
        Technology seems always to drag us down.
        When things work it’s great and when they don’t it’s like we’re back in the dark ages again without the ability to comment, keep in touch, etc.
        Good luck.

        Reply

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