I fully believe that, in addition to twitter, comments sections from news articles should not exist. They're so bad. there's nothing redeeming about them. places for the worst opinions to be aired. why do we have them?
Replies
Fewer than there used to be
jul 10, 2025, 1:45 am • 1 0 • view
So news orgs can make money from engagement
jul 10, 2025, 12:23 pm • 0 0 • view
Historical record?
jul 10, 2025, 12:41 pm • 0 0 • view
of what
jul 10, 2025, 2:45 pm • 0 0 • view
Venality? Obviously, it's not great data for any kind of analysis of public opinion. But I do find it interesting to wade through the comments just to understand how people who support all this monstrousness actually think about it.
jul 10, 2025, 3:28 pm • 0 0 • view
Agree.
jul 10, 2025, 1:01 am • 0 0 • view
It wasn't always thus... because of the bothsiderism argument that you should allow the brain dead idiot to express their opinion.. and claim it is " free speech" ... it is not .....to have free speech you must have free and rational thought ... or you are just a parrot for someone else's words..
jul 10, 2025, 1:02 am • 0 0 • view
I think they should exist but only to people who use their real names and photos. If you can’t say something loud and proud it doesn’t deserve to be heard.
jul 10, 2025, 2:13 pm • 0 0 • view
Engagement to justify ad revenue and relevance. Eyeballs and clickbait. It's all a game now. Having worked in the media for over a decade, this is what I've observed.
jul 10, 2025, 5:09 am • 0 0 • view
Yes, it's true - just look at the number of xenophobic statements in the comments on sites like the Daily Mail. It's appalling.
jul 9, 2025, 11:19 pm • 1 0 • view
How else will @nytimes.com know its takes are fucking shitty? Oh…
jul 10, 2025, 12:37 am • 1 0 • view
Where else will people post, "If Obama had a son" year after endless year when any Black man anywhere is accused of a crime?
jul 9, 2025, 11:02 pm • 1 0 • view
I would rather not cut off the freedom to voice opinions.
jul 10, 2025, 12:46 pm • 1 0 • view
Good news, you still have the freedom to voice opinions even if a comment section does not exist!
jul 10, 2025, 2:48 pm • 0 0 • view
Thank the internet
jul 10, 2025, 2:14 am • 1 0 • view
jul 10, 2025, 12:43 am • 0 0 • view
Just don't read them. Problem solved.
jul 10, 2025, 1:19 pm • 0 0 • view
That's not my problem is seeing them. The problem is it's a septic tank and encourages horrible behavior
jul 10, 2025, 2:45 pm • 1 0 • view
Absolutely agree there should be no comment sections on news articles. Or comment sections on most things. Fuck I don’t even think social media should exist anymore! People are the worst.
jul 10, 2025, 2:02 pm • 0 0 • view
I have learned a lot from comments.
jul 9, 2025, 10:56 pm • 1 0 • view
The MSN article comment sections are so unbelievably caustic that for my sanity I have to believe they aren’t real people
jul 10, 2025, 2:06 pm • 0 0 • view
I had to gently tell my 82 year old mom that she was being trolled in the local paper comments by a fellow going by the name "Justin Hale".
jul 10, 2025, 2:40 am • 1 0 • view
They exist so that news sites can use them as engagement meteics for advertisers, thats it.
jul 10, 2025, 10:24 am • 0 0 • view
Let's be real honest with ourselves, people addicted to sharing opinions online to strangers, Web 2.0 was a huge mistake.
jul 9, 2025, 11:28 pm • 3 0 • view
Even on leftie new site the comments are mostly a circle jerk of people posting vaguely associated opinions. They offer nothing substantive or insightful other than “wow a lot of people sure agree with this political take”
jul 9, 2025, 10:09 pm • 5 0 • view
I agree with you. I also feel like people are trying to find spaces to vent w/o getting verbally assaulted by a bunch of paid asshole trolls banging on about how “wokist, Marxist, radical leftist, blah blah blah” they are. We’ve tried talking to MAGA. They don’t listen. So we talk to each other.
jul 10, 2025, 3:33 am • 1 0 • view
Agreed.
jul 10, 2025, 1:46 am • 1 0 • view
Russian bots gotta post somewhere!
jul 10, 2025, 1:59 pm • 0 0 • view
I enjoy reading them.
jul 10, 2025, 2:09 pm • 0 0 • view
money, only reason. Drop the comments then you drop ad revenue and news sites depend on ad revenue
jul 10, 2025, 12:42 pm • 0 0 • view
Head over to @defector.com. Commenters offer expertise, humor, and support. It feels like what the internet was supposed to be.
jul 9, 2025, 11:46 pm • 2 0 • view
I've said this since they first came out.
jul 10, 2025, 3:13 am • 0 0 • view
The only good thing comment sections brought us was Ken M.
jul 9, 2025, 1:31 pm • 2 0 • view
Uh. The same reason bluesky exists?
jul 10, 2025, 4:12 am • 0 0 • view
So that idiots can out themselves
jul 10, 2025, 4:06 am • 0 0 • view
There should be comments sections but for other published writers at that outlet. Leak the office tea
jul 10, 2025, 10:58 am • 1 0 • view
you are wrong and I have many great examples
jul 10, 2025, 2:33 am • 1 0 • view
Exception for the UK Guardian? Comments are rational, often generous, often illuminating. They bar comments on trollable articles, do proper moderation. I did enjoy trolling Daily Mail ‘gammons’ - shaved beered up flag draped white men-but they put their most right wing OPs behind a paywall.
jul 10, 2025, 8:58 am • 0 0 • view
PS check out the US pages of the Daily Mail online. It’s fucking frightening and makes Fox look like Pulitzer material!
jul 10, 2025, 8:59 am • 2 0 • view
They should exist but only as a Suggestion Box in an Absolute Monarchy. Yes, write about your worst opinions here, pay no mind to the people laying siege to your house.
jul 10, 2025, 2:42 pm • 0 0 • view
Okay yes I know it's for money re why, that's for everything. I mean like why do we allow this
jul 10, 2025, 2:45 pm • 3 0 • view
news article comment sections just allow for poison to fester and grow. It's horrible. Go look at a Fox News or OAN article comment section and tell me yeah this is a great idea
jul 9, 2025, 1:29 pm • 24 0 • view
The NPR comment sections were so bad they did away with comments sections entirely years before the pandemic.
jul 9, 2025, 11:12 pm • 1 0 • view
Well your first problem is looking at fox news and OAN at all.
jul 9, 2025, 4:11 pm • 4 0 • view
that unfortunately is for work. They're the worst but it's every local paper too
jul 9, 2025, 7:26 pm • 1 0 • view
Your job sounds 🫤
jul 9, 2025, 7:37 pm • 2 0 • view
More clicks and longer engagement times which help drive up the cost of advertising and ultimately puts more money in the pockets of the owners of the publication or website
jul 10, 2025, 12:43 pm • 1 0 • view
NPR removed theirs a while ago and honestly? Good decision
jul 9, 2025, 2:09 pm • 15 0 • view
You know a huge chunk of those comments are from astroturfed social media accounts and are meant to shape public opinion toward the purchaser’s preferred narrative, right?
jul 10, 2025, 4:09 am • 2 0 • view
It’s literally just a less obvious version of, “as a black man…”
jul 10, 2025, 4:10 am • 1 0 • view
They are the best way for readers to call out shitty journalism, which, in the New York Times at least, has been a regular feature.
jul 9, 2025, 2:35 pm • 1 0 • view
I don't think it is? You could do this before comment sections in other ways! Letters to the editor. And now, you can use social media
jul 9, 2025, 2:36 pm • 0 0 • view
You say social media, but want to get rid of X?
jul 9, 2025, 10:05 pm • 0 0 • view
there are other platforms. I believe you may be on one now
jul 10, 2025, 2:50 pm • 0 0 • view
Ah. So only platforms that you approve of. Got it. I'll delete my X account immediately.
jul 10, 2025, 8:37 pm • 0 0 • view
Except most media organizations have minimal to no presence on bluesky, at least relative to their Twitter presence. And Twitter is just a no go for me.
jul 10, 2025, 3:55 pm • 0 0 • view
go read the Fox News, OAN, or any other non NYT comment section and tell me it's a good idea and it's really doing something there
jul 9, 2025, 2:38 pm • 1 0 • view
Well then we'll just have to respectfully disagree. All good.
jul 9, 2025, 3:27 pm • 0 0 • view
people love controversaries
jul 10, 2025, 1:55 pm • 0 0 • view
The only one I've ever seen work is Ars Technica's, but that site is half tech forum, half tech news.
jul 10, 2025, 12:05 am • 0 0 • view
Depending on the area of the news, they tend to be rife with Russian disinfo agents as well. If they tend to reply back in a convo only around ~ midnight-1am... it would appear that the morning shift has arrived in Moscow. 🫣🤷♂️
jul 10, 2025, 3:41 am • 3 0 • view
Yahoo news and such cut them off in Trump round 1, remember?
jul 10, 2025, 9:26 am • 1 0 • view
I like the idea of a separate "Letters To The Editor" section, removed from any specific article ... so we can see who all the crazies really are.
jul 10, 2025, 3:17 am • 0 0 • view
Engagement analytics they can pitch to advertisers to show how large and engaged their readers are with their content. This of course leads editors to encourage their columnists to make controversial statements and articles that drive such engagement.
jul 10, 2025, 1:32 pm • 1 0 • view
Yes. It should still be banned
jul 10, 2025, 2:44 pm • 1 0 • view
Should be, yes, but won't, because they help drive profits, and that's all that matters to them.
jul 10, 2025, 2:46 pm • 0 0 • view
Drives traffic to the web $ites.
jul 10, 2025, 1:56 pm • 0 0 • view
I don't care
jul 10, 2025, 2:44 pm • 0 0 • view
Then don’t whine about it. Don’t look at news sites on the web. .
jul 10, 2025, 3:08 pm • 0 0 • view
clicks/likes/hates = money
jul 10, 2025, 12:04 pm • 0 0 • view
Yes, they were a remarkably ill conceived idea, uniformly terrible.
jul 9, 2025, 1:30 pm • 3 0 • view
I use those exactly to see what is the worst possible opinion on stuff.
jul 9, 2025, 10:44 pm • 1 0 • view
News sites, and also NextDoor.
jul 10, 2025, 2:25 am • 1 0 • view
A comment to author or editor section might be a solution, similar to alt text additions. Freedom of speech-where does it begin & where does it end. Is what you find offensive always what others find offensive? If your employer requires you to read comments & you’re offended, is it the job for you?
jul 10, 2025, 3:46 am • 0 0 • view
Truly, they're a magnet for the worst and the dumbest.
jul 10, 2025, 2:23 am • 1 0 • view
What else are old people with too much time on their hands going to do?
jul 10, 2025, 12:24 pm • 0 0 • view
Agree 100% they are basically just giving a platform to whoever wants to spill bs, spread hate, and even act with malicious intent. The comment section is the most beloved entry for foreign propaganda networks.
jul 10, 2025, 2:01 pm • 0 0 • view
Agree but I get practice picking out AI and bots. Plus, I know where I have to focus my efforts. Sinclair Broadcasting has a near monopoly on conservative small market broadcasting regions. They tell their journalist what to say. The journalists tell America what to think.
jul 10, 2025, 2:02 pm • 0 0 • view