Slight confession: I zero in on the 1-5 range of comments and tend to skip anything above five. My favorites are the single comments.
Why?
Anything under six I figure I need the feedback to figure out the lack of reverb. You get to six or above and the post seems done--that it triggered enough on its own that my input's no longer needed.
It's sort of I-don't-need-to-know-what-I-already-know-and-you-apparently-know-as-well approach.
At least that's how I handle comments. I don't take them as a measure of effectiveness per se but rather connectivity--as in, did I connect?
Frankly, many of what I consider to be my best points never get comments, but that's cool. If you start writing solely to connect, the richness gets sacrificed for the bandwidth.
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Comments (5)
Speaking entirely for myself, I don't comment on your best points. I just link to them and let them be. These are often the posts on my own blog that receive one or no comments, and that is all that they need there, too.
Posted by J Navy | February 23, 2007 12:57 PM
I've noticed too that posts that I thought would invoke much feedback get little or none.
I think it's really a snowball effect. If the first few posts are high quality - I feel more urged to post with my own thoughts or question something I either didn't understand or don't agree with.
Also, the avid readers will recognize the posters who they feel leave quality comments - and are probably more apt to enter the discussion when seeing a familiar name.
I was under the impression that you did not read the feedback from your posts unless Mr. Meade brought something specifically to your attention (due to time constraints on your part).
There's always the theory that your best posts are the most thought-provoking and therefore the reader gets lost in a thought path (or tangent) instead of typing a comment post .
Posted by Thomas Pamelia | February 23, 2007 2:35 PM
longtime reader and convert, first-time comment. I'm a sponge for your entries and don't feel the need to tell you at every turn that you connect with every post. Thanks.
Posted by marlin | February 23, 2007 5:03 PM
Hi Tom:
In other words, you might like to consider many of us as thinking in line with Sir Thomas More's remark [in *A Man for All Seasons*]:
The maxim is "Qui tacet consentire": the maxim of the law is "Silence gives consent". If therefore you wish to construe what [our] silence betokened, you must construe that [we] consented, not that [we] denied.
Posted by Charles Cameron | February 24, 2007 10:42 AM
Hmm, may be that 5th person this time. . .
In my case, it usually boils down to "do I have anything worth saying". If there's nothing I can add- not even a wise crack- to the discussion, I save the bandwidth and keep quiet.
Posted by Michael | February 24, 2007 3:46 PM