“Intense Debate” On Blog Comments “Automattic”-ally Ended
Acquisition of Intense Debate start-up by Automattic has ended the argument of comment management for WordPress, at least in my mind. While I have to admit – Intense Debate wouldn’t have been my own personal choice as I prefer to keep all comments local, choice by Automattic ends the arguments…
And allow me explain why, with examples….
First of all – let me state:
I currently use SezWho because I like the way they have done the comment management and consistent profiles with allowing me to keep the content but here comes the kicker….
If Automattic has acquired Intense Debate – we can fully expect the ID to be fully integrated into the blog core and it makes no sense, unless you are really stubborn, to stick with anything else. In fact Matt specifically states that integration is coming on his blog.
I love options just as much as anyone else and I promote versatility when it comes to the blog design but I also love simplicity! Less plugins – faster your blog loads and if functionality provided out of the box – no reason to reinvent the wheel, however unfortunate it might be.
Plus by staying with the options supported by the Core Developers you are less likely to run into compatibility problems when core is upgraded.
Just take a look at what happened to Spam Karma 2. In my personal opinion it was superb plugin for fighting spam on your blog but the guys behind the coding simply couldn’t keep up with frequent changes and updates to the WordPress core and I had to remove plugin due to compatibility issues.
Comment management and portability is what is seen as next big step and no matter how much I prefer solution provided by SezWho – once Intense Debate opens its installation options again – my commenting system goes through major overhaul and switch to ID.
If reliability and less complexity alone with functionality is on your list – you might want to evaluate your options! Intense Debate will be De facto soon.
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Technorati: automattic, comments system, intense debate, sezwho, wordpress,
Hey Alex,
Great piece…This is an interesting one.
I want to see how WP integrates ID with the platform? Would they still have the comments synced to a central server even when users have an installed blog?
How exactly do they go about creating the profiles? Is it going to be like a typekey like central logging solution?
Very interesting to watch out what they do?
-jitendra
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Jitendra,
Thanks, I’m just as interested and quite frankly a bit upset
I do like the solution you provide with SezWho a lot more but once ID is part of the core, I’d be stupid to ignore it. I understand their need to add more functionality to the core WP but what I don’t like is integration of single solution in core.
Kind of remind me times when Netscape was still a browser people used and Microsoft attempted to change it and we all know how it ended.
I know one thing – I’ll be looking hard and be careful before and if I decide to hand comments from my blog over to Intense Debate for storage. I hope if they forcefully integrate it into the core blog they will give us option to keep the comments local, otherwise – this will not be an easy decision. I hate the idea that comments from my blog becomes property of some third party.
I guess we will see what happen and perhaps even have choice to keep what we like and have it co-exist with what forced on us.
Intense Debate is more looking like Disquss the same way it manages your comments and archive it with user profile and he can access all those commended database whenever he wants to. and i also prefer keeping your comments locally instead of using third party discussion plugin the reason is simple why bother with a thing if you can manage it easily and never poke a thing if its not teasing you in anyway.
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I too am currently using SezWho, but I have did look at ID. They have recently released an updated wordpress plugin that I believe allows you to keep your comments local, similar to Sezwho.
later,jb
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Thanks JB!
Benwaynet,
some of the guys do sync it back into the WP DB but the issue really is why deal with issues like double indexing, embedded iframe that takes the SEO juice from your site etc. by having your comments hosted elsewhere.
We at SezWho believe that conversation belongs to the site where its happening and moving comments away from the context of the conversation is just not the right thing to do…That is really why we didn’t build a content management system, a spam filtering system etc. Instead we are focussed on covering conversation across social web that includes posts, comments, wikis, bulletin boards, and all other manifestation of social media.
Thanks, Jitendra
Those points are exactly the reasons I have chosen the SezWho and while I see the move by Automattic and acknowledge it I do hope your system can co-exist and give us choices!
true. anything that can be done to speed up the loading of a site is appreciated by a reader like me.
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I just hope that their commenting system is compatible with CommentLuv! it should be ok, I got it working with haloscan. I’m interested to see how intense debate integrates to wordpress. I just hope it doesn’t make things too complex to the new user.
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Andy,
You and me both
While I’m willing to give up the keywordLuv usage – CommentLuv plugin needs to work 
Thanks for your plugin!
I definitely missed something. What’s happening with the WP comments?
I use Sez Who but only because it allows me to keep my comments on my own server. The SEO issue is a concern too when using outisde comment systems.
Although not keen to use third party systems myself I do not like the idea of freedom of choice being taken away so I hope the ID integration still allows WP users to choose other comment providers. Some of these offer forms of social networking and ways for others to find your site. With so many using WP these will suffer and there will be less inclination for new and hopefully more advanced commenting systems to be developed.
@Dennis – nothing yet, but looks like with the purchase described here there is a big possibility (although it is just a speculation at this time) of changes to comment system.
@Suebliemly – agreed. We can only hope that freedom of choice if left to us. Here is quote from Matt:
We can only hope that “as appropriate doesn’t mean leave us without choices. I’m all for threaded comments, reply to comment, reply via email etc but how I do voting and integrate global reputation should be a choice I make. That would be best outcome for all.
Although what I wanted to say by this article – integration of service by default – makes it hard for other people to compete in this space. Most users will choose the easy road and not even investigate the options.
That would be bad if they eliminated choices. Even if something may be better, it’s good to have the freedom to be able to go with whatever you want.
Automattic is great, I have always loved them. That’s awesome how they acquired Intense Debate. I’d never heard of them before, but in any case, it seems the merger will be beneficial to both parties.
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