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Housekeeping

I’m doing a bit of housekeeping tonight and I’ve brought back the normal comment settings. Now that I have a caveat in place–I delete SPAM and rudeness and I determine what is SPAM or rudeness–it feels like that option needs to be there for when I ask a sensitive question that people don’t necessarily want their name attached to in their answer. Not because they’re hiding behind the anonymous comment to say something they know isn’t right to say, but because they’re hiding behind the anonymous comment to protect their own identity or the identity of another person. Good anonymous commenting vs. bad anonymous commenting.

Bleu and I were also musing tonight: have the word verification boxes become impossibly difficult to read as of late? I’ve been reading tonight and it takes me four or five tries to leave each comment. Are we getting a larger portion of the scrunched together ones or is everyone having a hard time reading them lately?

0 comments

1 bleu { 04.26.08 at 9:50 pm }

Why is it whenever I see my name mentioned on your blog I feel like I am at my first concert and just got asked up on stage. I get all giddy and jump up and down inside myself.
lol
Thanks!!

Word verification is still on here btw and this is my second try.

🙂

2 Erin { 04.26.08 at 10:01 pm }

I thought my eyes were just getting worse!

Now to try to figure out what this one says…

3 Bea { 04.26.08 at 10:20 pm }

They’ve changed them. It sucks pretty badly. I’m not sure if I’ll get this message through, I have a particularly bad one… I’m hoping the blogosphere at large forces a return to the readable days before too long.

And I agree there is a good use for anon commenting. It’s a case of “if only a few bad eggs didn’t spoil it for the rest of us”. I think if you’re prepared and able to moderate, that’s a good solution.

Bea

4 luna { 04.27.08 at 12:46 am }

the verification on blogspot is awful lately! I’ve been squinting. so annoying. I’ll still leave a comment though, even if it takes me 3 tries… ~luna

5 Sam { 04.27.08 at 1:50 am }

I HATE comment verification and I think that it sucks ass. That is my rude input for the day. Damn brain-hurting miserable smooshy letter cluster f@%!. *sigh* Sorry. You may delete this if you want.

6 Jackie { 04.27.08 at 3:44 am }

I also struggled with word verification yesterday.

7 Heidi { 04.27.08 at 5:41 am }

I totally agree about the word verification!!

8 Tash { 04.27.08 at 5:49 am }

YES! OMG, I just commented on someone’s site it took me about 3 times to get in — they’re doing this bold/thin thing, and I feel like I’m going completely mental. Glad it’s not just me.

Let’s see if I can get this comment up, now.

9 Isn't it pretty to think so { 04.27.08 at 5:52 am }

I love word verification! I am convinced it is the universe sending me messages…sort of like reading tea leaves. And it is up to me to a) decipher what the damn letters are, and b) figure out what the hell they mean. Of course, I got one last week where the first three letters were BFN. The universe really pissed me off that day…
(can you read my sarcasm in this post?)

10 Vacant Uterus { 04.27.08 at 5:52 am }

Yes! The word verification has been AWFUL! I thought it was just me.

11 Rebecca { 04.27.08 at 6:22 am }

Woo, I can comment as myself! Yay!

I hate Word Verification anyway; I am partially colour-blind and find them really hard to read!

12 Anonymous { 04.27.08 at 6:52 am }

Thanks for making more options for leaving comments! I’ll be leaving more (nicely anonymous) comments from now on…

13 Jen { 04.27.08 at 8:15 am }

Yes, the word verification things have gotten ridiculous. I tried to post a comment on someone’s post yesterday and it took me six tries! I nearly gave up.

14 calliope { 04.27.08 at 8:26 am }

I just had a post about this! The word verifications are EVIL! & the more I mess them up the more I feel like it is some sort of sign that my comment is lame…
SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO glad that you opened up the comments again. woo hooo! Not that I minded a gread deal using the open id code, but it is nice to just be me.

& question (leaving it here because I am too nervous to battle another word verification) will any of the blogher stuff be streamlined on-line? I would LOVE to watch you guys in action.

15 chicklet { 04.27.08 at 8:53 am }

I find them impossible to read lately, even the one right now, it’s too freaking SQUISHY!

I’m off to enter it 5x…

16 The Town Criers { 04.27.08 at 9:04 am }

I wonder if it would help to zoom in on the screen (make the font bigger) during comment-leaving moments. Would bigger be any easier to read or is it simply a matter of squish. Of course, I would first need to learn how to zoom in like that…

17 Lori { 04.27.08 at 9:06 am }

If the word verification squishiness is in your imagination, it’s in mine, too. You wouldn’t believe what I see below this comment box. Just a bunch of indecipherable squish.

Second try.
Third try.
Fourth try.

18 Melanie { 04.27.08 at 9:43 am }

I’m glad that you said something about those &^%$# word verifications. I was becoming increasingly concerned that my RE was right, I am old. For example, I’m looking at the word verification below and I kid you not it says something like vleihsitlhy, except all mushed together like soupl

19 Manda { 04.27.08 at 9:46 am }

You hit the nail right on the head… The word verification is just short of impossible to read.

I saw a great verification process once, but I don’t remember where I saw it. It had (I think) 5 pictures of dogs and 1 picture of a horse. In the verification box, you entered the number of the picture that wasn’t a dog. Easy to see, but hard for bots to fake. But I’m guessing Blogger doesn’t take suggestions like that.

20 STE { 04.27.08 at 10:29 am }

Funny, this morning I, too, thought they were getting longer and harder to read.

I also switched back to allowing anonymous comments. I hadn’t really had any problems (though I do like knowing who’s commenting), and thought sometimes it’s easier to say something without declaring identity first.

21 Manda { 04.27.08 at 10:32 am }

Me again… I’m not trying to comment spam you, but if you go to Blogger’s help center, and search for Word Verification, you’ll find a thread on this. If enough people post, maybe they’ll change it back.

Although, right now, my word verification for this post is pretty darn easy to read. Maybe they got the memo?

22 Mrs. Spit { 04.27.08 at 11:56 am }

The words are gettting totally awful- they are shorter but more shmushed.

Hey, just like me . ..

23 JuliaS { 04.27.08 at 12:41 pm }

I thought it was just another side effect of the Lupron – vision disturbances!

It usually takes me a few tries to get a comment posted.

24 Deathstar { 04.27.08 at 1:48 pm }

Yes, I’ve been trying to post on a few blogs and I can barely read the bloody things!!!!

25 loribeth { 04.27.08 at 1:57 pm }

I’ve been noticing this lately too. Glad it’s not just me. Now to try to figure out what the heck that mess of letters underneath this comment box is…

26 Cathy { 04.27.08 at 6:25 pm }

If you download SnagIt (sorry, too lazy to find you the link, just google it), you can capture that part of the screen and zoom in. It DOES help clarify the word verifcation, even if it is a bit of extra work. But I’m addicted to SnagIt, and thus I most always have it running anyways.

Hey, it’s free, and you can do loads of cool stuff with it, so it’s worth a download anyways.

27 Kathy V { 04.28.08 at 12:28 pm }

I think the word verification things are wacko for sure. It looks like the letters are all on drugs or something. It is frustrating too because it is a pain in the butt to type words five times when you are trying to comment and can’t read what the scrunched up letters say.

28 Michell { 04.28.08 at 4:50 pm }

I have been having a really hard time with the word verification things lately too. I’ve been doing the comment moderation thing but am not completely sure I love it. The only upside is being able to see is that I can check for new comments at work.

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