Your wish to interact with me is not my obligation to respond.

[azurelunatic]

I disagree with the assertion that it's common courtesy to reply to all comments left in your journal, and I suspect that this is a matter of spoons/scale in some cases.

If it's a comment left by someone who you have a relationship with, then it is probably courteous to respond, unless the comment is clearly a no-replies-needed sort of thing.

If it's a comment as part of a conversational thread by some people who are talking to each other (and they just happen to be in your space doing so), then your overt presence in the thread can be taken as intrusive and ... over-attentive. Like the party host who attaches to a pair who are getting to know each other better and butts in.

If it's a comment from someone with whom one has no current relationship, I view it as entirely up to the host whether they respond to it or not. It is generally nice to, but I view that as "it is appreciated and gracious, but not-responding is still a socially valid option", rather than "not responding is rude".

This is especially so when it's a comment from someone who has never interacted with you before and they don't say where they're coming from, or part of a storm of comments originating from someone else's link to your journal, particularly when it's a link from a source that you're not involved in, or a source that's actively hostile. If your entry has just gone viral, you are absolved of all responsibility for responding to every damn thing that J. Random Internet User has to say about it. If you're a professional, sometimes you have to choose between actually doing what you do, or replying to all the people trying to talk to you. (Though a mass-response, like a new entry with "Hello to the entire internet who just dropped by to comment; your support is appreciated, thank you" is nice.)


Let me say that a little louder: a person contacting me does not oblige me to spend my time on them in return. Their desire to create a relationship, even the tenuous relationship of a mutually commenting interaction, does not oblige me to give them that relationship. I'm not obliged to respond to spammers, I'm not obliged to respond to people adding me on Twitter, I'm not obliged to respond to people I don't know saying "me too" on an entry of mine, I'm not obliged to respond to someone trying to troll me or start a fight.

I can speak in public without committing myself to acknowledge or respond to every person who has something to tell me about what I just said.

If I hampered myself with that restriction, I would never have posted any of my widely-linked entries in public. I make an effort to respond to most reasonable comments, and I apologize if it takes me longer than I think necessary -- but I would never make an absolute commitment to respond to all comments, I would never endanger my health in order to respond to all comments, I would never let responding to all comments stand in the way of my actual duties or getting the stuff that is in my head out of it.


It's also different in communities in some cases; things like dw_suggestions or suggestions are going to feature people coming by months and years later and adding to the discussion, and saying the same things and no, you're really not obligated to reply to every suggestions-commenter ever. The community's maintainers/administrators are the ultimate host in a community.

It is nice to maintain a consistent framework for replies, but it really varies on what you're using your journal for, and whether it just exploded because the entire internet dropped by.

Comments

[mathsnerd]

Oh Jesu Crist. I went and read the original "rant" about "common courtesy" on LJ and the 'net and now I want to curl up somewhere and cry. For a few hours. Someone has the time/energy/spoons/dedication to hang around for an hour to respond to any and all comments after posting online? Someone *judges* people for not having immediate replies ready for comments on journal entries or comments? I clearly should go shoot myself right now. Which reminds me.... I have some very supportive, loving comments on my last LJ post that I still haven't responded to. Drat. Need to go do that.

I try to respond to comments that either require a response or clearly went to so much effort to send love/support/you matter to me vibes that I wish to acknowledge the effort, even if it's just a smiley face or a hug or something. But responses cost me a lot sometimes, so they come in dribs and drabs. Kind of like my posting. I have writing-on and writing-off cycles.

And lookie-here, you got me writing-on again. :P All that to say, thank you for giving a rational response to that often-held view on netiquette, Azzy. *hugs*

[cleverthylacine]

This kind of thing is one of the reasons why I hate and try to stay out of the various $FAILs, incidentally.

(Will Shetterly's rampant and undeniable asshattery aside, and my own literary aestheticism/decadent sensiblities aside: I have a rule about apologies, which is that I not only don't expect them to be immediate, I don't trust them if they are; people who know that what they did was wrong the second you call them on it usually knew it was wrong and did it anyway, and are apologising to shut you up, and people who apologise because That's What You Do may not really understand why you want the apology. In neither case can you believe that the person won't do the same thing again. For there to be a genuine apology, the person who needs to make it has to have the spoons to craft it properly and that can't even happen until after they actually understand why what they did caused a problem and have decided that it was actually wrong.)

[cleverthylacine]

I have noticed, over the years, that most people start out trying to answer everything. In 1992 when I joined my first mailing list I almost cried because I thought I had to answer every email. Fortunately that didn't last.

The more popular you are beyond your personal circle of friends, the less of this you can do--even people who are not chronically ill or disabled have limitations. Whenever I see someone expressing the pieties that you're obliged to return all comments/suteki on poupee, answer all your email, answer every comment on every journal, what I think is: this is a person who has yet to become really popular. When I post a new item on poupee I get 50 comments overnight; you only get to make 20, so I have ways of limiting how many I choose to return and over how long a time. I gave up a long time ago on trying to do this kind of thing anywhere. The people who really love me, and whom I really love, I usually do get back to, and if I don't they usually know why.

The only exception to this is that I do try and answer all comments on fic. However, sometimes this does not happen for several days and sometimes all I have time/energy to say is "thanks, I'm glad you liked it/thanks, I appreciate your thoughts and will consider them/thanks, I'm glad you took the time to read it even if it's not your thing". (Sometimes, with unqualified squee, there is nothing else TO say, beyond "I'm glad you liked it", and I usually do find time to reply properly to thought-provoking, useful criticism; on the other hand, sometimes the criticism is merely that I did not write the kind of story the commenter likes to read, and that's not useful to me except in terms of framing the summary/labels better.)

[azurelunatic]

I took a look at the comment stats of the person who wrote the original screed that touched off my rantypants, and over the five-year lifetime of their journal, it's received less than one comment per day, and they've made less than one comment per day.

So I think your assessment about not-high-volume is bang-on.

[matgb]

I go further; I really get annoyed with people who reply incessently to empty comments.

If I, for example, DL a zip file of screencaps, I want to thank the person who put it up; that's courtesy, and having uploaded something once to see my bandwidth limits nearly crash my site despite saying I'd need to know how many people DLd, I know how annoying it is when people don't thank for stuff.

But seeing a post with 4 pages of comments, all of which are "taking, thanks" followed by "you're welcome" replies?

Utterly pointless, actually puts me off thanking the person for the upload; I don't want you to reply to me.

Having said that; I used to reply to most comments left purely to up my comment count; non LJ/DWers still get surprised by the number of comments we get on posts here; threads + notifications + most readers logged in with account + the reply box int he emails really help.

[azurelunatic]

I don't think I could switch to a not-fully-threaded blog now that I've experienced the full power of this. Who in the world has conversations that only go three layers deep?

[shirozora]

I used to not respond to comments left on my fic entries, then I tried to reply to all comments, and then I decided I was only replying to ones that went in deep and analyzed my stuff. I reply to almost all comments on my non-fic entries since it's usually people on my flist/reading page who are commenting and, y'know, flist/reading page but I am not obligated to reply to "Loved it! <3 <3 <3 Looking forward to the next chapter!" Took me a little while to get around to it, and it's done a lot of good for my mental health. No more pressure.

[cleverthylacine]

I bet your fics are more popular than mine :) because your policy is almost the reverse of mine.

[aedifica]

Completely agreed. I do try to reply to all comments left for me, but that's because I want to, not because I think anyone should have to.

[waketosleep]

Sometimes I post things that get a lot of responses and can't hope to reply to them all, or someone comments and all I can say is 'thanks for reading! :D' and get sick of doing that after about the first ten or so. Or better yet, someone comments on a thing I wrote six months ago (which I do love, but hey). So I have a blurb in my profile that explains while I don't always respond, I do always read what you say (because I am Writer, therefore I am Narcissist).

Your comments specifically, I think I always respond to. ;)

[azurelunatic]

Hee!

And one of the sneaky things about me leaving feedback: for me, DW comment feedback is sometimes a "Thank you for writing this" and/or a "here's what I liked, writer to writer" -- and sometimes it's also a "when I leave this comment for you, I get a copy of my comment plus this fic that I <3 emailed to me with no further effort than the leaving of the comment! Score!"

[nova]

Agreed! And sometimes strangers comment just to comment and aren't looking for a relationship at all.

[jumpuphigh]

&hearts

(No reply necessary)

[sasha_feather]

This post has been included in a link roundup at access_fandom. Thanks!

[azurelunatic]

And (for my reference and that of anyone who happens to be wandering by and curious), that roundup is: http://access-fandom.dreamwidth.org/15134.html

[jackandahat]

This, so much this. I've run into it when I've been linked to by something, and suddenly my written-for-my-friends' understanding has a bunch of strangers show up and demand I explain myself, what I mean by this word, don't I understand what I'm doing wrong, how I'm a bad evil person... just no.

(I don't mean when I've been genuinely offensive - I mean the kind of thing that happens when you're talking amongst friends, like breaking up with your girlfriend, and announcing you're giving up women forever and becoming a gay monk, or having a bad day with disability and expressing a wish to break everyone's kneecaps so they get it for once.)

Really, no. If you're in my journal you were either invited, in which case my default is to be nice to you (which may or may not involve responding), or you're uninvited, which means my response is entirely based on your behaviour.

[azurelunatic]

I would really hate to see how the internet-at-large would respond to zarhooie and me shouting variants on "SHUT UP WOMAN" at each other, especially the parts of the internet that haven't watched the film we're making reference to.

[liv]

I agree with you, on the whole. The replying to every comment paradigm makes sense if you're just starting out journalling; it can be a really good way to turn drive-bys into long-term connections, which is awesome. Also if everybody who comments is either a personal friend, or second-degree connected to your social circle, and there aren't too many of those, then it can be nice to spend five minutes thanking people for their participation and generally making sure you don't accidentally shun someone.

But insisting on this for everybody is completely ridiculous. My journal's sort of on the cusp between a mass email between me and my friends, and a public blog where random strangers come and debate me. So I probably could just about reply to every comment I receive, but it would mean no free time for anything else (and I'm speaking as someone who is able-bodied and childfree). Certainly if you suddenly get popular and a huge influx of people come along to read and debate your one post, you're not obliged to reply. And most definitely you don't have to reply to lots of trolls repeating the same attacks; in fact you don't even have to leave their messes visible in the thread, unless you choose to.

So yeah, the OP is trying to generate universal etiquette rules out of her personal experience, which is a forgivable mistake, but still a mistake.

PS: that thing she says about LJ deleting old entries for Basic accounts? That frightens me, so do you happen to know whether it's true so I can warn my Basic account-using friends?

[foxfirefey]

PS: that thing she says about LJ deleting old entries for Basic accounts? That frightens me, so do you happen to know whether it's true so I can warn my Basic account-using friends?

I haven't heard about that at all, and this thread doesn't make things any clearer. I mean, it's possible posts of hers have been lost through glitches or whatnot at some point (I had a boyfriend once who was a long time LJ user, like WAY BACK LJ user, and some glitch had wiped out posts of his once), but never have I heard about limits like the one described.

Here via access_fandom

[susanreads]

*applause*

I get very few comments, but I still didn't reply to all of them and I'm not going back to look for the ones I missed now. If people start talking to each other in my journal, I'll go "Squee! Conversation in my journal!" but I'd only reply to one of them, I think.

As for hanging around for an hour after posting to respond right away, if I had to follow those rules I'd never say anything, and I don't post much at the best of times.

[kaz]

YES, God, thank you.

Not only do I have spoon issues with commenting always (yay social anxiety!) I regularly go through months - months - of being unable to comment to anything at all, pretty much. If my BFF who I love to bits leaves a comment to me somewhere, the brain-to-keyboard thought transference is so hampered I can't respond. So introducing any kind of social rule re: responding will make me unable to participate in fandom at all. Thanks.

This is also my issue with "respond when you can" for reviews, because for me that's as likely to be five months later as in a few days.

And if I tell people this, I'll get "oh, I didn't mean *you*." Which, um, if you make rules for everyone they'd damn well better be for everyone, you know? (In terms of incorporating exceptions and the idea this doesn't always work from the start) I don't care to have to assume myself not contained in everyone and I don't care to be hit with social recriminations for my "rudeness" from people who don't realise I have one of the much-vaunted exceptions.

[originalpuck]

I just wanted to comment and say that this is pretty much exactly my issue wrt comments. I can get the best comments ever, from some of my best friends in the world, but because of my anxiety and panic disorders, some days it's just not happening. It doesn't matter if I want to or not. I simply can't bring myself to do it. It doesn't mean I appreciate the comments/commenter any less. It's simply how I function.

And so the idea of some sort of rule that seems to favor TAB folks gets really frustrating really quick.

[azurelunatic]

And in case anyone was wondering, I view this entry as taking place primarily in the larger framework of certain assorted geek feminism type discussions. I think that in some cases there's "a blogger should be a good host" expectation that hooks more deeply into certain elements of (Western, because that's the primary environment in which I was raised, though "Western" still covers a lot of territory, broader than my own experience) cultural programming for women than it does for men. I think that "you are a bad hostess" carries a certain amount more baggage/angry-mass than "you are a bad (masculine) host", and that bad-hostess-shaming is a very real element in the context of online discussions.

How dare you make commenters who are ONLY TRYING TO CONTRIBUTE TO THE DISCUSSION feel unwelcomed?
How dare you not moderate a discussion?
How dare you CENSOR THE FREE SPEECH that we were making in your comments?

Those disingenuous arguments that have been made by countless trolls and shit-stirrers are all bad-host shaming, and like any sort of social pressure, it has its good side and its bad side. Who gets to define what's a useful contribution? Who gets to declare the parameters of the discussion at hand? Who decides where to draw the line between free speech and usefully moderated discussion?

[ninety6tears]

Everyone has their own standards of online etiquette, so when I see other people not responding to comments I probably would've replied to, I try not to think that it's rude. It all goes into the category of "It's nice to, but not 'un-nice' not to." Besides, if this was widely accepted etiquette, I'd hate it - Nothing makes me feel more awkward than making people feel obliged to talk to me, LOL.

[nic]

(here via MF)

THANK YOU! I often feel guilty about my lack-of-replying to fic comments/journal comments, but if I'm not inspired to make a comment, I won't. I seriously cannot be bothered thinking of a creative way to say "thanks" over and over, and also, as you said, I didn't necessarily invite a CONVERSATION with someone simply by posting something on the internet.

Also, if I leave comment on fic, I DO NOT want a reply unless I left a specific question. They wrote a story, I thanked them for writing, End Of Transaction. Right? :)

And there's absolutely no need to reply to me here, because I'm essentially cheering you on.

[feelslikefire]

Thank you for writing & posting this. I agree whole-heartedly; I remember being very annoyed with the initial post you linked to. Too tired to brain. And no need to respond, of course. Hee!

[waywardoctagon]

I agree; I hate the idea that somebody wanting something from you (general you, including me) entitles them to it. (Plus, as mentioned, that they might not even want a response!)

And there's a delightful bit from ths article:

Everyday observation tells us that people regularly overestimate the amount they are “owed” by other people, and underestimate the amount they themselves owe. I can only speak for personal experience here, but at least half the time I have heard somebody begin a sentence with the words “I don't think it's unreasonable to expect” they will go on to suggest something which is not only unreasonable, but in some cases literally impossible.

We are very bad at estimating the requirements of other people's jobs. Nine times out of ten, when somebody says “how hard can it be to...” the answer to the question is “harder than you can possibly imagine, because you have never actually tried to do it.”

Although in this case I'd replace "have never actually tried to do it" with "are not in the same situation, and just because you can do something, or like doing something, doesn't mean that everyone can do it, or is obligated to".

[goodbyebird]

*hugs this comment*

[reddwarfer]

Man, I'd die if I had to respond to all comments. I used to get crap about it. And spent two weeks catching up...then ended up going on hiatus. I try my best, but sometimes I'd rather use my spoons for laundry.

[goodbyebird]

This.
People are in no way entitled to your time. How hard is this to comprehend, really? It especially baffles me when someone's spent a great deal of time making a fanwork/artile/whatevs(and then even more time to post and share it with others), someone drops two lines - and then they're offended that the other person dares not reply to the short comment they took the time to make.

here via metafandom.

[lovepeaceohana]

I completely empathize with the resentment of the entitlement some folks seem to feel regarding others' resources. Responding to anyone, be it online or in meatspace, takes time and energy that any given person simply may not have at any given time - and even if those resources are available, that doesn't oblige one to expend them. This reminds me a lot of the street harassment apologists who think that a woman somehow owes the random dude trying to chat her up an opportunity to suceed - everything from insisting she ought to at least defer politely to believing that she is obliged to actually engage him in conversation. Or people who somehow believe that the First Amendment grants them the right to air their unsavoury and/or unsubstantiated opinions in your online space (because otherwise it's censorship!!!omg). No. Just - no.

(And I say this as someone who does try to reply to things that warrant a reply, which is a function of both my relative smallness on the internet coupled with a job that permits me sufficient free time to do so.)

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

I just want to say that as a frequent drive-by commentor to various LJs, I agree with this! Coming from Usenet I tend to think of all LJ as one big conversation (except for entries that are Flocked or obviously personal), or one big public forum, where any relevant decent comment is acceptable. But I certainly don't want the OP to feel zie has to reply!

[sushimustwrite.livejournal.com]

There are people who really take replying to comments that seriously? Wow. I try, but I also forget.

[azurelunatic]

There are. tiferet mentioned over in the Dreamwidth comments that she's noticed that most of the people she's seen with this opinion tend to be new, and/or never had the entire internet come visit them, or never been popular enough to have consistently high-volume comments.

The person who posted the rant that set me off: discounting community entries, for the entire span of her journal's existence, it has received comments at a rate of less than one comment per day on average, including her own comments in her journal. Her own comment count throughout LiveJournal is (on average) less than one comment per day over her journal's lifetime.

[Edit: In case anybody wanted to know, there are around 12 comments per day left in my journal (including my own comments), and I leave around 19 comments per day.]

[xinef.livejournal.com]

I make sure that I read every single comment made on my LJ. However, whether I reply to any given comment depends on many factors, most importantly, time available and whether the comment needs a response. To some extent that latter decision is made by my thought "would I expect a response to this comment".

Eg. If someone posts a picture of their finished needlework and I post a comment saying how pretty it is, I don't expect a "thank you". But if I make some more specific comment about the pattern, the fibres or fabric used, etc, then a response is appreciated, and I would make one in return.

Make sense?

[azurelunatic]

Makes perfect sense.

[lady-angelina.livejournal.com]

While I agree that no one is obligated to reply to all comments left in every journal entry... there are certain patterns that make me bristle. Namely, when I've had at least a decent (if not close) friendship with someone in the past, and for no reason that I can come up with, they start ignoring all of the comments I leave for them, even though they reply to everyone else's comments (including those left before and after the one I left). I don't mean ignoring them here and there... I mean, in every single entry I leave a comment for them (and I also don't mean that I'm "stalking" them or commenting to every entry they post... I'm just talking about when I comment to entries I find interesting and have something to say).

That sort of makes me wonder if I've said or done anything to offend them, or if they even want me commenting in their journal anymore. It also makes me wonder if I should contact them privately to find out what's up, but the downside is that it could invoke the awkward turtle (what the hell does that phrase mean, anyway? XD ) for them if they really don't want to deal with me, or even if they're cool with me, and all of a sudden, I'm asking them if things are okay.

Sorry if this sounds rambly. ^^;;

[azurelunatic]

That's more than just "not replying to comments", that's "a person I've been interacting with has started ignoring me", and that upsets me too.

"awkward turtle" isn't a phrase I'm familiar with, but it sounds like an extension of the metaphor for a person self-protectively hiding from someone/something being compared to a turtle that's got all its extremities drawn inside its shell.