Earlier this month, game developer Blizzard announced - and then quickly retracted - a plan to require forum participants to comment using their real names. The company created the policy in an attempt to cut back on “unpleasantness run wild,” but the announcement was met with an onslaught of criticism. A discussion thread slamming the proposal on one of Blizzard’s forums reached more than 2,000 pages.
Now, the company has softened their approach. They’ll give users the ability to rank and flag comments, but anonymous posts will still be allowed.
Blizzard isn’t the only company grappling with the question of how to manage user comments. Newspapers, tech companies, even individual bloggers continue to experiment with ways to keep conversations vibrant, yet civil - without dedicating too many resources to the task.
What do you think of the ability to comment anonymously? Does it cause people to behave badly? Has it ever caused you to behave badly? Tell Marketplace here.
Yelp has become a scourge in our society. Not only are “semi” anonymous people allowed to slander small business, we are encouraged not to respond to their outrageous remarks so we won’t get in a flame war and have our comments spread all over the internet by a vindictive writer.
To add insult to injury, the good comments we DO have are “filtered” because Yelp thinks they are fake.
There are two class action lawsuits against Yelp alleging that Yelp extorts those that don’t pay for advertising get the bad reviews posted on top and the good reviews filtered.