In general, I believe LoGro’s civility guidelines are adequate to ensure that this is a safe place to venture an opinion. But as several commentors pointed out, many just prefer to read, lurk, and ponder, rather than weigh in on the discussion. That’s fine, too. I just like to do a reality check from time to time, to see if we can or should do things differently.

I like the idea of rating posts, and possibly even rating comments. Griff and Ross and I have talked about it in a general sense, and I think it’s time to revisit the idea and see what the technical possibilities and limitations might be.

I’m not sure if this has already been suggested, but one idea would be for Locally Grown to label certain posts for less-frequent or new commenters and ask others to not comment there.

More technically complicated would be to have your system automatically tally comments people make and include the total # with the commenter’s name. Some sites do this, as you probably know, though they probably require a log-in. Then you could ask for certain posts to not include comments by people with a certain # of comments or perhaps even exclude them electronically.

Of course listing # of comments might foster more comments from those who already do it a lot - as they seek to get the highest number!

I get a little frustrated when people don’t use the terms “blog,” “post,” and “comment” in the same way. I know Griff has tried to educate people on this. Correct me if I’m wrong, triumvirate, but Locally Grown as a whole is the “blog”; a “post” is what the triumvirate enters into the blog for the rest of us to “comment” on. Thus we commenters are not “bloggers” per se or even putting up “posts”; we’re just lowly commenters. It gets a little more complicated because the triumvirate, or blogger (or post-er), can also enter comments.

Of course anyone can start their own blog for free and do their own posts! Then see if you get any comments!

Of course, I think it’s a fantastically amazing idea. Anyone else?

My lack of posts is not due to a worry that someone will disagree with me. Sure, posters here sometimes get a little spirited in their comments, but that’s part of why it’s a good blog. I don’t think you’ve got much of a problem here with people personalizing their criticisms.

Though I think it is down right nice that you want to bring the lurkers out into the light of day, I think some of us are just destined to be only occassional posters. If people are holding back from posting for a reason and you wish to fix it…great. However keep in mind there will always be those of us that prefer to lurk and only jump in once in awhile.

Once we relocate to Northfield maybe I’ll post more, but considering my history with a few other blogs and online communities I will probably still do more lurking than posting.

I will now go back to lurking ……..

Your husband had a wonderful F2F conversation today, and he was quite helpful on some questions I had.

Speaking of Star Trek, I just wish I could get some of those Star Trek tech toys… The transporter to get me to St. Paul and back would be pretty cool, based on today’s gas prices.

Thank god for the big white transporter (vanpool). There is nothing like posting to LoGroNo while doing 65 up the highway to St. Paul. (not driving of course). Broadband cellular cards are a wonderful thing. Isn’t technology grand?

-J

More Star Trek based avatars.

John and David, you both bring up good points about the frustration with questions not being answered…. I’ve experienced that myself (and contributed to it as well, I’m sure). People have to have the motivated to respond, and the time to do so. I often suffer from a lack of both.

On the other hand, sometimes people post questions here that require a fair amount of time and follow-through to research. I figure that if the topic/question is important enough to them, they’ll do the work themselves.

If you’re serious about persevering, though, sometimes adding a comment to an old thread can revive the discussion, often with new participants, and more information can be gained.

From my perspective, I only really post when it’s either something that I’m knowledgeable about or passionate about. I have really only posted on 3 different subjects over the years…the recent Chamber piece (as an active yet frustrated Chamber member) and the prayer ladies controversy (as a member of the Human Rights Commission). While I read LG every single day, I don’t feel the need to comment–and don’t comment–on issues with which I’m unfamiliar or don’t know anything about. And I agree that if you don’t know what you’re talking about, people aren’t shy here about telling you that!
I’m not sure that being less controversial or posting about different subjects would change how often I post. I think you’ll always have a fair number of people who will just read LG or post only sporadically no matter what you do.

That being said, it does get frustrating at times to see the same people posting over and over again with very long posts. When that happens, sometimes people (I) don’t even read the entire thing, and that can keep people (me) from reading or posting. Anyway, you certainly don’t want to quash participation, but perhaps there’s some creative way to keep the very long postings a bit shorter.

I too get frustrated that questions I pose don’t get answered. I’m still waiting for answers to a few of those and probably will be a year from now…but I think that’s one of the issues with blogging. It’s easy to dodge a question and just move on and continue spouting your own message. Face-to-face discussion can better get those questions answered.