God Bless Snarky Commenters
April 10, 2007 by Eric Eggertson
Filed under Marketing
There’s been a lot of discussion about how hurtful it is to post nasty comments on blogs.
Today, we’d like to salute those commenters who, with wit and crassness, add zest to otherwise dull blog posts.
Take this eminently forgettable list of 100 tips on "How to Command Respect through Body Language", published by anonymous linkbait gerbils at BizNicheMedia.
There are some good suggestions and some stupid ones among the 100, but the best reading comes in the snarky comments section:
From Hamsack: And remember not to beat the crap out of the person interviewing you because of his or her smug attitude or patronizing responses to your interview answers … Oh, yeah and dont forget the drug tests and extensive background checks just to be considered for a lousy 10 dollar an hour job.
From Mervin J. Cruddie: And don’t poop yourself at smart dinner parties where all the women are wearing capri pants! Its just plain rude!
From Hank Fox:
Gronk’s Tips:
After scare lion off carrion, woman and small person always eat first.
When scratch lice out of armpit, try not let fall on cave neighbor. Also, no fart in crowded cave at sleep time.
Not laugh when friend get eaten by tiger. Save for later, when tell tale at campfire. Get much bigger laugh.
To impress pretty female, remember to rub crotch and leer. Make suggestive motion with club.
Are these comments insulting? You bet!
Are insults an appropriate way to respond to blog posts that are designed to draw traffic, but don’t live up to their suggestive headlines? You bet, as long as they don’t step over the line into outright nastiness.
I’m sure the editors and staff writers churning out these posts are nice people, and I hope they don’t take the comments personally. If you draw people in with headlines promising enlightenment, you have to expect a certain amount of hostility and disdain when the product is functional but not compelling.
The same kind of discussions take place every day on sites like fark.com, digg.com, and netscape.com. Link via Spin Thicket.
Tags: crowds, discussions, etiquette, netiquette, rudeness, nastiness, blogs, linkbait, comments, fark, digg, netscape, spinthicket
In Web 2.0, “community” = “snarky commenters”
I know some of the anonymous (and named) commenters behave abominably, but there is definitely an art to taking a dull or narrow-minded blog post and making it memorable by mocking it, or expanding the discussion to a more interesting level.
Not just in Web 2.0, but in all kinds of newsgroups and internet discussion groups
the level of discourse is more aggressive.
I would agree that to a certain extent it is refreshing. I think a lot of the appeal in online discourse is doing away with the veneer of corporate speak.