Food for thought: The problem of comments

Rebecca Rosen makes the good observation that after a decade's experience, "Internet comments continue to be terrible":

So many things about the Internet have become pretty awesome over the past decade or so, but there is one thing, however, that remains dysfunctional: comments. They continue to be terrible, and it's not only because of trolls and morons. Internet comments are hard to read and harder to engage with. Even in places with smart, thoughtful readers, the comment sections tend to be more like lists of unconnected ideas than genuine conversations. The problem is simply that it's hard to build a system that allows for smart ongoing conversations among large groups of people. It's a harder problem, fundamentally, than how to present and create good content.

I don't have time to get sidetracked by this at the moment, but it's an interesting question: why should something that in theory is so simple be so hard to do well? What's the hidden complexity that comment thread designers miss?

Comments

[Eekim]

I don't think the why is so hard. The transaction cost for having your say and getting some attention for it is nil. Unless you're seeking community, there's no incentive to develop or conform to group norms.

The harder question is what to do about it. I think designing systems to encourage intelligent conversations is still a huge, untapped market, and we can learn a lot from what we understand about facilitating positive face-to-face interaction.

I also think that we're starting to see some infrastructural shifts that may have a positive effect. "Portable" digital identity, such as Facebook Connect, is a good example of this. The transaction cost for acting like a buffoon is much higher if that reputation will follow me wherever I go.