TechSpot - PC Technology News and Analysis

I have noticed that it is very rare to see comments about the articles on Techspot's home page. Is it because nobody reads them? Or is it because nobody wants to waste time posting comments?

I just thought it would be nice to see more people posting there...

However, I do think I remember we tried to boost that once. Right when I joined, a contest started and the people who did the most posting in those articles were entered into a draw for one or more videocards... 6800GTs or 7800GTXs or something... I don't remember which model.

But I wonder if there's any other way to increase the posting there. I decided that I'm going to try to comment everything that I can, and I hope that maybe other people will too.

I comment every so often on an article that I read . The only thing with offering a product for comments on an article is that people might write useless things . I guess if we make the articles stand out more, then maybe people will read them. Something like a sidebar that gives us popular headlines in the tech world !

Thanks for your initiative MetalX. We definitely want those comments to increase in number and you are definitely helping initiating a discussion with your comments.

** I should also note that your login information should work across the whole site, so the same username and account information is used for the forums and the comments system. **

Among the things I have set up for increasing those recent (and not so recently, too):
* Show and link to last 50 headlines with # of comments
* Show most commented headlines in the frontpage
* Improved ease of registration
* Improve layout for both unregistered and logged in users wishing to post comments
* Giveaways (although we have not launched any in a while)

Stuff that is coming in the future for encouraging posting:
* Merging the comments database with vBulletin, so you could use either interface to comment (coming with CMS 2.0, still in development).
* More giveaways...
* Your suggestion here...

I was actually going to suggest merging the comments with vBulletin, but I guess you beat me to that idea

They were merged once before I thought.. I'd comment more often if I didn't have to leave the forum interface.

I have read all the reviews, but only comment if I have something meaningful to say.

Exactly - I only comment once in a while if I have something useful to add. My concern is that a newcomer will read the main page and follow it to the comments - then see a bunch of imbeciles once they read the comments - so unless I have something I think is useful and I'm sure about I don't say anything.

Thats well and good for the reviews. But there are several news articles posted daily on the frontpage, many go uncommented.

It seems to me like my 'automatic' login some times works for the home page and other times it works for the forum, but not both. Much of both the home page and the Forums are of low/no interest to me (e.g., I am not a gamer) and the forums allow me to pick topics to read by category and thread so I usually head there right away.

Agreed on that part, if you feel you have nothing useful to say then don't say it However going back to MetalX's original post, it so happens that thousands come to read our news, I'm sure if there was a habit created of posting comments for at least 5% of those people, we could get a nice boost of comments.

That's right, we used to have something like that setup a long time ago. The problem is that we relied on an inconsistent vbulletin hack to do so, and ultimately proved to be a really bad solution in the long term, so we switched to a real Content Management System for the frontpage news and the rest of the website, except of course the forums which run on vB.

I can see that you use StoryTeller (says on the bottom of the page ), but I have noticed that the login systems are different still; I never get logged onto the main page, but stay logged onto the forum . May I also suggest that you try and use the same smiley's, as the codes may become confusing.

EDIT:
Just wondering Julio; what was the hack that you used to use?

Login systems are different but if you log in from the main site, it will automatically log you in the forums.

I think it was called "Pluh News" but that was in the old vB 2.x days, today there are much better hacks to run a news site at least.

I have seen "vB News" and I tried it and it worked very well; but I'm not sure if you could integrate that into a CMS : . I am trying to set up a CMS for my website, and I have to say, it's not the easiest thing to do , and I do like the setup of the one here .

I read all the new stories every day. I comment on some, but no one else ever commented or replied.

I read almost every article but I don't say anything because I feel like I'd get flamed or mocked for some reason. I know I wouldn't but its a feeling I have. That and I also don't post comments because I usually do have a lot to say anyways.

Nick ^_^

I don't probably cuz I have Opera's speed dial set to all the different sub-categories right off the bat.

I just tried something after reading this thread (logged in) I clicked to the Home Page and I was no longer logged in. I then clicked on Forums and I was logged in.