The media has been discussing the value of online comments for some time now. The New york Times has an interesting analysis of what types of comments are posted during various times of the day, and conclude by saying (as we’ve heard many times before) that the few interesting comments are drowned out by vast amounts of clutter.
I’m not disagreeing that we could do without a lot of the harassing and poorly formulated comments that frequently appear online. But I don’t think we should apply the same rules to online comments as we do for newspaper editorials and debate either. After all , one of the major criticisms of the public debate is that “the public” is limited to a handful of people who get their comments printed, making the debate elitist and of little concern to the average citizen.
Perhaps the critics need to stop thinking so much about language, form and argument in individual comments, stop applying their own standards and listen to what si beign said? If a hundred out of a hundred and fifty comments says something along the lines of “we don’t like this proposed something in our city, but we are not used to the debating style of the academic community and the media, so we can’t be bothered to explain why we feel that way”, maybe the comments as a whole has some value in revealing public opinion?
