I am sorry for being cynical, from the surface this looks like neat technology and a nice project, but is there any reason to think that Github is any less of a privacy destroyer? It’s a massive, centralized free network, owned by a corporate giant. It is basically a law of nature that participants are going to be tracked and analyzed for (perceived) financial gain.
The project page talks about “open source” and “no lock-in”, but that’s not completely true. Github is a major part of the solution and is not open source. You may be able to export your data from the Github issues, but that does not mean there is no lock-in. The data is yours to take, but the API’s that power it are not. So it is not possible to switch to another platform without significant work.
On the other hand, GitHub is almost certainly better from a privacy perspective than Disqus. And everything goes through the uttranc.es server, so I doubt that GitHub could do much tracking via these comments. Besides, if it’s so hard to host your own comments (which it apparently is), then I think it’s better to have an imperfect, GitHub-based comments system than to have none at all.
I agree that Github intuitively feels better than Disqus, but that is exactly my point. That is just a feeling. If you look at it carefully, there is nothing to back that up. Your point that Github is not able to do much tracking because everything goes through uttranc.es does not hold, at least if I look at the example at the bottom of the page, because you need to sign in with your Github account before you can participate. So at the very least this works to increase the userbase if Github. Even people who are not interested in open source hosting at all now need to become a member, just to leave a comment on a blog.
I think it’s better to have an imperfect, GitHub-based comments system than to have none at all.
I strongly disagree with this. By giving in and going the easy way, the incentive to develop a real solution is taken away and you prolong the “imperfect” situation. Some things are just not free, even if corporations like to portray it otherwise. If comments are actually important to you, then put some effort into it. Either by developing it yourself, or paying a person/company to do it. if you don’t want to do that, is it really that important then? Or are you just giving in to the bait?
If comments are actually important to you, then put some effort into it.
That’s the thing – comments are important to me, but I’m the reader. Meanwhile, most blog writers today seem not to care enough about comments to bother. That being the case, it is good for me, as a reader, if there is an easy way for writers to allow comments.
I personally make an effort to allow comments on my own web site without resorting to a third-party solution, but unfortunately I think I am the exception rather than the rule.
Anyway – I don’t think uttranc.es is great, but if it makes some people get comments on their blog, who otherwise wouldn’t bother, then I think it does more good than evil.
My own philosophy is that blogs don’t need comments. If you want to respond you can contact me or write your own blog post or tweet or tiktok about it - whatever it may be. I don’t want to assume responsibility for moderating and/or curating somebody else’s words that will show up alongside my own.
Personally, I’m often disappointed to find that a blog post doesn’t have a comments section. Writing an e-mail just to express your gratitude feels weirder than leaving a comment.
I appreciate gratitude expressed by email way more than that expressed by comment.
I also feel a comment section is meant to serve other readers of the article at least as much as its author, so in fact I feel expressions of gratitude about the article are misplaced in the comments.
I also feel a comment section is meant to serve other readers of the article at least as much as its author
That’s a good point, and I agree!
What I dislike about writing e-mails is the ceremony involved. I need to explain what article I’m referring to, why I’m writing, say hello and goodbye and so forth. In a comments section, all of those things are implied. (That’s not to say I dislike writing e-mails in general, just as a replacement for comments.)
Indeed. That is why I appreciate emailed expressions of gratitude so much more – here I have someone so compelled to say thanks that all the trouble they had to go through didn’t deter them. It just hits differently.
(Doesn’t mean a graceful and sincere response necessarily comes naturally, so sometimes I have taken a long time to reply and in a handful of cases I never did – but don’t let fear of shouting into a void discourage you. I promise, if the author does see your message (which spam filters unfortunately do make uncertain), it will almost certainly be gladly received, even if you never hear back.)
Been a user of utteranc.es for some time now and I personally like it. IIRC someone here had made a similar system which uses GitHub Actions and Issues.
edit: Here is the Lobsters link, seems like the author had deleted the blog post
I am sorry for being cynical, from the surface this looks like neat technology and a nice project, but is there any reason to think that Github is any less of a privacy destroyer? It’s a massive, centralized free network, owned by a corporate giant. It is basically a law of nature that participants are going to be tracked and analyzed for (perceived) financial gain.
The project page talks about “open source” and “no lock-in”, but that’s not completely true. Github is a major part of the solution and is not open source. You may be able to export your data from the Github issues, but that does not mean there is no lock-in. The data is yours to take, but the API’s that power it are not. So it is not possible to switch to another platform without significant work.
On the other hand, GitHub is almost certainly better from a privacy perspective than Disqus. And everything goes through the uttranc.es server, so I doubt that GitHub could do much tracking via these comments. Besides, if it’s so hard to host your own comments (which it apparently is), then I think it’s better to have an imperfect, GitHub-based comments system than to have none at all.
I agree that Github intuitively feels better than Disqus, but that is exactly my point. That is just a feeling. If you look at it carefully, there is nothing to back that up. Your point that Github is not able to do much tracking because everything goes through uttranc.es does not hold, at least if I look at the example at the bottom of the page, because you need to sign in with your Github account before you can participate. So at the very least this works to increase the userbase if Github. Even people who are not interested in open source hosting at all now need to become a member, just to leave a comment on a blog.
I strongly disagree with this. By giving in and going the easy way, the incentive to develop a real solution is taken away and you prolong the “imperfect” situation. Some things are just not free, even if corporations like to portray it otherwise. If comments are actually important to you, then put some effort into it. Either by developing it yourself, or paying a person/company to do it. if you don’t want to do that, is it really that important then? Or are you just giving in to the bait?
That’s the thing – comments are important to me, but I’m the reader. Meanwhile, most blog writers today seem not to care enough about comments to bother. That being the case, it is good for me, as a reader, if there is an easy way for writers to allow comments.
I personally make an effort to allow comments on my own web site without resorting to a third-party solution, but unfortunately I think I am the exception rather than the rule.
Anyway – I don’t think uttranc.es is great, but if it makes some people get comments on their blog, who otherwise wouldn’t bother, then I think it does more good than evil.
My own philosophy is that blogs don’t need comments. If you want to respond you can contact me or write your own blog post or tweet or tiktok about it - whatever it may be. I don’t want to assume responsibility for moderating and/or curating somebody else’s words that will show up alongside my own.
Personally, I’m often disappointed to find that a blog post doesn’t have a comments section. Writing an e-mail just to express your gratitude feels weirder than leaving a comment.
I appreciate gratitude expressed by email way more than that expressed by comment.
I also feel a comment section is meant to serve other readers of the article at least as much as its author, so in fact I feel expressions of gratitude about the article are misplaced in the comments.
That’s a good point, and I agree!
What I dislike about writing e-mails is the ceremony involved. I need to explain what article I’m referring to, why I’m writing, say hello and goodbye and so forth. In a comments section, all of those things are implied. (That’s not to say I dislike writing e-mails in general, just as a replacement for comments.)
Indeed. That is why I appreciate emailed expressions of gratitude so much more – here I have someone so compelled to say thanks that all the trouble they had to go through didn’t deter them. It just hits differently.
(Doesn’t mean a graceful and sincere response necessarily comes naturally, so sometimes I have taken a long time to reply and in a handful of cases I never did – but don’t let fear of shouting into a void discourage you. I promise, if the author does see your message (which spam filters unfortunately do make uncertain), it will almost certainly be gladly received, even if you never hear back.)
I make a point of writing emails to express gratitude. Maybe it’s a little weird, but it’s almost always appreciated.
I how many (if any) tiktoks exist that are replies to blog posts.
Been a user of utteranc.es for some time now and I personally like it. IIRC someone here had made a similar system which uses GitHub Actions and Issues.
edit: Here is the Lobsters link, seems like the author had deleted the blog post