NPR.org | MinnPost | Charleston Gazette | Vancouver Sun | MarketWatch
NPR switched its user commenting to the Disqus platform this week, and is increasing its moderation efforts in response to user demand.

It took the unusual step of sending readers an email survey in advance, asking for ideas and feedback about how to improve the commenting system. More than 6,000 responded. The big surprise, social media product manager Kate Myers writes, is that readers called for more comment moderation.

We asked this question in our recent NPR audience survey: (more...)

The Next Web | Disqus
Google is developing a new article commenting system tied to its Google+ social network, an unnamed source tells The Next Web.

The Google comment system, which will almost certainly rival that of Facebook, will have deep links to Google’s network of services and websites, indexing comments in Google Search, and most significantly, the system will be available for use on third party sites.

Meanwhile, Disqus is beta-testing the next version of its popular commenting plugin, codenamed Disqus 2012. The biggest addition to the new version is a "community" tab that shows the most active discussions and the most frequent commenters across the site. (more...)

Disqus Product Blog | Infographic
One of the most popular commenting services for news websites and blogs says its data shows that commenters using pseudonyms are “the most important contributors to online communities.”

The service gives each user the option of commenting with a Disqus account, a social media identity or anonymously. It says 61 percent of commenters use pseudonyms, 35 percent choose to be anonymous and 4 percent use their "real identity" verified by Facebook. It also says those with pseudonyms post the best comments, while anonymous comments are lower quality. One theory: People don't mind being accountable online, but they don't want it to blow back on their work or personal lives by using a real identity. A pseudonym protects them while providing a measure of accountability. (more...)