Commenting

Comments are not always instant

You can comment on posts in the comment box at the bottom of each page, or on our Facebook page. Hopefully your comment will appear instantly, but sometimes that’s not possible due to spam.

The problem all blogs have is that the comment box is seen as a open invitation to post about anything, usually involving you handing your credit card details in exchange for magic beans that will solve whatever issues you’re not dealing with. To fight this we use a number of anti-spam systems. Some of these are suspicious of new commenters, so you’re first comment is more likely to get stopped. However depending on current conditions even regular readers could find their comments are placed in limbo. Other ways to avoid being barred are to avoid talking about the surgical enlargement or reduction of various body parts, Texas Hold ‘Em, or your guaranteed scheme to earn $$$$. Words associated with these activities might trigger a reaction in our spam defences.

The place you’re commenting from can also affect the spam filter. Annoyingly every so often .ac.uk emails trigger spam defences because they’re adopted by various scam artists who want a veneer of credibility.

Your email

Comments generally require an email address. We will not be contacting people through these email addresses unless they sign up for information. It’s part of the anti-spam mechanism, but it can also be a way to sign up to receive updates on follow-up comments.

Your icon

Next to your name on the comments is an avatar. Normally this is be random face generated from numbers derived from your email address. The avatars attach the comments to a personality and hopefully make it easier to skim comments to follow individual people. If you do not want your features to be randomly arranged you can sign up for a gravatar, a Globally Recognised Avatar. Gravatar is an independent service that will store an image and associate it with your email address. If you have a gravatar, this will override the generic avatars.