I’m not a proponent of user-comments on websites. There, I said it. That’s not to say that they don’t serve their purpose in the right environment, under the right conditions, with the right people, though. For example, I think the way Red Reporter utilizes comments during game-action is quite good. As long as people stay on topic. But people rarely stay on topic.
I make a point to not read the comments attached to most articles (news or sports-related) because, quite honestly, 99.9% of the comments are crap. I was reminded of this yesterday as I was reading the ESPN article on yesterday’s Cubbies/Reds game. I was shocked to see that there were over 600 (SIX HUNDRED) comments for this article alone.
“Do that many people really want to talk about Joey Votto?” I thought to myself.
Of course not.
Since it was an article about the Cubbies, Cubbie fans had to chime in - and nobody had anything to say about Jon Lieber’s performance, or what the Cubbies can do to improve their starting rotation. No, the Cubbie fans were there to talk about anything but yesterday’s game.
600+ comments of crap that had nothing to do with the game. Why were these people even here? Do they not have friends? Families? Lives?
What?! You actually want to read the comments? Go ahead. I dare you. Within seconds you’ll actually feel your brain turn to the consistency of an Oreo Cookie that fell into your glass of milk, but you forgot about it until you finished the glass of milk half an hour later and you don’t see it until it was stuck to the bottom of the glass. Forever.
It’s exactly like that.
You know what, I’ll save you the trouble. Here is my interpretation of the comments you will see attached to every single article about the Cubbies:









