May 10, 2012
The difficulties of Disqus 2012
I pulled the trigger on Monday, bringing Disqus 2012 online for the Kamloops Daily News comments. But two days later I had to pull the plug.
There was nothing wrong with the new features — at least, not from my point of view as a moderator. There were some grumblings from readers, but they likely would have adjusted after awhile.
No, the main problem was that it simply didn’t work in many cases. Some people told me comments weren’t showing up at all. Others would click the Post button and nothing would happen. Or maybe something was happening but it was so slow, they gave up. Then there were those who complained about login problems that I couldn’t understand, let alone solve.
A big drawback with this beta is that it depends largely on feedback from users. But if they can’t make the system work in the first place, they won’t be able to say what’s wrong.
I thought the problems might depend on which web browser was being used. When I asked readers about this possibility, I received a jumble of answers that casts that theory in doubt.
So we’re out of the beta. We’ll wait to see what happens over the next couple of months, and maybe give it another try.