Rework how the new comments system is to be implemented

[Insignis]

I love MD. I am so used to daily checking my manga feed. Click on comments - no comments nothing happens, comments are there it opens the forum thread. Click on chapter to open it. All in new tabs. Then I read comments, read chapter comments were about. Read chapter and potentially post a comment if there were no comments yet. Or just read comments if its about chapter I already read, just from different group.

Now opening comments opens that damn chapter with some special side tab, showing me last comment or telling me to pay to read/comment/something before others. It automatically marks that chapter as read, so if I just want to read comments, I need to go to the chapter, click the link to the forum in the new panel, close said panel, click on the manga title to go to its main page, and uncheck the "seen" mark, to keep stuff clean like it was before.

Not to be rude, but who ever designed this change has no clue what clean UI/UX is or they were forced by someone to make the site worse, to make fake "viewed/seen" marks appear on as many chapters and their versions as possible, and/or make people dislike commenting to close the forums? Cause like this is just bad.

 

[Lunkli]

I'd like to start with our motivation. Basically, we want to put the engagement adjacent to the content, just like every other platform does. Right now, even though it has been the case for years, it's not so straightforward to comment. You need to be redirected to another site (forums), and log in again if you haven't already (and if it's your first time on the forums, agree to the specific forum rules).

I think that this is the point that most people are taking issue with. You say that commenting is confusing, but the majority of users do not share this sentiment. None of us have ever seen any complaints about the forums being confusing. Maybe you have, by virtue of being the moderators of the site, but have you considered the possibility that that might just be a minority that you are overly exposed to due to your position?

From an actual user's perspective, it is "straightforward to comment." Even beyond that, many users like the current system. Rather than just being not confusing, the forums are actually less confusing, as a whole, than what you are trying to replace them with. So, ultimately, rather than solving a problem, to a lot of users, myself included, it feels more like you are creating a problem.

Sure, maybe "every other platform" uses a directly integrated comment system, but the idea that something being popular makes it true is a logical fallacy. Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, &c. all using integrated comments does not mean that they are the superior form of online discussion.

And I understand that a lot of people aren't giving very good arguments for why they think that the new system is bad, and that there's a lot of misinformation going around with people not realizing that the supporters-only period is temporary. But that doesn't mean that their conclusions are incorrect. Actually, the idea that they are is another logical fallacy.

All that is to say, I really think that you need to take your community more seriously.

If you claim that you're doing this for us, you should listen when we say that we don't like it. Really, it doesn't matter why else you're doing this. If you're making this change because you think it'll be better for the users, then you should listen when the users tell you that it is worse for them. The rest of your reasoning does not matter if the very basis of it is flawed.

If you have a trail of reasoning like "John is homeless" -> "I should build him a house" -> "Bricks are sturdy" -> "Therefore, I'll build a house out of bricks," but it turns out that John isn't homeless, then it doesn't matter if bricks are sturdy; you have no reason to build that house! If John tells you that he doesn't need a house, saying "bricks are sturdy" is not an argument against that. Similarly "two systems cannot coexist with the same weight" is not an argument against "forums are not confusing."

And if you're not doing this for the users, and you have some other reason to be making this change, then just say so, because right now you are wasting the good will of your community. I've seen translators include in their credits pages calls to action against you, telling their readers not to give any sort of financial support, specifically because of this change and how you are handling it.

So to sum this all up: Take your community seriously. Don't treat us like children that don't know what we want or what we're talking about when we say that we don't like the change that you've explicitly stated you've made for us.

 

[HaikenEdge]

And if you're not doing this for the users, and you have some other reason to be making this change, then just say so, because right now you are wasting the good will of your community. I've seen translators include in their credits pages calls to action against you, telling their readers not to give any sort of financial support, specifically because of this change and how you are handling it.

I can't wait until they make the new system open to everybody, people still not use it over the forums, and then they have to justify why they're keeping it over the forums. I wonder what logical hoops they'll jump through when that happens.

Because we all know this is happening. Because "engagement" is a metric corps can sell to advertisers. Why do you think "non-intrusive" ads happened before integrated comments even though users asked for integrated comments and not ads?

This ain't for us; MD already sold us out. This is to their corporate overlords, who are trying to squeeze as much money out of this operation as possible before it gets shut down for being a fucking criminal conspiracy to commit piracy and all the contracts are rendered unenforceable because you can't legally enforce a contract on something illegal.

 

[JVick]

Because we all know this is happening. Because "engagement" is a metric corps can sell to advertisers

If this was the case, wouldn't it be more profitable to keep the forum ? The way the new comments are implemented right now doesn't output another visit on any page & the click doesn't translate to any event where an advertisement is being displayed. You could maybe sell it as 'more time per exposed page' but that's a bit weak.

 

[Foostini]

I was about to be mad when the I clicked on the comments button only to be blindsided by...

"Only supporters can comment. Become a supporter to gain early access, too!"

I thought that us peasants are not allowed to comment anymore.

Turns out they're not. They just invented classism and gives priority to the rich. We can still comment. Just in the forums.

But, I do agree that the chapter also being opened when the comment button was opened is a terrible design.

Honestly i kinda regret making an account here, i just wanted to comment on a manga and after jumping through all the hoops not only can i still not comment but now i have a big ever present "BECOME A SUPPORTER" button on every page. This actively discourages me from doing that, actually, good job.

 

[BestBoy]

the majority of users do not share this sentiment

The majority of users have not shared a sentiment, because 92% of uses do not post in the forums. Which seems like a major motivation for the new comments. To make it so that 92% begin making comments.

 

[brainvomitboi]

My dearest admins,

If you really need something to work on to make yourselves look busy, the chapter reader count is still broken ("👁 N/A"). That'd be a much more innocuous project to work on rather than actively making the site more annoying to use.

Sincerely yours, Chathaniel.

 

[BobBiscuit]

If this was the case, wouldn't it be more profitable to keep the forum ? The way the new comments are implemented right now doesn't output another visit on any page & the click doesn't translate to any event where an advertisement is being displayed. You could maybe sell it as 'more time per exposed page' but that's a bit weak.

With the new system, since the comments and such are in the sidebar (which is always loaded/reloaded on each individual manga page), and each manga page is considered its own separate webpage in browsing history, cookies, and other metrics they'd be able to show to advertisers, putting ads into the new system would likely be the more profitable option, regardless. Additionally, I'm guessing that with the new system, they can shove ads in whenever the suits give the command, and that with said system being developed by them, they won't have to deal with XenForo to get it done -whether that be convincing XenForo to let them enable ads in the first place, work with them to develop the code for said ads as well as bug testing and fixing, or deal with any additional fees or profit-sharing, licensing contract renegotiations, and so on.

 

[Giguv]

The majority of users have not shared a sentiment, because 92% of uses do not post in the forums. Which seems like a major motivation for the new comments. To make it so that 92% begin making comments.

I feel like that is a pretty sensible ratio of people just reading to people actively commenting, is it not? Seems more or less in-line with how the views-to-comments ratio usually plays out on other platforms, including the platforms which use integrated comments style similar to what has been introduced.

 

[Tybold]

Buries forum access under much more visible comment section access
Inevitably: "Forum usage has dwindled since the implementation of the comments feature, so we're gonna sunset the forums. Please look forward to it. We will not be taking questions at this time."

 

[shinya78]

I feel like that is a pretty sensible ratio of people just reading to people actively commenting, is it not? Seems more or less in-line with how the views-to-comments ratio usually plays out on other platforms, including the platforms which use integrated comments style similar to what has been introduced.

Like I mentioned earlier, people that would comment, will comment regardless of method. The massive majority are here to read, and only read. Let's take a certain video from a certain platform as an example, to be specific their most viewed video that has comments enabled. It's currently sitting at over 9 billion views, surely a piece of media of that magnitude also has an incredible amount of people having discussions about it, right? Prepare for some quick maths.

That video, as of the moment of writing this, has 4,366,980 comments and 9,020,639,315 views. Looks impressive at a glance, doesn't it?

But that's 1 comment per 2066 views (rounded up), that amounts to a staggering 0.05%!

 

[BestBoy]

much more innocuous project

You'd think, but chapter read numbers just start fights between scanlation groups because of stupid internet clout and ego. They really should not bring them back.

 

[Lunkli]

The majority of users have not shared a sentiment, because 92% of uses do not post in the forums. Which seems like a major motivation for the new comments. To make it so that 92% begin making comments.

Your argument is based on the premise that 100% of readers want to comment, but like others have said, most don't have any interest in commenting at all. Changing the system is not going to make the majority of these people start actively participating in discussion on a regular basis, regardless of whether it becomes easier to use or not.

And even if the forums were "too confusing," anyone who actually wanted to comment would figure it out eventually, because there's literally zero chance that they're so confusing that someone would give up. So once they had figured it out, we would see them complaining. (The way people complain about Reddit comments, for example.) But those complaints do not exist to any notable extent.

So you shouldn't conflate "doesn't use the forums" with "thinks the forums are too confusing to use."

 

[psydynamite]

i for one love that they added an extra new comment section that holds 0 comments for every chapter that makes me have to do two clicks to get to the real comments what a good change!

 

[BestBoy]

argument

Easy there, it's not an argument in favor of or against. It's a possible explanation of the reasoning. It's also a reminder that you can't argue on behalf of the majority, when you're in fact a member of the minority. Your original comment doesn't qualify that you're only referring to the majority of forum users.

 

[Lunkli]

Easy there, it's not an argument in favor of or against. It's a possible explanation of the reasoning.

Even if the term has largely taken on a negative connotation in casual speech, a declarative statement on something (especially in opposition to another declarative statement on the same thing / something else) which is used to support a position is still an argument.

It's also a reminder that you can't argue on behalf of the majority, when you're in fact a member of the minority. Your original comment doesn't qualify that you're only referring to the majority of forum users.

This seems like unnecessary nitpicking, honestly. Like, when we're talking about the forum, why the hell would anyone assume I was talking about the opinions of people that don't use the forum? They're irrelevant to the situation, and you know that. And even then, the comment which you are responding to was literally about explaining why those people are irrelevant to the matter, and that was after multiple other people gave the same explanation, so it clearly wasn't difficult to tell why I was disregarding them.

Out of the people that care to participate in discussions on the site, the majority does not find the forums confusing. If you're going to bring people that only care about reading into this, you might as well bring in people that don't use the site at all. Or people that don't use the internet at all. This isn't even a slippery slope; these people are all equally relevant to this discussion.

When we're talking about discussion on this site, it is only reasonable to limit the discussion to only people that use the discussion systems on this site and care about discussion on this site.

So, I'm going to be honest. Your comment here seems extremely disingenuous. Your previous comment did do, but I was willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, then. I find it hard to justify doing that now.

If you have an opinion on this, then state that rather than trying to make up half-assed reasons for other people's arguments to be invalid. (And don't think I didn't notice that you're only taking issue with the premise of my argument, "most people like the forums," and are ignoring literally everything else, including the reasoning I've given for that argument.)

 

[BestBoy]

casual speech

Well, forum posting is casual speech in my book, and I don't really view providing a data point or hypotheticals as engaging in an argument.

forum

Maybe I misunderstood you. When I read the dev's response, to me he's referring to everyone that uses the site, not just forum users. I don't really see anything in your response that explains why the silent majority would be irrelevant, especially if the purpose of the new comment section is to remove the barrier of entry to engagement for those specific users (making a new account in a new tab on a separate website). There will be users who want to engage, but decide not to because of that. "People who want to engage, will engage" is not a nuanced enough point of view for real world circumstances. It's far too black and white.

Also, you are overanalyzing my replies looking for malice. And since you asked, I prefer the forums to the new comment section.

 

[Mangamoz]

We're still doing this? No one's even using the new comments anyway, not even those who can use it. Kinda don't feel they are worth all this drama.

 

[shinya78]

We're still doing this? No one's even using the new comments anyway, not even those who can use it. Kinda don't feel they are worth all this drama.

The suggestions are fine, it's calling for how the new stuff could be improved or how we can get a good compromise.

People still "arguing" about it? I say let it be, I even got into a small one that could be simplified as two guys shouting "just because you're right, doesn't mean you're correct" at each other in my other thread. At least the complaints about "paywalled comments" have died down to some degree when the fix to create forum thread came.

 

[Mangamoz]

The suggestions are fine, it's calling for how the new stuff could be improved or how we can get a good compromise.

People still "arguing" about it? I say let it be, I even got into a small one that could be simplified as two guys shouting "just because you're right, doesn't mean you're correct" at each other in my other thread. At least the complaints about "paywalled comments" have died down to some degree when the fix to create forum thread came.

Hopefully when they open comments to normies, they actually use them. Cause damn would I feel bad for the dev team. All that work, bugs, and backlash.

Just for everyone to step over it as if it was a turd on the sidewalk. (Disclaimer, I step over the new comments too...).

INB4 the monkey's paw curls, and when they do allow normies to use them, the mods will be swamped with sales bots trying to exploit the new comments. Oh, and can't forget the edgelord kiddies trying to write slurs indirectly.

 

[shinya78]

Hopefully when they open comments to normies, they actually use them. Cause damn would I feel bad for the dev team. All that work, bugs, and backlash.

Just for everyone to step over it as if it was a turd on the sidewalk. (Disclaimer, I step over the new comments too...).

INB4 the monkey's paw curls, and when they do allow normies to use them, the mods will be swamped with sales bots trying to exploit the new comments. Oh, and can't forget the edgelord kiddies trying to write slurs indirectly.

Hopefully, more stuff in the suggestions would stick for those willing to use the new system.

I don't see myself using it on the regular myself, last time that happened was V3.

Oh gawd no.