Publically responding to comments

[gunhilltrain]

I don't respond to all positive comments; at least not individually. I don't want it to become repetitive, and I'm not looking for a 'Watch Me!' display. That's what the next story is meant for.

I do try to react on specific questions, or if I can add something more than just a 'Thank you'.

I usually don't get that many comments, so it's not that difficult to reply. Sometimes I don't get any at all.

The story with thirty-one was, of course, my one foray into Loving Wives.

 

[Voboy]

I get sort of a weird pleasure out of my very first comment being an anonymous "Complete and utter shit!". Especially since all other comments have been at least vaguely positive. I'm keeping it.

I don't delete that one. It's on point. It might be a valid opinion.

The ones I delete are usually take-offs ("you know what would have been better? Here! Read my turgid paragraph!") or screeds that have nothing to do with the story ("this is the shit we can expect in Trump's America!").

 

[Salacious_Scribe]

Well, I won't say it hasn't happened, but IMHO, if they're leaving really nasty comments, they've already one-bombed you. That generally gets cleared away in the sweeps anyway. It's your call, but I see no real reason to leave übernasty comments up, any more than I see reason to leave four-letter graffiti up on my fence. (Come to think of it, I suspect the same psychological motivation applies in each case.)

What has happened in the past, is a troll leaves a bad comment and gives that story a 1. The author deletes the nasty comment so Mr. Troll leaves nasty comments on all that authors stories and gives all of them 1. They even continue as new stories post.

IF it's really bad I wait a few weeks and then delete it. Only had to do that twice.

 

[UsuallyPresent]

See also this - threaded comments & eventually comment subscription incoming.

 

[MrCurrie01]

.....

 

[Voboy]

I recently had someone incur some kind of brain fit over a half-baked religious satire story. Most of his/her ranting made no sense and they directly followed up with another rabid comment. That story went from 4.58 to 4.56, but only had 460 votes. At the same time, 5 of my other stories went down .01 that were stable for over a year, some with 4k votes. It's almost like they had multiple accounts and one-bombed all my stories. Funny how they acted like the religious mockery bothered them, yet they stated they were searching for incestuous pregnancy stories.

Cool.

My pending story is about a priest-fuck. So.

What category were you in? I'm going mature; comments there, of any sort, are rare for me.

 

[Seduc2ove]

I enjoy when an author responds publically.

 

[Wilson Spalding]

Doing it in public (responding, that is)

I want to publicly respond to comments on my stories, I've seen other authors do so by creating a comment themselves on thier, I mean their own stories, but I'm reluctant to do this because it would increase the comment count on the story, and implies greater interest from readers. Is there a better way? I dont', I mean don't want to send out private spam either, even if it's only to show gratitude.

Readers that comment, and I mean any comment are like God to me.

I'm sure this has been covered, but I couldn't find it!

Don't worry about the comment count -- that only means there's life at the end of the story.

I keep about half the comments people leave. If it's an objective observation or a subjective but reasoned judgement, no problem (even if it's negative). If it's a one-shot praise, awesome... but I usually won't respond unless the author of the comment really took some time with it. That might get a public response, it might get a PM, if only to say thanks for taking the time.

There are a few times I've kept comments that aren't otherwise constructive because the commenter invalidates their toxicity with their own stupidity.

A couple more times I've gently responded to those as well, especially if they're leaning into being socially judgmental rather than just critiquing the story.

Most of the time, though... I don't respond.