What's in a pseudonym?
We keep talking about high quality comments, and hope to get more of them on our own blogs. But do you know who leaves most of the better or top quality comments? Well, the recently released data by Disqus (a world popular commenting platform) might take you by surprise.
To gain an insight into the phenomenon of quality commenting, Disqus evaluated as many as 500,000 comments that were posted via their commenting platform. And the analysis brought out an interesting fact – that web users with fictitious or pseudonyms leave better blog comments.
People using pseudonyms don’t only leave comments of high quality, but they are also responsible for posting the maximum number of comments to blogs. According to the study conducted by Disqus, around 61% of users that use its commenting platform prefer using pseudonyms. The data also shows that only 35% of total Disqus users comment anonymously. The number of people using Facebook to comment (after logging in) is the smallest (only 4%).
Wait, What’s a Pseudonym?
A pseudonym is any imaginary (or fictitious) name that comments prefer to choose. The best part of the choosing pseudonyms is that they offer users a choice of identity, and an opportunity to express themselves in a better way, without enduring any loss to their personality.
The data shared by Disqus further reveals that the average commenter who uses a pseudonym post comments 6.5 times more, as compared to anonymous blog commenters. On the other hand, commenters with pseudonym comment 4.7 times more as compared to those that use Facebook login to respond. What’s more, maximum number of likes and replies also come from users with pseudonyms.
Most of the people have a general conception that commenters using their real names respond in a better way. However, this Disqus report suggests otherwise. Well, we can definitely expect to have more discussion on this issue.
The findings of this report put a big question mark on the increasing popularity of Facebook’s Comments Box. Currently, over 400,000 website publishers patronize the use of this commenting box. However, there’s a very small section of commenters who would really like to respond with their real identity.
Key Takeaway for Publishers
How does this report on blog commenting help publishers? What we can figure out from this data is that publishers should permit their audience to comment in a way the latter feel comfortable with. If you let the audience choose an option they most prefer, you can definitely expect to get more comments, replies and likes.
