The Case of the Missing Link: Leaving a link in Blogger comments
Photo courtesy of morgueFile
There was much gnashing of teeth and vows of resistance among non-Blogger garden bloggers last week. (See my post and readers’ comments.) Dismayed to find that the comment fields on our favorite Blogger blogs had been altered by the powers-that-be (Google/Blogger)—our beloved “Other” option had disappeared, and we were suddenly unable to leave a link back to our own sites—we felt shut out and ignored. To comment but not be able to leave a trail back to my own blog seemed to me the death knell of my participation in the garden-blogging community, and I took it very hard indeed.
Sure, I could still comment on Blogger blogs. But unless I got a Blogger account, I could only comment anonymously or, under the “Nickname” option, without a link back to my own site. “As regular commenters know,” I wrote, “the blogging dynamic depends on those links, so that the person whose blog you comment on, or other comment readers, can come visit your blog if they wish. Without the link, you’ve left a dead trail.”
Also feeling left out in the cold were other bloggers who host their own sites or who, like me, have their WordPress or other blogs hosted elsewhere. Some told me they’d be less likely to comment if they had to get an account with Blogger to do so. A few sympathetic Blogger bloggers told me they disliked the exclusivity of the change and worried about losing unhappy would-be commenters.
A week later, I’m happy to report that a couple of decent options do exist for those of us who want to leave a link when we comment on a Blogger blog. In their wisdom, of course, Blogger could alter the settings tomorrow to eliminate these loopholes, but I hope they’ll see the value in letting all commenters link, even those without Blogger accounts. Linking is essential to creating and maintaining a community on the Internet.
Option #1
Use HTML code to insert your link into the body of the comment. This is actually quite simple, and I keep the text handy to cut and paste it when I comment. What I can’t figure out is how to show you the code without the computer turning it into a link. Until then, I refer you to Entangled, who, I just learned, posted about this subject on December 2.
As a side note, I prefer commenting under “Nickname” and using my embedded link at the top of my comment. I never use the annoyingly sly option of “Anonymous.”
Option #2
If you give in to the dark side, as I did before discovering option #1, you can set up your own Blogger blog in about 5 minutes (it truly is easy), with the sole purpose of putting in a link to your real blog. The upside of this option is that Blogger blogs “recognize” you when you go to comment and will do all the work of putting in the link, though of course the link will be to your forwarding-address blog, as I like to think of it. I titled my forwarding-address blog Take Me to “Digging”.
The downside of this option is that the reader must click three times to get to your true blog—once more than for Blogger bloggers, but twice more than the old option of leaving a link under “Other.” A reader must first click on the link that’s automatically inserted with your comment. That takes them to a Blogger profile page with a link to your Blogger blog. When they click on that link (as they’d do for any other Blogger blogger), they get delivered to your forwarding-address blog, and from there you give them a link to your real blog. Whew. It’s not terrible, but the first option is far less work for the reader, and it doesn’t require you to get a Blogger account.
If you’d like to see the two different options in practice, and if Carol doesn’t mind the extra traffic (ha!), visit May Dreams Gardens’ December 2nd post, and scroll through the many comments until you find two by Pam/Digging. For the first comment I used Option #1 ; for the second, Option #2.
It can be hard to change a familiar routine, but at least we non-Bloggers and self-hosters can rejoin the conversation. Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming—gardens and plants!
P.S. My thanks to Ki at Mucknmire and Carol at May Dreams Gardens for digging for information at Google/Blogger and to MSS at Zanthan Gardens and Bill at Prairie Point for thinking outside the box on how to leave a link and trialing those methods. Thanks also to anyone who took the trouble to—and could figure out how to—complain to Blogger about the unfriendly change.
Another tip for surfing out from Blogger comments is to first click on the blog post title or permalink to have the post + comments open in one browser window, not the pop-up comments window. Then when you click the commenter’s link you can go to the blogger’s page.
I like putting links in the comments. I think it’s irritating that some blogs prohibit HMTL in the comments (cough GARDENRANT cough).
That’s a good tip, Chuck. You’re right—when you’re in those little comment pop-ups, you can’t very well read any links you click on.
As for Garden Rant, at least they don’t have the restrictive comment field that Blogger has enacted. —Pam
Pam… I don’t think you need the blogger blog to display your url. Go to the dashboard for blogger, click on Edit My Profile, scroll down and there will be a place to put in the url for your website (digging). Do that and then when someone looks at your profile, they will see your website address there and can click on it. Then you could actually delete the “faux blog” you created and it would take just two clicks to find you.
Carol, May Dreams Gardens
Carol, I’d love it if that would work, but so far as I can tell, Blogger will only display its own blogs, not those hosted elsewhere. I did what you suggested, but I couldn’t get an option for linking more directly to Digging. Maybe there’s a step I’m not getting? —Pam
Pam: There is a way to get your URL on your Blogger profile, but it wasn’t very intuitive, and now that I’ve done it I can’t retrace my steps. Essentially you want to get to Edit My Profile. There should be a longish list of things to fill out, one of which is Homepage URL – that’s where you put your Digging address. However, once you do that, your Blogger profile will have a link that only says My Web Page – I haven’t found a way to edit that.
What’s also annoying is that I already had a Google account with my work e-mail address, but I needed to create another one with my home e-mail address specifically for commenting on blogs.
I find this move by Blogger to be extremely frustrating – I liked the idea that you could click someone’s name and go to their website, regardless of what service they’re on. Google is starting to take on some of the nastier characteristics of Microsoft – not a good thing.
Enough ranting – everyone should be on Typepad or WordPress, anyway. 🙂
Oh, feel free to rant with me, Tracy. I’ll go back and see if I can change my homepage URL as you suggested. Thanks for the info. —Pam
I have also come across a few Blogger blogs – not garden-related – that do not allow anonymous comments – apparently that includes nicknames too. So that eliminates Option 1 altogether and you must have a Blogger/Google ID to comment.
Another thing you can do with Option 1 is to add the attribute target=_blank to the code at the end of your URL. This will make your site open in a separate window or separate tab, depending on how the reader has his browser set up.
For those who wish to get off Blogger, WordPress has a completely free hosted version at http://www.wordpress.com that you can convert to. No software installation is required. I have to agree with Tracy – I still like some aspects of Google but this is really annoying.
Great info, Bill. I’ve run across a few Blogger blogs too that don’t allow anyone but other Blogger folks to comment. If I’m feeling persistent, I’ll ask Annie in Austin to comment for me and let them know they’ve selected an exclusive setting. (She’s very kind about indulging me.) In every case, the blogger didn’t realize that he or she was eliminating potential commenters and fixed the setting immediately. —Pam
I created a blog at http://prairiepoint.wordpress.com and it was really easy. It does have some limitations though. For instance uploads of pix are limited to a total of 50 mb in the free version.
Good info about WordPress, Bill. —Pam
I am a “Blogger” blogger, but I irked that they have done this. I frequently use those comment links to find new garden blogs. I wish they would not restrict access like this. I think it is counterproductive & will ultimately do Blogger more harm than good. I wonder whose bright idea it was…
So do I, MMD. So do I. Thanks for the support. —Pam
I’ve complained to Blogger about this. Why they had to change something that was working fine is baffling. I think I might switch over to WordPress – just because it seems much easier to use.
If you do, I hope you’ll post about the ease or difficulty of the changeover for you, as well as the pros and cons. I think a lot of people are intimidated about leaving Blogger, which is so easy to use. But you feel that WordPress is easier? I’ve certainly found it easy to customize and to use, and I’m not a techie at all. However, I did have a techie’s assistance in setting it up. —Pam
I noticed this too, and I really hate it. I do think it is a ploy by Google in their neverending quest for world domination. Anyway, there’s a 3rd, even more sneaky option that I have been using. I succumbed and got a Blogger account, since many people automatically delete links from posts, and then I setup a blog on my Blogger account called “Cottage Magpie”, and then I told blogger that I wanted to post to a remote location (http://cottagemagpie.com/). Then I never publish that blog. Ever! So now my blogger link posts to where I want it to go. Of course, now they’re going to figure that out and nix it somehow, I’m sure! But for now, anyway, it at least gets you to 2 links instead of one.
~Angela 🙂
Where did you find the remote-location option? That sounds ideal—until Blogger changes it. —Pam
This is what the Blogger peeps say:
Blogger has removed the URL field for unauthenticated comments. Instead, we’re rolling out support for OpenID, a technology for “signing” your comments with your own URL. OpenID lets you comment with the URL you want, while preventing others from impersonating you.
I think this is to appear soon.
Thanks, Elizabeth. Carol at May Dreams told me about this too. It sounds like a decent alternative. Dare I say I’m holding my breath until it appears? —Pam
Here’s some information on the openID standard:
http://wiki.openid.net/OpenIDServers
Apparently Typekey/Typepad is already an openID service, and WordPress has it too. I don’t know about WordPress, but Typekey is capable of preventing you from commenting on Typepad blogs if you are not authenticated by logging in. I have that turned off at my blog in favor of the “type in the letters you see” etc. I think you are going to see more of the ‘you must be logged in to comment’ rather than less with the openID standard.
I use Google all the time as a search engine, but I can’t help but think Google wants to use universal IDs as a way to stuff your e-mail inbox with spam. When you register for a Google ID they really, really, really want you to accept a gmail account as well.
Plus, the way they have handled Blogger “features” so far has almost always stepped on the basic user’s toes without apology and without providing a way to send them the sort of user feedback that is considered absolutely necessary in software development. To register a complaint you have to get on the forum and to get on the forum you have to have a gmail account, etc. etc. Fuggedaboudit.
Blogger is the AOL of blogware.
Yes, it is so hard to register a complaint if you’re not an account holder that I gave up. In fact, it makes me tired just to think about it.
Anyway, thanks for your comment and the commiseration. —Pam
Oh, I feel so bad as a blogger person. Glad to see in Elizabeth’s comments that there seems to be a fix on the way although who knows when. Can’t all the blog applications just get along???
No need to feel bad about using Blogger, Bonnie. I’ve recommended it to people who are thinking about starting a blog. But I do think its developers need to be more sensitive about blocking out bloggers from other host sites. We were all getting along so well before this happened. —Pam
To answer your question, Pam, about how I found my remote location option.
Create a blog, then under the blog settings, choose “Publishing” — You need to tell it you will be publishing via FTP. Then you will have to put in the FTP server, user and password for your website–I believe you have to put in real information because it tests the connection. Then you can put your normal URL in the “BlogURL” field. Then, DON’T PUBLISH THAT BLOG! Or you’ll overwrite your existing blog. But even though you haven’t published it, your blog will now show up on your profile, and the link will point to the URL you entered. It’s a good temporary (if slightly under-the-radar) fix until their ID plan is implemented.
~Angela 🙂
In answer to Chuck’s complaint about HTML not being allowed on GardenRant comments, here’s our choice. Either we allow HTML OR have all URLs in comments converted to active links. Not being an HTML wizard myself, I assume that that second option enables more active links than the first.
Susan, my only suggestion would be that you tell people they can leave active links by typing in their URLs. I didn’t know that when I tried just now to leave an HTML link in my comment over at Garden Rant. My comment didn’t go through, and a message only told me that HTML comments were not allowed, and to fix the problem. What it didn’t tell me was that a typed URL would be converted into an active link.
On a whim, I did type the URL, thinking that maybe someone would bother to cut-and-paste it to see the link. I was pleasantly surprised when the URL became an active link automatically. If your comment field message could be rephrased to let people know, it might encourage them to type in those URLs. —Pam