Malta Today really needs to spend some money on moderating comments before they are uploaded
Nothing is more guaranteed to drag down the perception of a newspaper’s quality and standards than a very public display of what its core readership is like and the kind of people it attracts.
Malta Today operates a system in which it does not spend money on having a dedicated moderator who sits there checking comments and deleting them as necessary before uploading them, a system in which, when you post a comment, it does not become public immediately but sits there pending moderation.
Instead, what it has is the cheaper system – because it does not require dedicated manpower – in which all comments posted become public immediately, and then it is up to other readers to ‘report abuse’, following which the staff at Malta Today will look at the comment and decide whether it should be deleted.
The system has led to some truly atrocious comments sitting there for hours or even permanently if nobody bothers to report them. Malta Today has passed the buck for checking abuse in its comments boards to its readers. Yet it remains responsible at law for libel – as for all those comments by its readers calling me a “professional whore” and “a slut” – and for vulgarity which is permissible at law (Charlie Hebdo & c & c) but most unwise for a newspaper which wants to protect its reputation from accusations that it attracts the wrong sort of readers. Here is a typical example.
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Indeed, the only place where I post an occasional comment or two is on this website, for the very reasons you mentioned above.
Times of Malta do moderate their comments but the likelihood is that any rational and coherent thought will either be deleted in favour of a comment posted by a Labour troll or, if posted, criticised by the said Labour trolls for going ‘anti-government’ (or, in recent times, anti-Spring hunting or whatever).
What is more insidiously damaging is when an insulting comment is retained in public view for a long, long time defaming a contributor and whose prompt prudent reply is delayed before being published much later when no one is still following the one-sided exchange.
The Malta Independent isn’t far behind. Comments allowed might not be vulgar, but unbelievably racist. Case in point is the story below:
http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2015-01-23/local-news/Woman-ends-up-in-danger-of-dying-after-being-misdiagnosed-twice-6736129306
That ship has sailed a long time ago.
Comments on timesofmalta only seem to be moderated up to 17:30. It would appear that the moderator knocks off after that, leaving all editing for whoever replaces him/her the following morning.
Malta Today’s system is, admittedly, cheap and cheerful but it does have something going for it.
[Daphne – Malta Today’s system is irresponsible and it is affecting the newspaper’s reputation negatively by building a profile of the typical Malta Today reader as vulgar, crude, irrational, uneducated and vicious which might well be entirely false. I didn’t think you were entirely right about the moderating times at timesofmalta, because I know they work much later than that. So I’ve just rung them to check – they do keep going much later than 5.30pm but then it depends on the workload. I know exactly what that means because there are days when I find hundreds of comments pending and knocking them back takes hours. But it is still the responsible way.]
It’s not false at all. On the contrary, it is a very accurate profile picture.
There is a continuum which starts at Vivamalta.com and ends on the Times of Malta comments board and Xarabank, with Malta Today somewhere in between.
I am not saying this with any disrespect towards Saviour Balzan but let’s be honest, his own language borders the extreme at times.
For example, when speaking about Aaron Farrugia, Balzan wrote on his blog ‘but really what the f*** does this man know about Freeport.’ or in a heading to one of his editorials ‘Yet another police f*** up.’
Naturally he’s right about some of the things he says but that kind of language is not becoming of one of the newspaper’s owners and is inexcusable.
Even worse is the venom-loaded pen he uses when he writes about people he profoundly dislikes.
All this doesn’t help his paper and it is then understandable that some dregs of society take his cue and give vent to even cruder expletives.
They cannot see how degrading it all is particularly when one can say the same thing and leave a much stronger impression without resorting to vulgarities.
Hasbu qieghed il-kazin tal-Labour.
Mhux hasbu, imma fir-realta Malta Today huwa kazin tal-Labour hamallu u virtwali.
L-editur huwa l-barman tal-kazin li jibda jidghi u jitlifha kull tant zmien.
Bhal Ray Cam hawn ohrajn li jidhlu fuq kull ahbar imxandra fil gazzetti hallil jikkumentaw b’mod vulgari u vjolenti.
Jien mhux darba jew tnejn kelli nikkumbatti ma’ Ray Cam, ghax hu veru pastas, hammallu u injorant.
Meta issegwihom ghal hafna zmien malajr tinduna li dawn gew imqabbda biex jikkumbattu kull haga li tista taghmel hsara sew lil Muscat, lil-gvern tieghu u lill-PL. Jirrepettu dejjem l-istess 4/6 sentenzi fuq kwazi kull post.
Imma l-vulgarita taghhom tpoggihom fil-livel baxx ta’ nies li ghandu l-PL mieghu.
Here are two articles which I think make interesting points about commentary, moderation and trolls in newspapers:
http://www.theguardian.com/science/brain-flapping/2014/sep/12/comment-sections-toxic-moderation
http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2013/01/04/the-guardian-reveals-an-important-truth-about-article-comments/
A writer’s skill is gauged not by his/her calling a person a c***, but by the ability in writing about that person in a way that readers will readily deduce that such person must be a c***.
Chico, the problem is some people just c*** right.
That is exactly what happens when a country is fed with the perception that anything goes as long as the great leader stays in power.
Values, not necessarily related to any religion, are the way forward for a stable society. Unfortunately for us this government has bought silence from persons that used to criticize previous governments on every issue under the sun. Malta is now reaping the wild wind.
Actually if there is a link in your comment they will put it on hold pending moderation. Then if the comment is critical of the Labour Party and the link supports the criticism they will delete the whole comment, even if the link is to one of their own articles from years ago.