A certain blogger and I have been having another spat. I know. I know. But she started it, really mother.
Take a look at the comments:
Now, comments one and three are from me. They’re written in my usual ‘style’ – punctuation and all (whether it’s right or not). When I ask a question, in comment one, there’s a question mark.
Comments two and four are written by someone else.
Comment five is not written by me, even though if you click my name it goes through to my blogger profile. It’s written by the author of this blog. I did submit a third comment, but it is not the comment that has appeared (having quickly grown tired of talking to two different sock-puppets, my somewhat provocative comment was “Have you considered seeing a doctor? Seriously”).
Can blogspot blog owners forge / edit comments without the system saying so?
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22 Comments
Clearly if a Blog allows anonymous commenting, then comments may be forged. It’s one reason why I’m really against all anonymous commenting.
Yeah but surely you can’t forge the posters name with the link to their profile in?
Yes you can. With Blogger, if you select “other” as an identity, then you may enter a name and URL. That URL could be a Blogger profile.
Yes. I’ve used that to reinstate comments I’ve accidentally deleted.
That. Sucks.
You can probably tell if the page displays the bloggers picture- it won’t be there for faked entries.
You can indeed fake comments in such a manner – as explained here by professional political nuisance Tim Ireland. In fact, you don’t even need to own the blog you’re doing it on.
There aren’t many political bloggers out there that would stoop to the level of using that particular loophole – but nonetheless it’s extremely lax of Google to leave it open despite it being reported to them repeatedly.
I wouldn’t go so far (a la Tim) to suggest that anonymous commenting should be banned – but people like your good self who have been victims of these sort of shenanigans should at least have the right to protect their profiles!
You can do it with WordPress too, of course.
… and Haloscan is real easy. However I use that to modify links from people who can’t post properly.
If it’s a fake ala Tim Ireland, you could for a short while change your blogger display name (http://www.blogger.com/edit-profile.g) to see if the changes follows all of the comments!
This is very mature… I thought this site was used to promote discussions on Lib Dem policy/ performance in elections etc etc not to slaunder other users.
Hear hear! Bloody rubbish – move on! And that was me that time… question answered, thanks folks.
Mayb the whole article should be removed?
It’s all to easy. I’ve used it to move posts so that I can insert replies in the right order, but it is widely open to abuse.
As you can tell!
Technically, of course, one still has to leave a genuine mail address, so you can tell who I am by checking that (not that I’m hiding my identity, as you’ll see if you click my – er, your – name.
Presumably, therefore, the owner of the site can find out who submitted that post. And technically, they may be defaming your character or stealing your identity or some such. One for the lawyers, perhaps?
And, to sum up, with the old blogger, yes, you could even edit the text of comments made by other registered users; it required hacing a url, but it was doable. I used to do it to fix URLs and remove some of the more choice language.
No idea if you can on Blogger2 though, as I care not. When I reboot VTX, it’ll be OpenID/Registered only for comments, for the reasons above.
What is more bizarre if she HAS been chucked out of the Lib Dems is why she turns up at all the Lib Dem events in Camden. Are they not bothered that someone has breached party rules and has been forced to leave as a consequence is so readily accepted by Flick Rea and Keith Moffitt.
She’s clearly a mad homophobe, which is ironic considering that most of Camden’s party is gay. So why do they accept her with open arms? Perhaps someone will care to explain.
There are many patient and forgiving people in the Lib Dems – I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing!
But even so Rob – is it not like accepting the favour of company you should not like to keep? We’d all be in complete horror if someone was being openly racist and yet was allowed to get involved in a local party – despite being expelled nationally.
This seems to be the type of behaviour that Labour and the Tories throw at us – that we say one thing and then do the other. It is very odd behaviour in my view.
Rob, go along with what you say at comment 12 and close comments here. The debate has moved on too far from the original question.
It is extremely disappointing that you are closing down the debate on this Duncan. It is shameful that this person is still allowed to be a member by Camden.
You are all legtimising homophobia.
The article was asking if about what blogspot.com editors can do to comments. The thread is now far different to that. I know nothing of what this person’s involvement in Camden is (though I have been in Camden quite a bit recently, and haven’t seen her at anything). I just think that using this forum to pick over this issue again (it has been pretty much done to death) doesn’t do anybody any good.
And of course I have no power to “close down debate” – it was just a suggestion.
Dear All,
Just to make it clear. Susanne is not a member of the Party. Full stop. Anywhere.
However, she wishes to remain engaged and helps out in Camden. If the Local Party are happy to accept her assistance, they are free to do so.
I would say, however, that this appears to be becoming an ongoing emnity. If one or other stopped reacting to the other’s provocation, perhaps this would come to a natural end?