If I ever give up blogging for good, it will be because of comments like this:
I just don’t get it. What a lame blog topic that should have been left on the cutting room floor. There is no science here. Evidently cited just to provide an opportunity to express a personal belief. Why not blog on the news of the day..the successfully trapping the first “anti-atom” and its potential implications? This is real news, real science and in keeping with your expertise. You could teach me something. Instead you give me this?
Obviously the sensible reaction is to laugh and move on, but few of us achieve that level of Zen detachment in dealing with the world. Many of the comments at CV are great, and I’ve certainly learned a lot from the interactions here, but quite a high percentage are of this form. When you put a lot of work into the blog and care about how it turns out, this kind of stuff wears you down. Why are people like this? I understand that not every post will interest every person; is it really more satisfying to take time to lash out in the comment section (when you have never left a constructive comment yet), rather than just skipping to something else on the vast and endlessly amusing internet?
[/grumpy]
Everybody loves you…are you feeling better? Good…now get back to writing
🙂
Oh no, don’t feel grumpy! I will show my appreciation by clicking on the blinky Donors Choose button. That should lift your spirits about blogging!
Pah, I was expecting a snappy repartee in response to Jack’s post, and you give me this? This is real life, real news, and this post is lame.
I wouldn’t waste my time in this blog anymore.
I think there’s something in the air. I’ve had more than the usual problems with commenters at several sites lately, but today took the cake!
This is the best blog on Earth,
so all of you trolls better go to Hell!
[/singing]
Seriously, one of the things one learns from the web is that there are people whose only amusement is to annoy other people. DNFT!!
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/What_is_a_troll%3F
I often read through the comments first to see if I want to read the post ? Perhaps the very interesting commenters you attract are one of the reason the blog is so popular – It is good fun and nice to be able to say what you really think, *grumpy* can be vy satisfying when you dont get the content you want.
I thought at first it was just someone attempting to get under your skin enough to get you to reduce your blogging and interacting with commenters, or alternatively someone trying to annoy your readers into avoiding the comments like one would avoid comments on youtube. I presumed the someone in question would be motivated by religion or by personal investment in some extremely cranky non-standard cosmology, TOE, gravity that makes the PPNF explode, or whatnot.
We love you Sean.
Sean, you just can’t be like Waters, Gabriel, Ozzy – the whole is bigger than you and you have to carry on. Common!
So a blog post provides “an opportunity to express a personal belief”.
Well I never…
My first reaction to that comment is that it was a cleverly ironic parody of a stereotypical internet troll with no social skills or empathy for other people.
On second thoughts, though, you can probably delete the “a cleverly ironic parody of” part of that sentence.
ps. “Grumpy Kvetching” sounds like a bizarre sexual practice involving one of the Seven Dwarfs.
Yes, that outburst is surprising. I happen to think the article you referenced is seriously interesting.
But then bad manners and irritability are a cheap and easy response that people can throw out without any thought. But my main criticism is the complete absence of any curiosity that he shows in the subject.
He claims there is no science. But at the heart of science lies curiosity, a burning need to know and understand. If the science mattered to him I would expect him to exhibit it with an exploratory curiosity.
As it happens, the subject of curiosity is particularly apposite in this case. The moment autonomously moving colloidal objects are able to show curiosity, i.e. discriminate between conditions in its environment so that it can make choices, then we have life.
So dare I suggest that our incurious commenter shows an absence of life?
Anyone who puts something out for worldly consumption, be they scientists, artists, writers, teachers, athletes, etc., should expect a spectrum of responses, from adoring cheerleaders to those intent on tearing the ideas down. One should always expect outliers and consider the possibility that the tone of their replies really have nothing to do with you.
If the author of the reply in question was so interested in discussing CERN’s trapping of anti-matter, then he was free to look for another blog or start their own. Dumping on you tells us more about that person than it does about you. Don’t let the content of other people’s character affect who you are and what you do.
If you ever do give up blogging, I’ll miss your grumpy kvetching.
No! No! Pay no attention to comments like these!
Trust me, many of your most devoted readers don’t comment because … well … we have our own jobs to do and not much time to spare. But I for one love and value this blog. It’s a cherished part of my daily morning routine. It reminds me that science matters on those days when writing science fiction seems like a totally ridiculous way to earn a living and I start thinking about getting into some useful line of work … like, say, garbage collection.
I would be miserable if you stopped. And so, I’m sure, would many other silently faithful readers who rarely or never post comments. Keep up the good work, and don’t worry about the occasional flak!
Your devoted fan,
Chris Moriarty
Seth Godin, blogger and marketing expert, recently wrote (http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2010/11/alienating-the-2.html) about the 2% of people who will be unhappy enough to tell you about it, no matter what you do. Take heart, and know that these few malcontents are in the vast minority. Take the mostly positive tone of the comments here as an example of the fact that most of your readers are satisfied.
If you need additional comfort, get into contact with the person doing analytics for your blog (if it’s not you). They can give you all sorts of information about the consumption of the information you provide. I wouldn’t be surprised if the rate of commenting is something like 0.001% of all blog viewers. Add to that the idea that you are much more likely to hear from the dissatisfied, and it might be a little easier to laugh off the few discouraging comments.
“If I ever give up blogging for good, it will be because of comments like this:…”
Please, not!.
We need you and people like you!.
I´m one of the ” many other silently faithful readers who rarely or never post comments” (Chris Moriarty).
From Spain, thanks Sean.
“people suck in general”
Those who find this to be true are probably happy. How did this get to be a put-down instead of the highest praise? I also always thought that “fuck you” sounds more like a blessing than a curse. 🙂
“people suck in general”
This is sadly not true. If it were, the world would be a much more satisfying place.
Note that I wrote “Those who find this to be true”. YMMV.
Dear Sean,
I loved your book, I love your blog, and people are fuckheads on the internet. Please keep doing what you do.
cheers,
Fraser.
Haters hate.
Well, Jack did apologize in post #5, in which he then went on to say, “I enjoy your posts and I enjoyed your book too. Please keep writing both. Best wishes.“
People have a bizarre sense of entitlement on the internet. Maybe they also have it in person, but I don’t think so, at least not as much – it seems like something about the actual physical social exchange triggers chemical adjustments of some sort that say “I’m just another guy and fitting in here matters, being liked matters”, and maybe that exchange doesn’t take place when there’s not a voice or a face, I don’t know… There has to be some explanation for why so much internet commentary belongs in a urinal. People just aren’t like this in person. (And sure, anonymity is part of it a lot of the time, but this guy seems to like your site! It’s not like he’s hiding behind some mask in order to attack you. I buy that he doesn’t at all realize what a self-absorbed dickbag he sounds like, and I bet he wouldn’t do it in person in some analogous scenario.)
Something is happening to derail the thought process that would make people realize that this is just an outlet for a person/a few people, and they happen to do/think interesting stuff so it has some popularity, but it’s still just some folks sharing some thoughts for their own purposes, take it or leave it. Anybody who starts a sermon about “expectations” deserves to spend some quality time with a hot bowl of dicks.
I mean, “You’re better than this”? Thanks, Dad! Seriously though, isn’t that something a father says to a son who has just called for bail money after getting caught carving up hookers at a rest area on the interstate? Don’t *we* owe *you*? People need to get the hell out of here with “expectations” and “you’re better than this” and similar condescending horseshit.
I love the blog, and if you decide to post occasional interpretive nude elderly chocolate syrup body art, rock on. Don’t waste any time worrying about the bizarre internet douchebag commentariat.
I agree with Brian, Jack took it back, come on folks, lighten up.
You know Dr.Sean,
Why do I like your blog?
Apart of the good scientific and educational content, I feel that you respect your colleagues, you don’t talk about them badly or aggressively when they differ with you, you are one of the most considerate science bloggers I read to them.
If you want to live in our virtual world(internet), don’t be sensetive.