Tips for Improving the Chances Your Comments Will be Approved
admin There are now over 110,000 approved comments on TheTopTens with hundreds more rolling in every day. But in truth there have probably been at least that many comments submitted over the years that do not show up in the stats because they were deleted for one reason or another.As much as we don't want to waste time deleting comments, we don't want you to spend time composing comments that won't make their way onto the site. For that reason, here is a list of tips for adding comments that will get approved.
Be Original – We don't want to read the same comment over and over, and we assume you don't want to either. There is only so many times you can read "good song", "great song", and "the best" before it gets old.
Say Enough – Speaking of "good song", "great song", and "the best", even if we didn't get dozens of these comments everyday, we'd still delete them because there is nothing to them. They aren't worth reading. We're not asking for dissertations on why you voted the way you did, but comments should at the very least be long enough to be interesting. And if you don't have much to say, feel free not to say anything. Your vote will be counted just the same.
Go Beyond the Obvious – Stating the obvious is when you go to the list of Best Xbox 360 Games, vote on an item and then for your comment you write "best Xbox 360 game". It goes without saying and is redundant. If your comment doesn't say anything your vote already implied, it probably won't be approved.
Watch Your Spelling – Everyone makes spelling mistakes, some more than others. I'm sure if we went back though our very own blog posts, there would be a few letters out of place. But when a comment is so misspelled that it becomes hard to read, then there is a problem. If spelling is an issue, we suggest switching to a browser with spell check like Firefox, Chrome or Safari.
Nix the Profanity – We've talked about our policy on profanity before, but in case you missed it here you go: we prefer to keep the content rating on this site PG. It's true that a lot of people do not get offended by profanity and we'll be the first to admit that a well placed vulgarity can be just what the doctor ordered, but that is not the opinion of everyone. Many people are offended by profanity and even if they aren't, they would just as soon not have their children inundated with it. On the other hand, we have yet to find a person who genuinely finds an absence of profanity offensive. So in order to appeal to the largest number of people possible, we'll continue with our no profanity stance.
Support Your Vote – This guideline applies to two types of comments that we frequently have to remove. The first are comments that often times start the same way, "I only voted for this so I could say..." and then something about how bad the list is or how the item they voted for is undeserving. Here's the thing about these types of comments. They aren't going to be approved so it's a waste of time adding them. Also, even though you voted just to leave a nasty comment about something, the vote still counts.
The second type of comment this applies to is the comment that, while it may be positive, doesn't explain why you voted for that particular item. For example, if you vote for Metallica's Master of Puppets in the list of best metal songs and leave a comment stating that you think Metallica is the greatest band of all time, don't be surprised if the comment does not get approved. The comment in this case is related to the item but not closely enough because it doesn't explain why you voted for that song. You could very well have voted for any other Metallica song on the list.
Use the Comment Quality Indicator – We added the comment quality indicator for one purpose, to give you an idea of how likely it is that a comment will be approved. We felt bad having to delete comment after comment that people had spent their time contributing but were not a good fit for the site so we wanted to provide a feedback mechanism so you have a better idea of the type of comments we are looking for before you even submit them.
The Comment Quality indicator takes into account a few of the items on this list to give you a score ranging from a poor quality comment to a good comment. Comments at the poor end of the spectrum probably won't be approved.