Posted on January 18, 2012

People Using Pseudonyms Leave Better Blog Comments

Dave Copeland, Read Write Web, January 16, 2012

People who use pseudonyms — as opposed to remaining anonymous or using their real identity — are more likely to leave high-quality comments on blogs and other Web sites, according to data released by Disqus.

In addition to leaving more comments, people using pseudonyms are more likely to leave comments that get “likes” from other readers, according to Disqus, which operates blog commenting platforms for about one million Web sites, including ReadWriteWeb.

Not only does the data throw the conventional web wisdom that people who use their real names leave better comment into question, it also gives Disqus and other comment platforms leverage to compete with Facebook, which has made inroads into the commenting space by allowing sites to let people leaving comments use their Facebook identities.

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Of course Disqus has a vested interest in convincing publishers to allow anonymous comments and remarks left under a pseudonym.

But the company is maintaining that, based on its review of 500,000 comments left using its system, 61% of the comments left by those types of users gained positive reviews from other readers, as opposed to 51% for comments left by people using their identity and 34% for people who remained anonymous.