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WordPress Comments Roundup

@dpknauss recently posted a round-up of Comment suggestions, and alternatives to WordPress default comments

A Proper Comment System for WordPress: Twenty Simple Suggestions

There are a number of good points in there, that really deserve more space.

I’ll start with the one I disagree with: 3. Disable nested comments. I think comment nesting can be useful for signifying who is being replied to.

4. Enable private comments, this is something I experimented with using activitypub. Currently received activitypub replies/comments without a public scope are dropped. I played around with the inbox hook to allow incoming DM’s, these too have since been announced as part of the 2025 roadmap.

5-7 basically all touch on moderation, and this is one of the points I’m excited about, since the latest plugin release has brought user account level control over blocking, muting

Anyhow, lots to chew on!

Fediverse reactions

Comments

  1. Dan Knauss
    Dan Knauss

    @dev I agree, nesting is useful โ€” but it would be great to be able to disable it by default in a core setting that impacts comment blocks. My experience is that most simple commenting is all aimed at the original post author, not the prior commenters, so nesting only confuses and complicates the interface. This can be true even where there is a high volume of comments. Nesting can get out of control with noise and quarrels and buried good thoughts lost from the main thread. It needs more moderator attention. Substack is a good example of what can go wrong.

    Some popular single author blogs do well with high-volume comments without nesting. A common etiquette is to @ refer to other commenters, which the post author might do in a comment that engages the dayโ€™s commenters. Ecosophiaโ€™s open thread posts are a good example of this.

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