More on Teaser Blogs
| Sun Jan. 4, 2009 11:39 AM PST
MORE ON TEASER BLOGS....Dave Munger responds to my annoyance with "teaser" blogs, which routinely make you click "continue" to read an entire blog post:
This really depends. I mean, if you've got a three-paragraph post, and you're asking people to click through to read one more paragraph, I agree. But what if you've got a post that's 8 or 10 paragraphs long? Or what if you're embedding some bandwidth-heavy content? Most people aren't going to click through, so this can save a lot of bandwidth. Yes, I'm biased, because that's what CogDaily does, but at least you know now why we do it.
FWIW, I don't have a problem with this. My problem is mostly with blogs that do this routinely and for no very good reason. I already mentioned Felix Salmon's blog, and others in the original thread called out Josh Marshall and the Firedoglake crew. Basically, it's a real pain in the butt to have to click "continue" constantly just to finish up a blog post, and there's no question that it reduces my reading of blogs that do this.
But I don't have any problem with doing it for a reason. Occasional long posts, especially ones that have a limited audience, are fine candidates for this treatment. Putting spoilers below the fold is fine. I'm not quite sure what kind of content would be so bandwidth heavy that this would be a good excuse, but I suppose this works too. And doing what CogDaily often does, which is to summarize a new piece of research in enough detail to let you know if you might be interested in reading the gory details, and then putting said details below the fold — that's fine too.
But my plea is to use some discretion here. Actually, use a lot of discretion. 600 words isn't that much, and there's no need to cut a post that long in half. Spoilers are uncommon unless you're running a movie review site. And scrolling past a post you aren't interested in only takes one or two seconds. So please: do this sparingly. The world will be a better place for it.
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Basically, it's a real pain in the butt to have to click "continue" constantly just to finish up a blog post, and there's no question that it reduces my reading of blogs that do this.
'Pagehit wise, eyeball foolish.'
max
['They've still not quite got the business model down.']
Submitted by Tom Parmenter (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 12:00 PM PST.
fivethirtyeight.com has some sort of markup that allows a teaser paragraph to be extended to full length IN PLACE. When you get to the end, on to the next item.
Submitted by charlie don't surf (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 12:02 PM PST.
There are legitimate reasons for the partial posts with click-through. I know a few bloggers who do this in their RSS feeds after they discovered other sites (usually "splogs," spam blogs) that reposted their entire content automatically without their consent. However, there is little reason to do this on the actual blog. Some sites legitimately do this with very long posts. However it often is used to inflate hits, like some sites that are notorious for posting top ten lists on ten separate pages (each page laden with ads). The real question is whether you do it for reasons of reader convenience, or to inflate you advertising revenue through hits.
But overall, this post of gripes does indicate one thing, there are conventions to the blog format. They are evolving (not always for the better) but people do get annoyed when sites flout the rules.
This is why I hack my own full feed together for some blogs using Yahoo's Pipes. The fetch page function is a great headache deterrent!
Andrew Sullivan is the worst one I know of. Routinely the "click for more" yields one more paragraph. Wow! I like reading Sullivan but this has reduced my motivation to go to his site. Bloggers be warned: avoid the teaser blog!
Tom Parmenter above beat me to it: If people insist on splitting up blog posts, at least do some clever javascripting the way fivethirtyeight does so that the post can be expanded in place, you don't lose your place in going through the other posts, etc.
I think 538 has the best set up. Not sure what effect that has on bandwidth though.
I honestly don't mind Sullivan doing it. The only thing that really bothers me and that i just won't read are blogs that post a headline plus two or three lines of text. That's just way too much work.
Submitted by dan robinson (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 3:11 PM PST.
On my Mac with Firefox, I open tabs for each of the posts I want to read as I scroll down the page. Command-mouse click gets the tab open with the post and when I have scanned the entire page, I go back and read the individual posts.
Not that much of a pain, really.
Submitted by Jasper (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 3:16 PM PST.
I echo the commenter above about Sullivan. Real pain in the neck, especially if you're using your Iphone with 3G, which means pages load oh so slowly. Please, bloggers of America, just say "no" to requiring people to click on links.
Submitted by bmaz (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 3:23 PM PST.
That is exactly why it is done at Firedoglake.
Submitted by bmaz (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 3:25 PM PST.
Okay, the last comment was in response to ArtEclectic at 5:16pm
I would also guess that at FDL they do it to keep track of whose posts are actually being read and whose are just dead space (their posters keep multiplying like rabbits).
I read Emptywheel and then move on to the main FDL page where I usually only read Jane and Ian. I prefer the teaser posts because it's easier to scroll past the people I don't read when their posts are of roughly uniform length and most of the posts for the day are on the first page. Otherwise I might have to page thru several pages of the day's posts to make sure I haven't missed any of Jane's or Ian's posts.
But if it wasn't for all that stuff I don't read, I might agree that the teasers are a pain in the ass.
Submitted by bend (not verified) on Sun Jan. 4, 2009 10:38 PM PST.
I would add that Ackerman, who I adore, is notably guilty on this front. His lyrics titles make understanding the post via title incredibly difficult. Thus one has to click every title in hopes that one is germane to the subject at hand.
Having wrote that, this is why Google Reader is such a fantastic thing.
I was surprised at the comments about Andrew Sullivan's blog because I never noticed the problem. But I read his RSS feed, and it's a full feed.
So I checked his actual blog ... and was shocked at what a stupid system he has. His RSS feed is a full feed, but his blog is only a partial feed! That's insane.
Submitted by The Pop View (not verified) on Mon Jan. 5, 2009 1:31 PM PST.
Agreed that Andrew Sullivan is particularly egregious at this. Read two short paragraphs, then click to read one final short paragraph. And then do it for very post.
Maddening.
Steve Benen, at his old digs, started with simply having hidden text that revealed itself on demand. This, I thought, was a nice compromise between getting at content and skipping it if the reader finds it uninteresting.
He eventually changed that practice and explained why: ad revenue, which is based on the number of page views. Clicking through adds another page view.
I was ok with that. I didn't like the format change personally, but far be it from me to deprive someone like Steve of his livelihood.
