It turns out, all negative posts across the blogosphere are made by this one, bitter guy who has nothing better to do with his time.

Funny thing is, a lot of blog heckling is done to position themselves as being brilliant, but anybody who gets unprofessional in their comments doesn’t get my respect–and doesn’t get my readership.

I once considered an alternative if people felt my removing anything from a comment was wrong. I’d have the comments words put in alphabetical order with a note attached saying it was now a better comment and more logical. I did not do this in the end but I think it might have been funny.

Most of the serious hecklers always seem to want to threaten to sue me and then they go and harass all my friends looking for support… it’s most strange.

One even tried to have the registrar give him my domain name! It didn’t happen but some people really do get hot under the collar over the strangest things.

However, I guess it is something that all bloggers will eventually have to deal with once they have been around for a while.

BTW, good post, good topic…

Johnny
http://www.collegetidbits.com

My blog was getting alot of attention due to some commercial success in the music industry. Then, the heckling began. I was so turned off that I stopped blogging for quite some time. Now, unfortunately due to that, I lost abit of readership.

Your article makes me realize that this sort of heckling behaviour is common, and that I am not alone. You and other readers here have given valuable advice on how to cope with these people.

I like the quote from blogger Colm here:
“- As Scott Adams says “Never get involved in a debate with an idiot. They drag you down to their level where they beat you to death with stupidity”.”

Thank you and have a wonderful day in and out of blog world.

Or whatever.

I wish this article was available when I got my first zinger. That experience prompted me to write this: http://www.ehow.com/how_2205603_handle-negative-comments-blog.html

Granted, it’s a bit Zen’ish & bare-bones…Jonathan goes into much better detail. Thanks for the post!

While I never had this problem (then again, I only blogged for some like 4 months before I got fed up) this article reminds me of one of the main things a new blogger has to keep in mind whenever they find themselves pushed into a corner.

Stay calm (take your time), analyze what’s happening, think about good reactions, and continue working on the topic that stirred the heckle up while holding on to your own opinion and values.

Not letting others divert you from your opinion and the way you handle other people’s comments is essential to finding your own blogging voice and retaining or building up it’s power.

Interesting article, it’s about a subject that could happen to many new bloggers …

- Wakish -

Eventually I had to engage comment moderation and filter out his/her comments. The final comment was a gloating one about how my activation of comments proved that they had won and proved my “inferior intellect”. For me that final comment provided more of an insight into mind of the individual. They were basically looking for some form of self gratification by challenging and “defeating” a high profile name.

I learned a few things from the experience:
- You may not be able to reason with them because often their motivation is not rational.
- For every one abusive heckler you are likely to have many more loyal supporters who will come to your defence. While that’s nice to know it unfortunately isn’t always a good thing when you are trying to defuse a situation.
- Responding to them only makes things worse. You wouldn’t get into an argument with an abusive drunk in a bar and the anonymity of the internet has the same effect as drink on some individuals. Just walk on by.
- As Scott Adams says “Never get involved in a debate with an idiot. They drag you down to their level where they beat you to death with stupidity”.

What I got was close, but the dream turned to nightmare as several very-negative comments (from genuine thrashers) could be found in related forums web-wide. Normally I could take this in stride, but they often made me wish the Internet wasn’t so anonymous. Live and learn, and the next time Benchmark Reviews (http://benchmarkreviews.com) breaks new ground we’ll be ready to return fire.

I’ve have a couple of different blogs — and once wrote regular guest posts on another. I haven’t experienced blog heckling personally on my blogs — since most of my traffic is obtained via search engines, readers are naturally inclined to enjoy the subject matter.

But, on the blog where I used to guest post, I remember the author always coming under fire from all sorts of people for his posts. Some people seem to be lightning rods for controversy and a lot of it has to do with their “blog demeanor.”

Just as some people can go out in the real world and never run into trouble, there are some who always seem to get into scuffles. The blogosphere is no different.

Great write up – despite my steadily growing community at my blog, I am rarely heckled, if at all but every now and then someone would criticize me. Something you said struck me and that was how your loyal subscribers will rise to the occasion and defend you without you needing to do much of anything.

One time someone said something about one of my videos. Imagine my surprise when a few loyal subscribers banded together to “protect” me. I was surprised, if not amused by this.

Another time a bunch of pilots wrote irate comments about a story I wrote, setting off a nerve within that community. Most of them were abusive – they were deleted, even spammed out of existence. My blog is no place for hateful, abusive comments. Some of them had genuine advice in them but they were peppered with abusive language so out the door they went. Too bad. I would have let them stay if they weren’t so abusive.

:P

—-
I’ve come to enjoy hecklers. They reresent an opportunity to prove yourself. Like a sort of test. Come heckle me Jon.