Warning! The new WordPress feature is utter trollbait
So I was all excited about being able to find new blogs/posts through the new WordPress feature that adds related posts to the end of each post.
Then I found out that it was linking my blog with a blog by a white guy who claims to be a “racial realist” and writes a bunch of racist shit. Given that The Angry Black Woman has just gotten over a white supremacist attack, I’m pretty wary of any link between SWS and anything white supremacist.
So I left a comment on the announcement post, and came back to my dashboard to find a troll comment. Note the obviously fake email address and banal sexism.
CaptainReality
fake@ibm.com | 121.45.94.116Feminists are irrelevant losers. Their ideas die with them, because they’re invariably childless. They’re all so miserable and dour.
Anyhow, I’m off to make sure my daughter has dollies to hug and toy prams to push around so that she doesn’t become a miserable spinster like most of you lot.
So women of colour are, yet again, forced away from using a powerful networking tool because of actual or potential attacks. Hm.
Anyway, I’d suggest that most of you disable the feature. You can do so by going to the Design tab in your dashboard, clicking on Extras, and then checking the box that lets you disable the possibly related posts feature. I’ve also posted about it in the announcement thread (currently waiting for my comment to come out of moderation) and in the forums (if any shit starts there, I will start throwing knives), so maybe WP will change the feature altogether.
I’m going to make a comment policy too now, cos I now feel I need to specify that if you’re arsehole enough to use a fake email address your words must not be worth much in the way of dialogue, so you’ll be treated as a troll and blacklisted. And because this blog seems to be getting heaps more traffic lately, just off the whole feminist blogsplosion.
Edited to add: The comments policy is here. It’s not ideal, but it’s something. It’s also very late for me and I want to go to bed.
You might also notice a new Creative Commons License on my sidebar over there. Don’t be a jerk in comments and don’t steal my shit. That is basically it.
Edit #2: I’ve disabled the ‘Possibly related posts’ feature, but it doesn’t seem to be working. My blog is still showing up on the links at other sites.
I just noticed this feature on my blog and couldn’t get rid of it quick enough! Thanks for highlighting it – it’s a really really really bad idea, and whoever thought it was a good idea needs their head examining! Luckily, it’s easy enough to disable it, as you have found out. Thank goodness for that!
Hi, by the way, I read here often but have not commented before, but I’m still in a WTF? mood about this new feature WP is all excited about, so it’s nice to vent! Debs xx
I suspect disabling this feature doesn’t stop your blog being crawled by the tag-bots who generate the database used for the Related Posts feature on other blogs who have enabled it. It only stops the list of Related Posts being generated at the foot of your posts, nothing more.
WordPress should have an opt-in feature for whether people want the tag-bots to crawl their blog or not.
Sorry, additional thought: I know they say that disabling this feature will disable your posts appearing on other blogs, but I’m equally sure that it’s highly likely that they’ve bollixed the code that’s supposed to do that. Mullenweig has a little bit of a history about being half-arsed with initial releases.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure they’ve stuffed it up too.
You can actually set your blog to only accept comments from those who have registered an account at wordpress.com. It’s Dashboard -> Options -> Discussion -> “Users must be logged in to leave a comment” I believe. That way, users will have to verify their email address before leaving a comment.
You’ll get less comments of course as some folks don’t want to jump through hoops to leave a single comment.
Good luck on getting your comment accepted on the announcement page. Matt and crew have shown time and time again that they listen to the users here.
Yeah, Dr. Mike, I get a number of comments from people all over the place who wouldn’t necessarily say anything if they had to jump through that hoop. Luckily this is the first problem I’ve had with trolls/white supremacists and with any luck it’ll be the last. So I don’t really feel the need to resort to that just yet.
Matt has responded to my comment, and my post on the forums, so hopefully the WP crew will be responsive and make some changes.
Thanks for writing this and getting WP to respond. This is exactly what I’m worried about with bloggers writing about mental health issues. The last thing people in the first stages of their recovery need is someone showing up telling them all about the wonderful world of Sci3nt0l0gy.
Shoot, this just showed up on another blog I admin. The links there at the moment were appropriate, but given the subject matter, there is a very large potential for completely inappropriate stuff.
Thanks for the heads-up, I’ve kyboshed it.
It’s so hard to bounce back from those nasty comments. It’s like having someone show up behind you and smack you unexpectedly at your computer
I have no helpful suggestions, other than a message of support as you deal with the hate. If you weren’t speaking truth, you wouldn’t upset them so much.
Thank you for this info, MUCH appreciated, from another feminist who doesn’t want the pleasure of endless trolls on her blog.
Bug Girl,
It only upset me for a second until I realised how ridiculously outlandish the troll was. He might as well have been telling me how “stupid” my mum is.
I’m lucky I caught it in time so that no more trolls or white supremacists came along!
Make sure to blacklist the IP address at your own blog too!
Oh God, Captain Reality is a frequent troll on my blog. I have him moderated every way to Sunday so no one ever sees his racist comments but he is determined that *I* will see them, so he comments all the time. Finally I moved him out of the moderation thing and into the automatic blacklist thing, so I don’t even see his shit anymore unless I go to empty the spam queue.
Like I said, I have no qualms in blacklisting obvious trolls. And it really sucks that you have to put up with that.
I’m having a similar problem. My husband and I are in the process of adopting and we are getting hateful comments and posts from people who have been hurt by adoption. The new “feature” just upped the ante on the hate mail. I turned it off almost immediately.
and I don’t see any problem at all with being opinionated.
I’m totally disappointed with WordPress to have stuffed an unwanted ‘feature’ into our blogs. And to top it all, if it isn’t working the way it is supposed to, its a total disaster!
Here’s my version of things!
About comments, enable ‘The comment author must have a previously approved comment’. That way, if a first-timer (like me) comments on your blog, you get to moderate it. And the next time I come back, my comments go live if you have approved my first comment.
Good day!
Hi Manoj,
Yeah, I’m pretty disappointed with the feature, but having turned it off I’m not worrying too much about it anymore.
As for comments, I’d rather just moderate them.
More reasons to host your own site. I wonder how long it will take for wordpress.com to find ways around the fixes being implemented.