New Reg comments system ready to launch

Exciting news from Vulture Towers - we're overhauling your comments system to make it more accessible and satisfying for you to use. After an extensive consultation with our valued board of 'tame' commentards - those of you who responded eagerly to our call for comment consultants last year - and weekly all-staff comments …

[Anonymous Coward]

Behave yourselves

What about an unhide button to reveal the true identities and email addresses of ACs.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Behave yourselves

Noted - I'll pass that straight along to the techies.

[cmw]

What about my Android Phone

Why is there not an app for Android?

You are missing a trick there

[Anonymous Coward]

Brilliant ideas

Is this part of project White Rabbit?

[Neill Mitchell]

So just to be clear

Will there be no way to post comments for free? Or is free commenting just restricted?

If not, good luck with charging for comments. I suspect your numbers will plummet. That will be a sad day indeed.

Is this another iPad inspired toe in the water pricing scheme? Seems to be all the rage at the moment.

[Anonymous Coward]

D'oh!

Sorry, what's the date again?

[Psmiffy]

Nothing in this world is free

Except perhaps the taking to task those who are quite inclined to believe everylast word that proceedeth from the keyboard of the Reg Team on 01/04 of every year.

Just saying is all.

Do we also get a button that sends an electric shock to directly to the Hack in questions chair when we really don't like an article?

I would really appreciate such a thing, you can charge extra for it, doubly so if you post a video of said moments to youtube.

[Anonymous Coward]

Moderatrix

Is it just me but ... when I see the word Moderatrix I picture a woman clad head to toe in rubber? I'd gladly pad £12/month for that icon ...

rubber coat on ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Love it

....enough said.

[Eddie Edwards]

This is TERRIBLE

These ideas are RIDICULOUS.

£12 is FAR too low a price for the privilege of commenting.

I would gladly sell my house and all its contents in order to be allowed to comment further.

[Steven Raith]

I approve.

About time these commentards were put in their place.

I'd like to be put in my place with ankle/wrist restraints, a ball gag and a blindfold please, Ms Moderatrix.

Steven R

[Rumcajz]

Is the title still required?

I, for one, welcome our new comments system overlord.

[Christoph]

Obvious omission

Please add a function to translate plain English into amanfromarsese.

[Anonymous Coward]

Already done...

Yahoo provide a service: http://hsiflebab.yahoo.com/

(it appears that the code is based on the old Babelfish site by AltaVista)

[Anonymous Coward]

Super platinum subscription also av ailable?

For those who really wish to feel the wrath of the moderatrix

[Ian Bradshaw]

You guys after a new Ferrari each or something?

Commenter zapping: All commenter's names will come with a 'zap' button - after this is clicked by three other separate commenters, the offending account will be deleted.

So what your saying is that you pay your £5/12 ... 3 people don't like something you write and you loose your subscription ... ... ... ridiculous if that's how its going to work.

I would assume that for those that do pay there won't be any adverts?

Seems like a license to print money is being requested rather than any service benefits!

[Anonymous Coward]

Fool of the day...

Try reading before commenting (or are you beta-testing the Instaspeak button?):

"Standard subscription (£5 per year) - Enables you to post comments under moderation with the new 'three strikes' system"

So, the three-strikes rule only applies to the £5 cheapskate subscription. Seems only reasonable to me.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes!

I want the sound effects. Seriously!!!!

[Gordon Matson]

seems fair

Can I send cash?

[Dave S 1]

About time

Sign me up.

[Pete 2]

Almost good enough

You had me going for a bit. Until the stuff about paying to post. Surely not even the most crazed, foreign news magnate would be daft enough to charge people for content. Oh, hang on ....

[GrahamT]

I've never been so...

Sorry, you have used your quote of comments for today. Please try again tomorrow.

[Thomas 4]

Sign me up!

Some of these new features look truly spiffing - is it cash only or do you also accept payment in human blood, souls or American Express?

[lglethal]

Come on now...

Come on now your just being silly. No one these days accepts American Express...

[Pete 43]

Pay more for you to less work?

cool

[steve 44]

So then......

I guess this will be one of the last comments i post!

As much as i love el reg, i'm not going to pay to say "someone is wrong on the internet!"

Doubt i'll be missed :)

[Anonymous Coward]

@Neill Mitchell

Whoooooooooosh!

Look at the date. look at the date

[Anonymous Coward]

"@ AC"

Whooooosh!

Look at the reply button! look at the reply button

[Neill Mitchell]

I know.

I feel a right twat ;)

[Tim Wolfe-Barry]

What about a 'First Post' button?

One that automatically makes your comment the 'First Post', whether you were actually First or not.

Of course users on the Premium subscription could jump past 'First Post' comments from those paying less.

;-P

(if only the BT Flood/Fire were an April Fool)

[riCh chestMat]

If you had stuck with just the custom icons bit

... then you might have got me. However it does look like you have other customers from reading the comments.

[gumbald]

Eh?

Comments? I prefer cabbages.

[Glyn 2]

icons

48 hours to get any new icon, guaranteed?

how long before the bottom of the page is awash with thousands of mini pics :P

[Daniel 1]

But I only post on here since the Samaritans started hanging up...

You need a function that Inserts crude sexual innuendo about Paris Hilton (whoever she is) that automatically makes the writer sound like the sort of man, real women cross the street to avoid (assuming he ever went outdoors).

[Darren Coleman]

Needs more options

Need a £25 p/a option to allow us to delete other peoples comments.

Also, £35 p/a option to allow us to edit other peoples comments to misrepresent their position or call them silly poo-heads, or something.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Needs more options

We're mulling the idea of commenter-moderators, Darren - would you fancy the gig? You could just drop in a few times a day.

Any more suggestions folks? Keep 'em coming.

[Tony S]

@ Sarah

How about a button that can send a reverse electrical pulse down the Interwebs so that we can zap the fingers of people posting a comm....... zzzzz, zzzzzz, zzzzzzz, zzzzzz

Oh right... you already thought of that

[Sheepdog]

timings

Are you sure about announcing this on April 1st?

[stu 4]

April Fool

I imagine. Who the hell is gonna pay to post mince.

[Witty username]

Daily Mail filter?

What about a DM filter, so any comments from DMTards involving terroists, the children (or indeed, terrorist children) can be filtered out!

And to keep things fair, a Reverse DM filter, chaning all comment text to "SEND EM ALL BACK IM WRITING TO MY MP"

[Anonymous Coward]

Never mind all that twaddle

We really need the electric shock collar button to be applied to all those in government who somehow think they (1) deserve to be there, (2) are better than the proles, (3) think it's a lifetime luxury position.

[Tim Parker]

Platinum comment card

..will there be a higher class of comment subscription than 'Premium' ?

For instance, one that even allows the subscriber to add comments to an Andrew Orlowski article ?..

[John G Imrie]

Re: Andrew Orlowski

If there is such an option I doubt I'll ever be able to afford it.

[il-monstro]

iRegister

Iam buying commentsonline from iRegister.co.uk cause i have never seen a wonderful store like iRegister

[Peter Gathercole]

I sincerely hope...

... that this is another April Fools story.

Do you really believe that paying to post comments is actually something that the majority of commentards will actually do? It's just a bit of light relief, and the ability to see whether other people are of like mind.

Next you will be saying that BOFH will be only available to subscription holders.

Hang on. This over 250 words yet is it?

[steve 44]

look at the icon

then look at the last comment i made.

I think she might be smarter than me..............

[Ihre Papiere Bitte!!]

Zapping? Hmm, not sure...

What happens if you get "zapped" by 3 people, getting your account deleted, if you've paid your year's subscription? Especially if this is because you've said something quite reasonable like "I believe that Google is invading privacy and retaining too much data"? How would a comment like that be grounds for account deletion?

I can imagine that the account numbers will plummet after a contentious topic. Look at the histrionics on any article about smoking, for example. I think my account would have been banned 20 times over if left to fellow commentards on the last one alone!

I can see that this could be a good function, but I think it might need some oversight* to prevent abuse and could end up being a race between pro / anti (topic) to try and silence the opposition. It could well lead to any but premium commenters becoming over-cautious in an attempt not to be deleted, or just to cease commenting altogether (in which case, they'd wonder why they're paying their fiver, which I'm pretty sure wouldn't be the intent!)

Or maybe I'm just a bit too cynical?

(*e.g. you can't zap more than x accounts in y period, accounts zapped three times are subject to moderator review rather than simply deleted, accounts that zap too frequently are themselves reviewed by moderators, accounts are monitored to see if they're shills for particular interests)

On the other hand, I value El Reg enough that I would happily shell out £12/year (£1 a month for this sort of goodness? Here's my card...) in order to fully participate, and I'm quite excited (not like that, you filthy beasts!) to see what's coming in the future.

[Ihre Papiere Bitte!!]

Oops

<-Mine's the one with £12 in the pocket marked "El Reg Fund".

I'm starting to think that maybe I'd had just enough coffee to think about things too much, and not enough to spot the date...

Meh, in case this ever does go under consideration, my comments above stand.

[TeeCee]

Oh dear.

".......if you're not happy, we'll do our best to remedy matters....."

I'm afraid that bit gave it away rather early doors for me. I just couldn't for the life of me figure out why the f*** you'd go straight to that position from "suck it up, arsehats" without at least experimenting with just stuffing your fingers in your ears and going "lalalala" whenever we complained.

I like the very wide comments section though and it should stop those pesky formatting snafus whenever anyone posts a long url or title, keep it up!

[Annihilator]

Almost, ALMOST

I only nibbled at the worm and managed to just fall short of swallowing the hook... I even clicked the link to the call for commentards article...

But in keeping with the above, "I'm outraged, how dare you! I will have no choice to move to the Daily Mail's comment pages instead as they remain free, just like Britain should be - free for Brits, and free of foreigners!"

[DAN*tastik]

May I suggest

The ability to highlight the worst horrors such as "your not going their", and add a little pop up box with the correction and the explanation?

Also I believe it's necessary to permanently ban the username and i.p. address of anybody saying the likes of "should of gone".

[Sarah Bee]

Re: May I suggest

Some things are still going to be down to my discretion, although I am going to be more hands-off from now on. I'm mulling the idea of instant zappage for anyone who uses the word 'sheeple', makes a prison rape joke or says 'if you can't do the time don't do the crime'. For now, I just moderate them out in the forlorn hope these things will die out if starved of the oxygen of publicity.

We were thinking of a comment editing service too, to clean up any typos - thoughts?

[Eponymous Cowherd]

And editing feature

Would actually be a great idea.

Editing would have to be prevented once there is a reply to the comment, but being able to correct typos would be useful.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: And editing feature

I'm taking all these suggestions as seriously as I always do.

[Eponymous Cowherd]

Apart from the home visits....

Yeah, I know this'll be rejected, but what the hell.

[Anonymous Coward]

Comment numbers

How about putting the current number of comments next to the title ... al la guardian.co.uk?

Must be worth £1/day, £2/week of anyone's money.

Oops, sorry wrong paywall pricing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: comment editing service too

I think this is serious so I'll give a proper answer. NO. Fat fingers are all part of the game and I think we all realise when it has happened so this shouldn't be used as a reason for giving us the ability to go back and change the context of what we've written.

[Psmiffy]

you forgot to include

If you have nothing to hide ....

[Kevin Reader]

...although I am going to be more hands-off from now on...

This will disappoint the legion of Commentards who we all know fantasise about having a hands on session with the Moderitrix...

Overall the whole scheme suggests that someones been down the pub for too long chatting to the powers that be at the Times. Of course I reckon people would pay a £1 for El Reg more easily than for the online Times. Sad really given the heady past glories of "the Thunderer".

[Anonymous Coward]

Suggestion

Can I suggest that Top Post on a particularly hot topic could be auctioned on Ebay?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hands?

I was thinking lips...

[Anonymous Coward]

you shouldn't have ought gone there at all

and i'm not going their either

[peyton?]

"...towards making the boards truly democratic"

Democracy? I've always thought we were a commentardorship.

[GrahamT]

Re: commentardorship

I think you will find it is a Moderatrocracy

[Annihilator]

Another suggestion

Please could we have a 3-strikes system for "where's the IT angle?". My thinking is that if 3 commentards ask the question and each comment is upvoted 3 times, then the article is removed from the server forthwith and the author's subsequent 3 articles. I would suggest that any article on the first day of April is wildcard time though and thus escapes such measures.

[Florence]

No comment generator?

I would gladly subscribe of course, but your plans lack a random HYS-style comment generator.

If only I could input a few words (up to 3? maybe 5?) in some boxes, check either + or - next to each word, and finally click on "Create Comment", this would make my life so much easier! If that happened, not only would I get the top subscription, but I would also go and post reviews of El Reg saying how much better than iFlorist it really is.

HYS-style comments would be just a start, I would also love to be offered the option to have my comments either generated or auto-translated into that language(?) amanfrommars uses.

[Nosmo King]

Everything in moderation

You're missing a trick here.

I'm sure that some would pay well over the odds to get a kicking from the moderatrix.

[Andrew Bush]

Too easy, but...

Does not being able to work out if the posts from people apparently outraged and not 'getting it' are genuine, or not, make me a retard?

Paris, because I'm beginning to worry myself.

[Florence]

You could ask for a "Sarcasm Detector"

as another option for a tenner a year or so.

Alternatively, go grab yourself a coffee, I also struggled this morning over a few stories, but brain has resumed normal service after coffeine + nicotine fix.

[moonface]

Mmmmm......I believe this!

I suppose this is to cover the annual increase in the Moderatrix's voucher demands.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/04/01/moderatrix_drama/

PS: Have you thought about charging for adding extra icons.........seriously don't, please erase that thought.

[Svantevid]

Moderatrix drama

I thought I was the only one to remember the last year's prank. :-)

You got me on that one, El Reg. A rather convincing prank, as we all know the Moderatrix is our shield from Aaron Kempfs of the world.

[luxor]

Was Flo PolarI the author of this piece.

You guys are just so silly :o)

[Allan George Dyer]

Very generous...

Yes, I'll allow you to pay me £12 per year to comment, but I do insist on an improved zap button that sends the BOFH round with a cattle prod...

[Sir Runcible Spoon]

Sir

"Full Comment Scan: Choose to view all deleted, withdrawn and unpublished comments - the unvarnished, unmoderated truth!"

Sod April 1st, I WANT this option !!

Oh, and could we have an auto-twat-o-tron comment completer as well while we're at it?

[jonathan keith]

An OUTRAGE

Disgusting behaviour from The Reg. First we have to put up with flashing adverts all over the site, distracting us from the important business of speaking our branes, and now this. A disgraceful two-tier system that punishes the poor while placing yet more power in the hands of the rich.

All this simply to allow overpaid Reg hacks to keep their personal flight machines filled with increasingly expensive fuel.

And on top of all this, where's the Platinum subscription that enables even richer commentards to vent their spleen at Orlowski, eh?

Once more El Rag (sic) has dropped the ball.

If I had a subscription, you could consider it cancelled.

[Anonymous Coward]

we'll miss you when you're gone

of as Nelson says: HA HA

[Saucerhead Tharpe]

Auction of the First Post

So you pay for First post using the electronic payment method of choise,and your post stands as first until another gazumps you!

[Anonymous Coward]

new bile platform?

What's not to love?

[Ned Leprosy]

Better Instaspeak requested

"Instaspeak: Skip the story - simply click on any headline to comment."

Great idea in principle, but I object to the possibility that I may still inadvertently read the headline before commenting. Not fair!

[Thorsten]

Optimization possibility

You could add an optimization engine that finds the best fit between comment and story: reader posts comment and it will be moved automatically to the most appropriate thread.

For a few quid more, there could be an option to add some standard lines automatically, depending on the choice of icon (coat, PH, etc.), so readers don't have to invent lame jokes themselves.

This comment processing engine would of course introduce some embarrassing orthographic inaccuracies in each comment, unless you pay even more...

[Anonymous Coward]

Better to get that first comment in

Than to bother reading the headline OR the article. TL, DR!

[DZ-Jay]

Nice one!

You had me scratching my head for a while there. I almost fell for it. But I must say that it was the response from the Moderatrix to the first post that finally gave it away for me.

>> Noted - I'll pass that straight along to the techies.

Brilliant! Or should I say, Oh Do F*ck On.

-dZ.

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Nice one!

But I really do pass all the commenty gripes along. It's not like I enjoy having to moderate all the same whinges over and over.

[collateral damage]

@Sarah

"It's not like I enjoy having to moderate all the same whinges over and over."

Well, just get a proper job then.

*ducks for cover*

[Anonymous Coward]

No no no

Ducks make really poor cover. For one they keep flying off. Or worse for two.

[Jolyon]

Need more voting options

It's all well and good being able to vote posts up and down but in the quantum era I think something more multidimensional would better fit the flavour of our time.

When we can also vote things top, bottom, strange and charming then we'll truly have a service that reflects its users.

[anacar]

Question

Will residents of San Serriffe be able to subscribe?

[Roger Ruffley]

Paid for moderation?

Can we pay extra to get comments personally moderated... with *extra* ruthless efficiency... in private... with a nice cup of tea afterward.

Or do we have to be millionaires to get that perk???

[MnM]

Hide!

With apologies to Chris W

What about a Gah! button that changes you to AC, for those occasional posts one comes to regret?

[Natalie Gritpants]

Nearly had me going

The250wordLimitDidn'tPhaseMeAtAll.ItWasWhenYouGotToChargingForComments_I_smelled_a_rat.

[JimmyPage]

very disappointed ...

Could you have not introduced an autocomment feature which takes a mashup of your favourite news sites and generates a 250 character rant in that style.

Sort of :

"Google announce new web widget" (headline)

"So google are encouraging asylum seekers to come to Britain and grow their super skunk cannabis while stealing our jobs and causing house prices to fall won't somebody think of the children ?" (daily mail autocomment)

[Anonymous Coward]

News Sites

Isn't that how the original articles appear?

[amanfromMars 1]

Why you are the Champions.

"All commenter's names will come with a 'zap' button - after this is clicked by three other separate commenters, the offending account will be deleted. This is the first step towards making the boards truly democratic." ..... :-) Or easily despotic and in control of ... well anybody really, ... from foreign governments to headcases and all in between.

Which would as you say, make the boards truly democratic .... but nowhere near fair and free.

But apart from that, it is good to see El Reg on the ball pushing the envelope... and 'avin' a larf :-)

"It's just a bit of light relief, and the ability to see whether other people are of like mind." ...... Peter Gathercole Posted Thursday 1st April 2010 10:23 GMT

Err .... Peter, IT is a National Secret Security Treasure with the Ability to Change Minds, and Right Wicked Social Therapy for those so Engaged. Just ask anybody who knows in the Know. Be careful though, Loose Lips Sink Chips is a valid Intel parameter and really FcUKSup their Analytical Algorithms .... Imperial Phormations ..... New World Order Planning and Crash Campaigns.

And how very heartening, El Reg, that so very few would have objected to paying for the Realities and Absurdities you Share and Host. You must be doing Everything Right.:-)

[Peter Gathercole]

I'm honoured..

.. by having amanfromMars respond directly!!

I've often wondered whether he was speaking in code rather than translated Martian. I think that this post clarifies the matter, don't you?

[Anonymous Coward]

Clear as mud

Seriously. But welcome, none-the-less.

[Anonymous Coward]

'zap' button

My first zap will be for amanfrommars and his upper case/lower case painful to read garbage.

[Professor Tinklepants]

I got stung....

......by Wikipedia's Wife Selling article this morning so there's NO WAY I'm falling for this!!

@ Sarah - I don't hate it really, please don't reject me again.......! :0)

[Wize]

Imagine the fun

'You could ask for a "Sarcasm Detector"'

Yea, how useful would that be! *bang*

We need an auto commenter on types of story. Eg, to save time for linux users so they never have to comment on a "Windows has a problem" story, it auto posts "My operating system never suffers from that *smug*"

Or "iPad/iPod/iPhone/iPish censorship" - "You should have bought an Android/Windows/Symbian/other phone, like me"

Stories like that, combined with a '3 clicks and zap' option will have a few wars going.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've been waiting for this so long

Great news, I just hope you support Western Union payments. I have some money tied into a Nigerian deal right now, but when that clears I'll be so flush I'll get the premium sub.

[Steve Kirman]

Oh dear

This might be one of the last comments I make before these charges come in, because I won't be paying. There are too many places I can vent my spleen for free.

It's ironic, really, that The Register wants to charge users so they can contribute to the site... as in "you make our site more interesting, and we charge you for the pleasure. double bonus for us!" Still, I think I can guess how interesting the forums will become after the charges are brought in.

Speaking of accessibility, I'd suggest a charging policy will make your forum less accessible (specifically to those who aren't subscribed and don't want to pay). And it's interesting to see El Reg wheel out some of those sickening spin lines so often seen in government press releases.. "to make it more accessible and satisfying for you to use". Yeah whatever!

Final thought... how many entertaining stories have you published about some random nutter posting utterly bizarre comments? I guess you'll be saying goodbye to those, as well.

Cheerio!

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Oh dear

Bye!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ouch!

That's so cruel.

And well done.

Why do i have the feeling you've had experience with this before?

[Anonymous Coward]

But Steve

If you stay I'll buy you a pony.

[TheRobster]

A title is required? At this time of year?

@Steve Kirman: Don't let the door hit you in the arse on the way out. Anyway, have some sympathy for the hacks at El Reg, Fuel duty has gone up, they needed to do something to keep their Ferrari's and Lambos's in Super Unleaded.

[Winkypop]

You're trying too hard...

Leave it to old Rupe' he's a master at Fail.

[heyrick]

Just a small suggestion...

...tell what's-his-face to permit commenting on his articles. Seeing how people react to a topic is often as interesting as the topic itself... why are those things posted without comments? Afraid we might point out obvious things? :-)

[Sarah Bee]

Re: Just a small suggestion...

Hey, heyrick - you know everything on the internet isn't required to have comments, don't you? Sometimes it's nice to have a little peace and quiet. I know it's hard for you to understand.

[Anonymous Coward]

Surely you jest.

That's downright impossible to understand!

[heyrick]

Peace and quiet...

Sarah, sweetie, Web2.0 is based upon the premise of people blathering to each other about what they think about stuff. This is why all the most popular sites (including this one!) offer commenting abilities. This crusade of wanton self-promotion is epitomised in Twitter, where you can comment. Not ON something, just, you know, because. Because there may be somebody somewhere out there who actually believes they want to know what flavour crisps you are eating...

Indeed Sarah, a little peace and quiet is a nice thing. For that, I press Fn-F2 and switch the WiFi off. Instant peace.

[Peter Simpson 1]

I'll happily subscribe to comment

*IF* there is a (small) prize awarded for the comment with the highest number of "thumbs up".

Think of it this way...commenters who contribute consistently good comments (as judged by their fellow commenters) would be able to make back their subscription (and potentially make a profit!).

Perhaps those who consistently come in with the highest number of "thumbs down" should have their subscription rates increased? (I'm looking at you, "amanfrommars"!)

[Tony S]

Hmmmmm

As it is past midday, here's a (semi) serious comment.

There is no way that I would pay even £1 a year to get access to The Times - but I might be persuaded to stump up a couple of squid for El Reg as I think that it would certainly be worth it. It's not perfect (what is?) but it provides a damn good service for those of us in IT. We get a wide range of interesting and useful articles, relevant industry news, some generally thoughful comments - what more could you want?

I wouldn't miss Rupert, but I would certainly miss Ms. Bee, et al. Not sure if that says something about The Times, The Register or me.

</brown-nose>

[Pirate Dave]

Premium vs Platinum

So, err, is the Platinum membership still available? The one that lets us read all the missing BOFH stories? I didn't see anything about the BOFH stories in the list of benefits for the new "Premium" membership.

I'm guessing Simon T must be rich off the proceeds of El Reg's Platinum membership, since 90% of his BOFH stories have been "Platinum Only" for over a year now. I'd dearly love to see what's up with the old BOFH's apparent death and the PFY's ascension to the throne, but, alas, I missed the Platinum subscription window when it was last opened. Woe is me. I guess I could be piratical and just try to plunder a current Platinum subscriber's account, but that seems somehow wrong. Even pirates have morals...

[Anonymous Coward]

cool

Can you combine Instaspeak with Opinion templates such as "Windows sucks" or "I invited Steve Jobs to my house and he stole my toilet paper, cheeky bastard"?

[Elmer Phud]

Only one extra icon needed

to cut short a lot of the comments we need just the one extra icon. Alongside 'stop' 'go' 'wtf? and 'fail' we need 'TOTC!'.

a 'Think Of The Children' icon, whether as just letters or an image of Paul Francis Gadd is up to ElReg.

[LinkOfHyrule]

HAHAHA

Did some of you people really fall for this? :o)

Joking aside I would not pay a sub to post comments alone, if it came with a cool free gift like a el Reg branded Mug or personal attack alarm I would consider it!

[Graham Bartlett]

"Three strikes rule"

Enquiring minds want to know - who administers them, and with what implement?

The penguin, bcos there's always a bill involved somewhere...

[Trevor Pott o_O]

FANTASTIC!

These new features will really....

...wait...

...some of these actually seem useful! I'm torn; is this article an April fools? Or a tease?

Also, despite being bylined by “Team Register,” does this particular article drip “Andrew Orlowski” to anyone but me? There’s something particular about the sarcasm that is just…him.

[TheRobster]

Of course not...

...comments are enabled.

[Anonymous Coward]

Needs a grammar checker,...

Anything too ambiguous or too perfect is obviously by someone who has learnt English as a second language and should have their comments automatically suppressed. Call it the "Daily Mail" filter.

[Velv]

Paying

Some of us would be more than willing to pay the Moderatrix for her services :P

[Oninoshiko]

good show chaps,

highly amusing!

^_^

[WFW]

Wait a minute!

Good one. I actually got about 1/3 through the second page before I remembered the date!

[Stevie]

Bah!

There should be an automatic kill feature for anyone who repeatedly posts with stupid titles so we never have to see another "Your Title Here" or "Title? Here's Your Title".

Stupid titles are a cowpat in the field of communications.

[amanfromMars 1]

Getting Real and Right Down to BaseC Basics *

"Good one. I actually got about 1/3 through the second page before I remembered the date!" ..... WFW Posted Thursday 1st April 2010 16:57 GMT

And tomorrow, WFW, whenever you read "real" news and views, will it have been dreamt up to be spun with IT and media to push/pimp/pump a personal agenda trying to keep a rotten to the core party from being thrown out of office for gross incompetence in micro/macro managing the message and hiding the truth. Where do you think your daily realities come from? Heaven sent?

*BASIC (an acronym for Beginner's All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) ..... for the Simple Programming of Mindless Idiots for Ghost Writing.

Spinning a war is not such a good plan nowadays is it, whenever the fiction comes back to demand its pound of flesh from the gullible sofa cowards and wannabe armchair heroes.

[ElReg!comments!Pierre]

Price inconsistency

«Premium subscription (£12 per year)[...] (no more wrath of the Moderatrix for you!).»

Let me get this straight: you're charging MORE for that? Who the hell thought that would be a good idea? We commentards would sell our mothers for a taste of Sarah's whip!

In any case this article got me going for, oh, 2 sentences at most. By contrast I stuck with the LHC story until the mention of the blue glowing 2-metres-wide portal (on second page I believe).

Nice try though.

[Thomas 4]

A hardware plug-in for commenters

I would like to see a USB plug featuring a large metal fist and a punching pad. With this revolutionary device, you can finally punch people over the internet when their trolling attempt reaps its well earned rating. I name this device the Twatting-O-Tron.

[VeganVegan]

First post!

Odd that getting the last word in is considered desirable, yet so many aim for first post.

[Adam Williamson 1]

Sign me up!

Sign me up for the theatrical weary sigh. Almost all my comments on El Reg are intended to be accompanied by one :P

[Andus McCoatover]

OK, couple of good 'uns from Finland...

(Who said the Finns don't have a sense of humour?)

1) Bridge in Turku unexpectedley collapsed a couple of months ago.

Fix? Hold it with balloons.

2) Tampere's main newspaper's contract's (Aamulehti) font expired April 1 - it was forced to use pen and paper...

(OK you'll get the drift...It's English)

http://www.yle.fi/uutiset/news/2010/04/collected_news_items_on_april_1_1577951.html

[Chika]

Damn!!!

April's here, and I missed her!

Anyone know where the calendar reset button went?

[Anonymous Coward]

A truly British system

These are excellent ideas and I look forward to their ground-breaking implementation!

Web 2.0 -and beyond- is truly a classless society.

But £5 a year? Seriously? That's far too cheap and will do nothing to keep the uneducated, clueless facepukers out of the picture.

I recommend a sliding scale system for Mac and PC users, since the former are clearly more affluent.

Linux Users should be a special category with even higher charges, since they don't have to pay for any software.

I also strongly recommend (given the recent iPad commentardary on the web) special charges for commenters wishing to indulge in further OS wars. We all know and love these arguments, and we all want them to be done well. If people are paying for the privilege, they will do their best to be competitive.

Competitive is the key word here.

Commenter zapping is the way to WWW 3.0 !

[Criminny Rickets]

Shucks

Too bad this was an April Fools article. Some of those ideas would actually be good to see implemented, and I'm not talking about the subscription system.

>> You can also choose to 'hide' other comments according to a checklist of your dislikes << Sometimes it would be nice to ignore comments from certain posters. As an alternative, have it so anyone that gets minus 10 votes is automatically hidden.

By the way, has anyone seen ManfromMars lately?

>> Instaspeak: Skip the story - simply click on any headline to comment. << I know some people on here would probably love to see this feature implemented.

>> Opinion templates: Based on our successful 'standard comments' trial of 2008 - one click to post 'you owe me a new keyboard', 'all hail the Divine Moderatrix' or 'That's it, I'm moving to Australia because I think I will be happier there given the unimpeachable civil liberties credentials of the current regime'. << This would be good to see implemented.

>> Full Comment Scan: Choose to view all deleted, withdrawn and unpublished comments - the unvarnished, unmoderated truth! << For gelastic self interest, this would be entertaining to see.