Generally I enjoy the site sci-fi.com. Enjoy the blog, the writing, I’m subscribed. They’ve linked to blog posts here in the past and seem like good blog neighbors. Their comment registration system, however, is about as anti-commenter friendly as a blog can get. Check out how they describe their own system (emphasis mine):

You need to be registered to comment on this site. No worries, though — registering is easy, fast and completely free.

After trying this morning to register, I disagree. It’s one of the least futuristic comment registration systems I’ve ever seen and experienced firsthand on any planet. But don’t take my word for it, follow along below with the sequence of events.

First, follow the Sci-fi Members link and end up on their comment form to see they default check three different subscriptions.

Pitching their newsletters and store during the comment registration process? I understand why they want to do that, but if the subscriptions are that great, we’ll be more than happy to sign up for them. Add to that in my Firefox status bar the McAfee SiteAdvisor for scifi.com is in yellow caution mode:

Oops. A third party program received 5.7 emails per week? Looks from what we’re agreeing to is 3 subscriptions, not 5.7 subscriptions a week. What’s the story here? Not wanting any of this, my email box is crowded enough, I uncheck the boxes and move onto the other parts of the form.

Does it let me use a tagged email address so I can more easily figure out who sold or gave my email address to spammers: myemail+tag@domain.com?

Even though the error message above says it accepts the + character in email addresses, it doesn’t. Moving past reason #2 not to register and leave a comment, we move to the password field. You’d think a site that looks forward like scifi.com would encourage SECURE passwords. Passwords at least 10 characters, letters (upper and lower case), numbers and symbols, right?

Wrong, it’s letters and numbers only. That’s strike reason #3 to leave comments, but let’s not stop there. The username field doesn’t employ any sort of AJAX username checker so you can see if your name is already taken. This means you need to fill everything out over and over again trying to find out if your name is taken. Has some imposter has already claimed TDavid? Yup.

Another bummer? When you click back on the browser, the password field is erased (sessions, use sessions). This registration process just to leave a comment on a blog is a mess. Sure, we have CAPTCHA enabled for new commenters here at Hmm, but I’d rather fill out two separate CAPTCHAs (and help a good cause) then jump through all these hoops only to be added to a list that gets 5.7 emails a week. As for us default checking the new comment notification by email? That is a benefit to readers, unlike newsletters sent too frequently and that are difficult to unsubscribe from according to a third party source.

It’s no wonder very few people seem to be leaving comments with a system like this. It isn’t that the content doesn’t encourage feedback, it’s the system telling them no, no, no. I’d probably have left this comment somewhere on Scifi.com, perhaps this post ironically titled, if I had the patience to beat my way through this system. Two people did.

Scifi.com I like your blog and your site, but you need to get your engineer Scotty to work on your Movable Type comment registration warp drive post haste. And for any other bloggers out there with a similar anti-commenter system: please don’t do this.

• To default check or not email notification?
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