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Comments on news stories won't build online communities, says moderation expert

Reader comments on news stories do not build online communities, an expert from an independent moderation consultancy has told Journalism.co.uk.

Robert Marcus, director of Chat Moderators, said that allowing readers to comment on articles and blog posts would not guarantee news websites generate a community amongst the audience.

"The word community is used as some kind of catch-all label here, but a community is made up of people who know each other, albeit in a purely virtual way, who engage in a variety of conversations," said Marcus.

"Commenting on news stories is a very narrow activity. It doesn't build community - it might build loyalty and interactivity for a website to some degree, but I can't see where it builds community, because it only appeals to a limited number of people."

The vertical nature of commenting on news articles restricts interaction between users and the growth of a community, explained Marcus.

"There's no opportunity for me to discuss things with the other posters - just a list of 'what do you thinks?' that are not linked to each other," he said.

News sites should be wary of comment areas being dominated by campaigners or those seeking 'their name in lights', a phenomenon that can occur because of a lack of 'friendliness' and community between readers and journalists in this area, he added.

A sense of community amongst a news site's audience, said Marcus, could only be achieved by the creation of a community space, such as forums, parallel to comment areas on news and news blogs.

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