The April Fool’s joke we thought it better not to run on The Denver Post’s site

Realizing that April Fool’s jokes are often funnier to the joker than the jokee, we decided not to go through with this one.

Your Two Cents

The Denver Post’s article commenting functionality has undergone many changes since it debuted in 2007. We have had more than one million comments posted. Our moderators have deleted more than 25,000 comments. Hundreds of liberals and conservatives have protested our deletions, claiming that we only delete conservative/liberal comments.

While the traffic our comments section generates has been sort of okay — about 3.5% of overall site traffic — ads are not enough to support the costs. You’ve heard about newspapers’ difficulty figuring out an online ad revenue model. Well, this week, we figured it out. We call this the “Your Two Cents” plan.

Your Two Cents
Part of the challenge with our article comments is that commenters write too much. Another challenge is many people don’t use their real name, and those people tend to be the ones who also go on profanity-laden hate-parades. The other part fo the challenge is we, The Denver Post, aren’t making enough money with our article comments. Your Two Cents addresses all of these challenges.

Starting next week, April 5, The Denver Post will start charging commenters for each word in each comment they write. Two cents a word. This means:

1. Commenters will have a financial incentive to be concise
2. Commenters must provide real first and last names in order to pay for their commenting
3. The Denver Post will increase online profits, allowing us to invest in comment moderation and other online endeavors

If you have any thoughts, suggestions or praise for this plan, please share it in the comments below.

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