I used to allow only those who have been approved before to post comments without moderation, but now I allow them all to go through. I use akismet and it catches nearly all the spam comments. I do go through my comments once a day to make sure nothing slipped through and reply to people.

The pros- it’s a lot easier than approving a gazillion comments when I run giveaways that have commenting as an entry method (I mostly use Rafflecopter, but sometimes ask for comments too). It saves me time, and so far I haven’t had an issue. Plus I feel like it increases participation and keeps the flow of conversation going.

Yes! I use Akismet which catches beyone 99.99%

@morganbarnhart – I am surprised Akismet does not work for you, or maybe my blog is small enough to not attract a certain type of spam. Part of my socila media involovement is to go around and comment on other peoples blogs. Can’t talk for everyone but personally I am mildly irritated if I am on a non sensitive blog and I see my comment ‘held for moderation’. Really? Where is the satisfaction and closure in that? And the ‘Captcha’s are usually implemented in a way that it is down tio the user to notice they are there and fill them in – really easy to miss. I went to all the effort of commenting  but apparantly I have ‘not’ and somehow it is ‘my’ problem - that is not going to endear me to the blog or its owner.

All in all, if we want commenters, I think we ned to welcome them rather than put up barriers.

@donpurdum I am in two minds on this issue. At the moment I am allowing comments to go on the page without moderation, although if you do this please use Akismet.

The main reason I do this is that it reduces the barrier to commenting. If someone comments I would love to have them feel like I trust them enough to comment and not moderate it first.

I hate it when I comment somewhere and my comment awaits moderation and a lot of the time I never get a response or I don’t care enough later to check it. I have seen some comments awaiting moderation for days. Very frustrating.

It’s a bit of a trial, but so far things are going ok.

Russell Allert

@hesham @abigailgorton

I guess I should stop using captcha and use Akismet. I didn’t use it for so long because I heard it was horrible. But I suppose I’d better. I really don’t mind that I have to wait for my comment to be moderated, mainly because I know I made a valuable, non-spammy comment and it’ll be approved as soon as its seen.

@kristi-hines I think this is one of those situations where big time bloggers like you probably need to protect your blog and reputation more from hand posted spam / offensive remarks than us smallbies do. And I say that in the most positive way… Kind if like financial planning… We are all on the same course eventually, but the immediate action plan is different depending where we are in the curve – in debt, breaking even, small assets, big investments or completely established.

I always setup comments with moderation by default. 

Akismet and Captcha do a nice job, but there are still ways for spam to slip thru. And you can still get comments that do not belong to your post (be it an offensive remark by some anonymous bored surfer, or a totally unrelated, private and slightly embarrassing question by a family member…).

I believe that since it’s your (company’s) blog, you are allowed to make sure the quality of the content is on a certain level. 

Also, when you moderate comments, you pay closer attention to what is said, and you are more likely to respond to them.

@donpurdum Check out the Best Commenting System thread – there’s discussion about different commenting platforms including pros and cons of Facebook’s.

http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/clubs/blogging/forum/topic/the-best-commenting-system/

@kristi-hines After reading through the discussion, I decided to implement DISQUS. It is clean, simple, and I love the interactive capabilities.

Thanks for pointing me in that direction!
Don

@alexachipman I always recommend GASP - http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/growmap-anti-spambot-plugin/.  It won’t stop people commenters that think sending those kinds of comments is useful, but it requires you to check a box per comment to confirm you are human.  Prevents spammers using automated software without really annoying your commenters.

@carolinechen-whatley is that attacks that Akismet put into spam or ones that got past Akismet? So far kismet s dealing with most everything for me. Thanks!

I used to before I kept getting a bunch of spam comments (typepad).  On my Blogger blog I really never had a lot of spam at all so those comments are still open (but word verification turned on).

But I have no problem letting people comment  But I only turned it on after too much of it was spam and bothering me (LOL).

Best wishes,Heather

Non-spammers can sometimes still post inappropriate content, or things that should really be addressed privately. I have a pretty loose hand with what I approve, but especially since my site is geared towards kids and families, always want to double check it before it goes live.