Good idea. People are getting pretty cranky with their comments.

Crap. I had a rather lengthy rant going about insurances and the vast amount of crapness they embody and my seven year old came along and ate the comment.

Anyway, I work at a major medical university in billing. I see first hand every day just how greedy and ridiculous they are. I’m sorry you are having to deal with this and I wish I knew more about Utah’s medical system to offer something other than what you already know.

What Tarin said is right. While there are the inevitable “haters” out there, the people that love you and your entire family far outnumber them. Your wife and her struggle with depression motivated me to get help. She made me feel like I wasn’t alone. As lame and stalkerish as that sounds it’s very very real. At least for me. She helped me fight the depression and embrace the lovable lunatic in me. I’m grateful to both of you for all that you offer to all of us out here on the other side of the monitor.

I really do believe that blogging that has created a revolution in the dissemination information and ideas. If using new technology to return to a process popular in the 1700s can be considered revloutionary.

I feel like the really great bloggers out there are akin to the diarists and Grubstreet journalists of the 18th Century.

Someday, I really do think it’s possible that the blurbodoocery could be considered as a sort of 21st Century Addison&Steele or Dr. Johnson. It’s an exciting thing to be able to watch and to be allowed to participate in.

Thanks for keeping the dialogue open.

Well, I’m not going to say that requiring people to sign in is good or bad. It’s Jon’s site/blog and he can do what he wants with it. That’s it, end of story.

But…(dramatic pause)… I feel obliged to ask Jon this question: Have you read 1984 by George Orwell? I won’t call you “Big Brother” but that book is the first thing that I thought about when I saw that I had to sign up to post a comment.

I’m not a fan of censorship and a firm believer of the 1st Amendment (and the 2nd Amendment too but we can save that issue for later. In fact I’ll [robably catch hell for it from other people).

If Jon legitimately feels the need to moderate posts, fine. I can think of situations where he (or any other sane person) might want to do that. Just as long as – and yes, I really don’t like to even suggest this – he doesn’t start to delete posts because he disagrees with, regardless of the topic.

p.s.,
I may be many things but I’m sure as hell NOT, using whatever definition of the term Jon uses, a “hater”.

I don’t see the Blurbodoocery as a media outlet, and therefore I don’t see the 1st Amendment as an issue here. Receiving lots of traffic on a blog does not mean you are obligated to allow comments. Allowing comments on a blog does not mean allowing ALL comments. Your editorial privilege outranks the free speech of some anonymous “hater.”

I thought differently — I really believed that blog comments fell under the whole “free speech” thing — until two incidents occurred to change my mind. After that, this household decided that neither of us should have to pay for comments that suck. We weren’t offering a public forum; we didn’t have to provide one.

Oh, give me a break you guys! It’s his site, so what if he wants to turn on the signin mec. Good for you John. The people that have been leaving negative and just plain nasty comments are just bored. They’re annoying bitter people that choose to disagree with your views just for the sake of disagreeing. Those people like to ‘act’ like they have a distinct view so this is how they ‘roll’.

Health Insurance sucks in America. Plain and simple. Sure you have group benefits here and there that are really good, but when it comes down to what matters, I wouldn’t be suprised if well over half of middle class americans either don’t have health insurance or have to pay an unreasonable amount for it.

This is not really similar to your situation, but it sure as hell illustrates that there is a huge problem.

My dad officially went on disability in June of this year. His health had deteriorated to the point that he could no longer work a normal job. There is a surgery that he needs to get that could correct about 40% of his disability. Right now his health is at the point that I fear that he won’t be around next summer… Social Security WILL NOT allow him on medicaid until June 2007! That is the length of time that he has to wait to basically get some form of insurance in order to try to get better. Not to mention that the expensive meds they’ve got him taking eat up most of his savings!

Congrats on getting some insurance, as I hope everything goes well from here on out.

Love visiting the site.

I always thought this would be a good idea for dooce.com when comments started to get out of hand.

Yes, I know, I’m perhaps guiltier than most on that count – I never trolled, but I DID use an incredible amount of bandwidth. But I’ll bet there would have been fewer low-blow comments, and less resulting comment frenzy, had people been obligated to sign in before commenting.

I’m glad you’ve taken that step here, because if there’s one thing that really fucks with my feng shui, it’s anonymous dickwads with nothin’ but hate to share. People who have nothing better to do than try to stir up trouble on someone else’s website need to be given a hobby, a purpose in life, and perhaps an enema. Not necessarily in that order.

Oh, and I dig the Chuck calendar. I opened it up and shoved it in my dog’s face and said “Look! It’s your Internet cousin, Chuck!” Soemhow, the little fucker wasn’t as impressed as I was.

Word, Bucky.

Commenting is a privelage folks.

We’re lucky Jon hasn’t shut it down all together.

Jon, I wonder if this will up the number of wacky emails you get.

Glad you will have a little bit more security – some of the people commenting on here really try to tear you guys up. Enough so that I’m ready to form an internet hit squad to take care of them for you!!! You do whatcha gotta do…

TOTALLY off-topic, LOVED the photos of Chuck today! Heather has GOT to share how on earth she can get him to hold still like that!!!

Can’t wait until January so I can have a puppy-Chuck on my calendar!

My first thought? That’s another password I’m going to have to remember now.

And then, I had horrid flashbacks of being picked last for kickball in 4th grade. But really, it’s for the best I think.

And how DOES Chuck sit so still? My dogs won’t even sit still when they are sleeping. I need to know the key to the dog-stillness.

Yay to you for filtering out the negativity. Since I had my bundle of joy in September I don’t have the time or desire to deal with people being negative and mean.

However, I think that your post presented something interesting. You were just putting forth a problem that you were working to solve and people had to start attacking you. IMHO, this is the whole problem with our country- we have trouble uniting for PRODUCTIVE goals(yet, ironically, we’re the UNITED States of America). I thought it was just that women had trouble uniting… it seems that men can get catty, too.

Where’s the love?

Yeah…last I checked, this site is owned and operated by a private citizen. Therefore I have no problem letting the lead singer/driver of the Winnebago filter comments. The problem happens when public monies are used to broadcast propaganda, which is what I recall happening in Orwellís 1984 (though I could be wrong as it’s been a while since I read it).

I will miss some of the drama though.

Orwell???? First amendment???? For real????

I enjoy the blurbodoocery because it’s like being invited into Jon and Heather’s living room. Over-the-top snark in the comments section is the equivalent of graffiti on walls. Jon is being perfectly reasonable in asking people to sign in (like taking your shoes off at the door) and for removing snark (like painting over graffiti) because it is HIS blog.

I hope I don’t sound like a fawning sycophant. I hope that doesn’t suck!

PS – how did you train Chuck to sit still with objects on his nose?