Flutterby™! : comment content

Ages ago I had a mailing list conversation with Dave Winer where I recanted my previous position that the discussion in weblogs was largely driven by the content and tone of them. This was sometime after TC made a Flutterby entry the second Google result for "french military victories", and I'd seen that when you get the masses piling in, the tone of the conversation deteriorates.

With that in mind, I'd love to see readership numbers for the SFGate blogs. Michael Bauer's dining & restaurant review weblog attracts the trolls. Fred Larson's weblog of Bay Area photography doesn't. And the multi-contributor Culture Blog manages to look at the art scene and Bay Area tech personalities without bringing in the flamers.

I wonder what their relative readership is. The latter two attract fewer comments, and there are other variables, but I think there's something really strong about the style and tone of the primary writing that makes a big difference.