I'm not sure when it started exactly, but for the last few months Blogger has been selectively flagging the comments that I leave on other blogs as spam.
It doesn't happen with every comment, or even on every blog, it just seems to do it randomly. Some days all of my comments will post normally, and on others, every single comment I leave will disappear as soon I close the separate blog window that opens for each blog.
At first, this was only a minor nuisance, one that I figured would resolve itself in due time. However, after many months now, and seemingly no resolution in sight, it's become downright frustrating. It's easily the most annoying thing that has occurred in my almost seven years of blogging.
I've tried Google for a solution, which yielded none (typical Google). I've searched through the Blogger help forum a couple of different times, and have only found that some other people have been having this same problem for upwards of three years, and Blogger has done nothing to help them (typical Blogger).
I've deleted my browsing history, cleared the cookies, ate some oyster crackers; and still the problem persists!
I've sent multiple messages to folks over the last few months letting them know that my shit is going to their spam, and had to send out another batch just last night. I'm hardly the most prolific of commenters, and my comments themselves will never win any awards, but I hate the thought of people thinking that I'm no longer reading what they're posting; especially those that have supported my various endeavors over the years.
The only trick that I've found to work some days is to leave my comment, copy it, then hit publish. It'll look fine, but if I refresh the page it disappears. So, then I paste the comment back in place, check that little 'follow-up comments' box, and hit publish again. This has had a pretty good success rate, but sometimes it can take 3-4 tries before the comment will stick around after the refresh. Bo reminded me last night that some people have their options set to receive an email every time a comment is left on their blog. I've never done that, so I had forgotten all about it. Now knowing this again, I suspect that some folks have received three or four emails with the same comment from me in it. I guess if you wondered why that was happening, now you know, it's just me trying to get a comment to stick to your post. It also means that some, or all, of my comments are being flagged on your blog. If you have a second, maybe you could go mark them as 'not spam', it would sure help me out a bunch. Of course, even that doesn't always work either, I'm already having trouble again with blogs who's owners have already marked my stuff as not spam on at least one occasion (Bo, Eric, Fuji, etc.).
I sure hope that this issue get resolved at some point in the very near future, but if it doesn't, just know that I'm still leaving comments, you just might not be seeing them 😡.
The comments part of Blogger has been a disaster for the last few months. I'm repeatedly having to refresh and monkey with cookies to get my comments to publish. ... I encountered a couple of your comments in spam while I was away last week and published them. Weirdly when I just through my spam history there were a whole bunch of comments from you and Fuji (just you guys) that I'm pretty sure have already published -- as I had read them before.
ReplyDeleteAt least I'm in good company, I guess... Fuji may feel otherwise :)
DeleteI hadn't had any problems (that I know of) leaving comments on your blog until just last week, but ever since then it's been a crapshoot.
Same thing for me - just Jon & Fuji. Blogger seems to think you guys comment too much, I guess.
DeleteIt's pretty annoying... but at this point, I've just accepted it. I wrote a post about a month ago similar to yours. I also check my SPAM at least once a week to make sure nobody else's comments are going unnoticed.
DeleteI was thinking of doing post around the time that yours dropped, and then when it did, I shelved the idea. But since nothing has improved since then (I thought that your pull might spur someone at Blogger into action), and I'm tired of sending out messages to people asking them to check their spam, here I am doing a similar post to yours.
DeleteAfter reading Bo's comment, it got me to thinking. I wonder if Blogger has some sort of cap in place where you can only leave so many comments per hour? I usually let a couple of days worth of posts go by before catching up on commenting, and I wonder if leaving a certain amount of comments in such a short time triggers something over at Blogger, because that's what the bots(?) do when the spam everyone; shit tons of comments in a short amount of time. I think I'm gonna try out this new theory by spreading out my comments throughout the day for a few days and see if they'll stay out of everyone's spam folders.
That's super annoying.
ReplyDeleteYou have no idea. Hopefully you won't ever have to find out.
DeleteThat's annoying. Where do I go to check and see where the comments they think are spam are?
ReplyDeleteWell, if your setup is the same as mine, just click on the comments section that's over on the left hand side, and up at the top, by the total number of comments, there should be a little arrow pointing down. Click on that, and it should bring up your spam folder in the options.
DeleteThanks, I did that, several from you in there as well as several from EP, one from SumoMenkoMan and a few other people, dating back to 2018...how very frustrating!
DeleteI had no idea that the problem had been occurring for so long!
DeleteI've had a few occasions where I couldn't log in to post, but as far as I know once I'm in, I can post. Hope they can figure it out!
ReplyDeleteI can see how that would be annoying as well. I've heard of many people having trouble logging in over the years, thankfully those issues usually get fixed at some point.
DeleteI moderate all of the comments to my posts, which shows the spam and all other comments together, and I have the choice of approving or deleting.
ReplyDeleteI haven't had any trouble with the blogs that moderate comments. Maybe everybody could do me a solid and switch over to that method of commenting :)
DeleteSorry to hear you have issues. So frustrating I know. I'm having issues leaving comments as my account. I'm logged in but when I try to leave a comment on someone's blog, including, mine it tells me I have to log in. Which I am. And no matter how I logout/login it does the same. The only fix I've found so far is to do a new post. Once I publish that. it then allows me to leave comments as myself. Weird. And yep the forums and Google haven't been any help.
ReplyDeleteThat's really bad too. I haven't ever heard of that one. Looking on the bright side though, I guess that means that you'll just have to keep posting :)
DeleteOh, and I know that I've got comments sitting in your spam folder as well.
Wanted to reply first thanks Jon for another reminder to check my spam comments, and second to let Bulldog know that I missed a comment from him on my last post (2 weeks ago) because the comment went to spam.
DeleteBlogger has gone downhill the last couple years and it hasn't added any motivation to do more posts. At some point I might just call it and just use twitter for posts or even open an instagram account. Hope it doesn't come to that though.
Considering that there are still thousands (tens of thousands?) active blogs on Blogger, one would think that they might want to fix all of these problems, but I guess not. Blogging may not be as big in the U.S. anymore, but it's still incredibly popular in many other countries around the world. By not doing anything, Blogger is just pushing people towards other platforms, and presumably losing money in the process.
DeleteI'm not sure if anyone else that comments on mine has been hit with this besides you, but either way I'm sorry you have to put up with that, it's stupid. I'm one of the folks that gets emails when some (but not all!) people leave comments, so at least if I get the email and see a comment didn't post I can manually allow it. It does seem like more of your comments are posting normally on mine lately?
ReplyDeleteThanks, and yes, it's very stupid! I don't think I've had any problems commenting on your posts since the message I sent you. Hopefully it'll remain that way :)
DeleteFor years blogger sends some kind of message to my spam mailbox when I have made a comment on a blog. I got so used to them now I forget what it says. I'll see if I get it from this post.
ReplyDeleteOh it gives a mail delivery error saying the message was blocked. One of those "mailer demon" type messages. I just delete the things since they are in my spam box and don't really effect anything at all.
DeleteI used to get those too, but only when I left comments on one specific blog. I thought that they had actually fixed that one, but if you're still getting them, obviously they haven't. Who knew that there were still so many different problems out there!
DeleteI noticed a few of yours got flagged as spam on my blog. I thought it was something I did. Fortunately, I check the Comments section directly, so I still saw everything you wrote (and I can remove the spam flag as well!)
ReplyDeleteNope, it's apparently a me thing. It's good to know that at least one person is seeing all of my stuff.
DeleteThe post title was a little concerning!
ReplyDeleteI've enjoyed blogging more this year than I had the previous six, so if you thought I might be hanging up my keyboard, don't fear, I've still got plenty more in me.
DeleteWow. Never knew that. There was a time when Blogger wouldn’t let me post comments with my profile, but I cleared my cookies and the problem was solved. That has to be frustrating to not have comments post. Glad you made us aware of the problem. I’ll have to check my spam folder and see if I have any that I missed, because now that you mention it, it does seem like many of my posts have fewer comments than normal.
ReplyDeleteClearing ones cookies seems to be the solution to a number of problems, unfortunately it doesn't work for this one. It would probably be a good idea for everyone to occasionally check their spam folders, who knows might be getting sent there?
DeleteI had this happen to one of my replied to a
ReplyDeletecomment made but I think it got deleted because I posted it shortly after another one. I think they may delete those made on the same day as that is when I noticed mine was deleted.
As others have mentioned, Blogger has clearly been having some major problems with comments, and certainly for longer than I was aware of. At this point, I suppose anything is possible.
Delete