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Things just got tough for Disqus

Started by mathewi · 9 months ago

One of the announcements that came out of the TechStars event today was that Automattic, the parent company of Wordpress, has acquired the hosted blog-comment service Intense Debate for an undisclosed amount. You can read Wordpress founder Matt Mullenweg’s thoughts about it, as wel ... Continue reading »

18 comments

  • We're just in the process of implementing Disqus for a site that's launching on Thursday. The thing is, Disqus is the best of all of the hosted commenting systems, but it's all about momentum. If WordPress fully integrates IntenseDebate and uses it as the cornerstone for social interaction across all WordPress sites, then it's game over for anyone else.

    And why wouldn't WordPress do this? I don't understand Fred Wilson's comment about hoping WP doesn't play favourites. That's an argument for Disqus's survival rather than the good of the WordPress community and platform.
  • I love Disqus (though not so much on my Blackberry -- that earlier blank message from me? was because it didn't give me the post box on the BB).

    What I love the most is being able to deal with comments from my email box -- reply, approve, delete, all that. I was really distressed when I heard that Intense Debate had been acquired, because I would much rather see the competition continue between ID and Disqus on equal footing. I also don't want lockin to Intense Debate when I'm happy using Disqus.

    Now, they just have to get the comments formatted for lame BB browsers and I'll be totally 100% satisfied.
  • Interesting. Any idea whether Wordpress had any talks with Disqus about an aquisition? Seems like Disqus is the more entrenched of the two comment syndication services.
  • Don't really know whether they talked to Disqus or not, but a number
    of people have speculated that the main reason Wordpress avoided
    Disqus could be that it was more expensive. I don't know whether
    that's the case or not.
  • Yeah, I get the sense that Disqus is the larger of the two existing groups, but with VC funding I can understand why they'd be looking for a different payout that Automattic.

    I'm betting the Mullenweg and the WP team aren't shelling out huge dollars for Intense Debate, and Disqus would rather get acquired by a media giant like TimeWarner a few years down the road for 30 million.

    Just getting edged out in WordPress doesn't preclude Disqus from getting integrated with newspapers, Cnet, or any of the other huge media platforms out there. And they have good connections.
  • That's a good point, Jason.
  • Hmm. Obviously, Automattic can incorporate Intense Debate into WordPress.com and force it on thousands of blogs in the near future.

    However, for hosted WordPress, lots of bloggers are very precious about 'ownership' of comments and I think including Intense Debate in core wordpress.org would meet with strong resistance (and would be a mistake).

    I can also see objections from WordPress.com users that may force Automattic to make Intense Debate a configurable option.

    Disqus already has a tightly integrated WP plugin and is widely used on many blogs (including WordPress) so I don't think the picture is that bleak for Disqus.

    Competition is good and keeps everyone on their toes.
  • thank you so much for sharing this one! its really useful.
  • I agree with you! This was actually what I was looking for all over the net, and I am glad that I finally stumbled into your article! I love your blog and cool design you have
  • Need more time to see which will have more user intensedebate or disqus
  • That is straightforward to do wordpress's built-in commenting system, since the comments are in my database. But with disqus, not so much.
  • Yup, this is bad. Wordpress should definitely reconsider.
  • Both Mullenweg and WP are great group. They are working hard ...and its shows on there results.

    Thank You !
  • We're just in the process of implementing Disqus for a site that's launching on Thursday. The thing is, Disqus is the best of all of the hosted commenting systems, but it's all about momentum. If WordPress fully integrates IntenseDebate and uses it as the cornerstone for social interaction across all WordPress sites, then it's game over for anyone else.
  • I think it is awesome that Disqus has competition. I don't know if any of you have noticed, but when Disquus is used on major forums...with about 100 comments... there is a very slow load time. Also, there is another comment system called js-kit and I the blog I write in uses it and I like the way its states they have on-screen controls for comment formatting.

    Thanks for writing this article.
    Love for the people,
    -T
  • Nice post! I have a blog with the same interest/topic. Hope we can exchange links.

    Best Regards!

    Doc doog
  • Many people have integrated disqus with seemic so they now have video comments. Its a very cool feature.
  • Excellent blog, thanks for the share. I'll be a regular viewer

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