Commenting on blog posts

Have switched to HaloScan for commenting. I have commented with both HaloScan and the default at Blogger and I find the later less smooth.

I wish to allow all comments. To facilitate commenting the process should be smooth, fast and unmoderated with no character verification. In Blogger my settings were set thus but the process of commenting is stilted.

No moderation will allow unwanted comments and spam but Blogger does not seem to have the ability to remove these comments subsequently. Moderation delays the process and there is the psychological barrier that the blogmaster may not allow the comment to pass. HaloScan can be set with moderation on or off, but allows removal of comments subsequently. It gives more freedom in timestamping (code rather than a limited number of set options) but template design is better in Blogger. And I would like for a larger comment box but this does not seem to be available in the free version.

An improvement in commenting would be to show the preview as one types so mistakes in html code could be seen prior to publishing. I have seen this but can't remember where. Even easier would be formatting buttons similar to wikipedia.

The downside to this switch is previous comments are lost (or hidden somewhere in cyberspace).