TOP Readers Are, On Average, Above Average

That last post was unpleasant, and I apologize.

When I retire from blogging, as must happen someday, I'm going to spill the beans on a lot of things I haven't been able to talk about over the years. Even preceding the Internet. I got stories. Stats, earnings, gossip, insider scoops, troubles, triumphs, enmities, freaks-scoundrels-'n'-fools. You might think this plan churlish, but consider that David Vestal always refused to sign non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) on principle, saying, "I'm in the disclosure business." Me too, David.

A couple of things I can mention: one is that among my stalkerish-bullying harassers years ago was the significant other of a famous photographer. I had written briefly about the photographer, slathering praise all over them (I use the neutral pronoun), even calling them one of the greatest photographers ever; but to this self-appointed sentinel and defender of the SO's almighty reputation, I had damned with praise that was yet too faint. The first email I got was not excessive in length and still retained an air of reasonableness, and I responded politely with an apology. I might even have modified the post to mollify my interlocutor. I can't recall now. However, the original injustice seemed to prick the person more deeply as time went on, and, without there being any further offense, they renewed their objections numerous times over a period of months, each time at greater length and in ways that seemed to me to be more and more unhinged. I stopped answering after three or four of these communications, but ended up pretty thoroughly alarmed. Curiously, the defender always referred to the Great Eminence in the third person, or by their full name.

The neatest and funniest of all the "problem children" readers over the years was a gentleman who appeared suddenly, and, right away, took, shall we say, a vigorous approach to participation. Trouble was, he often attacked other commenters, with relish and gusto. (This is a story I've told before, so you might remember it.) I would withhold the comment and write him polite emails reminding him that I don't allow fights to get going in the Comments Section, under the terms spelled out in The Comment Guidelines:  

2. TOP is not a forum! Please don't respond to other commenters unless you're being helpful. Your comment should be your response to the main post.

This exasperated him, and eventually he wrote, "But I WANT to fight!!! That's what I get on the Internet for!!! If you're not going to allow me to fight with other people, then I'M LEAVING!!!" Or words and exclamation points to that effect.

To which I sent a one-word response: "Bye."

Never heard from the guy again. Hey, at least he was as good as his word.

Above average
By the way, you needn't be tempted to see yourself in this or the previous post, even if you think you are sometimes contentious. If you ever did have a comment that didn't appear, it might be your fault—one time a reader couldn't find his comment because it was among the Featured Comments added to the main post(!)—or—more likely—it might be my fault—sometimes I get disorganized and miss a comment or three, at least for a while, and sometimes, I imagine, forever. That doesn't mean there was anything wrong with that comment—moderation can get quite complex, and I don't have the organizing gene. I don't mind people disagreeing with me or with each other. In fact I like to Feature comments that offer opposite reactions. The fact of the matter is that I very rarely get a comment I need to disallow, and very rarely get a comment that requires private negotiation with the sender. Ninety-nine percent of the time, if I do contact someone privately, suggesting they might soften their words, I get a friendly, coöperative reply back.

TOP readers are (almost) all above average.  :-)

Mike

Original contents copyright 2025 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. (To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below or on the title of this post.)

Featured Comments from:

Jack Luke: "Your blog is a much admired and loved relic of the Internet of old. I don’t mean that in disparaging way—with the rise of Substack and the like, modern-day writers have turned back to a format not entirely dissimilar to this blog’s. More to the point, the uniquely close relationship you have with your readers, largely fostered through your absolutely Herculean moderation efforts, is the sort of ‘engagement’—to use the parlance of the day—that bigger publishers would kill for. But to maintain this on a larger site is nigh on impossible—it takes a great deal of effort, and that is the reason why other websites have less vibrant comment sections. I have little doubt the comments are why this website trucks along mostly merrily despite a vastly changed publishing landscape. And that this rolling stone of old school Internet wisdom should pick up a few unwelcome passengers along the way is no great surprise!"

Roger: "Some of my comments haven't made it. That's OK. I'd start my own blog if I felt it was necessary that everything I wrote be posted (read)."

Mike replies: You've left 245 comments going back to Dec. 12th, 2007, making you an O.G. among commenters (your first comment came in about a month after I moved from Blogger to TypePad). I did find at least two that were not published—that aspect of comments is not easy to check, as I do not publish Featured Comments in the full Comments section, so I would need to go back and check each one individually, and diminishing returns for effort begins to kick in rather powerfully. But, to you and everyone whose comments occasionally failed to appear as expected, sorry! At the very least, I read them all.

Comments

[Patrick Dodds]

I asked chatGPT deepsearch - gave me a massive long answer - I can send to you if you want? Too long for a comment though. Sorry for your troubles.

[Stan B.]

I will contact my estranged wife and let her know that her overzealousness is no longer warranted...

[Mr Pak Ming Wan]

This is one aspect I like a lot about TOP, that I don't have to wade through unhinged, inappropriate, and distracting personal opinion that isn't on topic. You hear these stories of the abuse that workers have to read in these large human moderation factories and I can believe it all. Some humans are just not nice people.

Stay strong! The edits you make here make your site a better place.

Pak

[Tom Burke]

So sorry to hear that you've been harassed in that way. It must be very disturbing at the best of times. I've never understood how people can make provocative up-front comments (or posts, on X and other forums); my approach has always been to be as cautious as possible.

I suppose, though, that it's a sign that ToP is (still) getting a significant readership. I had a blog which I ran for about 10 years, about cruising (that is, going on cruises for holidays), which widened into some general coverage of the cruise industry. It was reasonably popular - some hundreds of unique page hits daily, and some individual informational posts achieved thousands of hits over the years, but I never had any abusive comments - just too small and specialist, I suppose. So look on the bright side - you're only getting them because ToP is good, popular and has achieved significant status.

As for my own blog, first I lost interest in cruising, then Covid killed the industry for a couple of years. so I just took it down. Didn't actually miss it, in the end.

[Allan Graham]

Coöperation spelled with a diaeresis. How delightful!

[Howard]

Mike-
In regards to spilling beans.
Love or hate him, Keith Olbermann in all his podcasts feature a spot at the end labeled "Things I Promised Not to Tell". Olbermann proceeds to recount events in his life, mostly broadcast and personal events where he names well known individuals who "wronged" him regardless to whether it was a job/position or his love life. Albeit, he is financially secure and doesn't have to work, offering him a cushion to tell his stories without having to worry about being fired.

[Craig Stocks]

My approach to jerks on social media is to ignore them; don’t feed the trolls. (Social media also has the advantage of being able to block people.)

[David Dyer-Bennet]

As a Minnesotan (the home state of Lake Wobegon), I'm used to everybody being above average. (Yes, it's only the children who are above average in the original quote.)

I don't really recall if any of my comments haven't appeared. I know we've had brief correspondence on a couple of them (about whether they'd appear, I mean, not ordinary correspondence sparked by the comment). That's a given when the commenting is advertised as moderated.

[Thomas Paris]

I was going to say I wasn't surprised you had had some terrible people but, in fact, I was. And I think that says a lot about how good a job you do here, moderating comments.

And when I say "not surprised", don't get me wrong. I was saddened. My thoughts to you.

I had a couple of bad interactions online, though nothing as bad as what you were describing. And even though I know the best thing to do is to ignore them, and I did, it was still taxing. So yeah, I can only imagine how tough it must be for you.

But, you do have lots of great people here!
Thank you for making all this possible and to your readers for being so good.