Labnotes

Feb 13th, 2006
Stay on top of the conversation - co.mments.com

I got tired of how hard it is to follow all the interesting conversations happening in the comments. It’s just tedious to go back and check for updates. So I decided to do something about it.

Let me introduce you to co.mments.com.

It’s a simple idea. Bookmark a conversation you want to follow from your browser, and get all the new comments delivered to your feed reader. The co.mments server takes care of finding out new comments, grouping them by conversation and keeping track of the ones you’ve read.

Right now it will work with most WordPress and MovableType blogs, Blogger, Flickr and Digg. More coming up.

It’s the first release, so be patient. It’s rough around the edges, not all the features are there yet, and it’s not the fastest server in the world. But it’s functional and you can try it out today. And if there’s a feature you want, or an improvement you can think of, just let me know.

Update: I’m getting a lot of traffic from MetaFilter, so I went and added it. Now you can also bookmark MetaFilter discussions.

Posted by Assaf Filed in announcements
1. Feb 14th, 2006
  verbal croquis » co.mments.com
  
  [...] We interrupt this program with a breaking news bulletin. [...]
2. Feb 14th, 2006
  JackSim
  
  Hi there,
  
  First, co.mments looks awsome! I just opened an account and started testing it. I’ve encountered a bug with special (accented) characters (like we have in French) on a WordPress blog using UFT-8 encoding. The characters are not properly encoded/displayed on the co.mments site and in the feed.
  
  All the best,
  
  JackSim
3. Feb 14th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  not yet, and I apologize to everyone who can’t use it with non-English sites right now. I’m going to start working on better international character support.
4. Feb 14th, 2006
  Diego
  
  Wow, if this work, it really looks like the definitve solution to his :).
  
  I’ve created MyComments (mycommets.idslab.com.ar) a time ago, is very used in the spanish blogosphere, so I’m telling you this with some knowledge on this subject ;).
  
  There’s just one thing I don’t understand… How can you parse the new comments?!?! Since they have no standard or any marks to indetify them!?
  
  Greets! Diego
5. Feb 14th, 2006
  Scott Hanselman
  
  Have we all completely forgotten RSS Comment support?
6. Feb 14th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  @ Diego
  
  Some blogs are good about structuring the output. Finding the post is the hardest part, I’m still fine tuning that. But with WP, MT, Blogger, Flickr and Digg, the comments are easy to identify.
  
  @ Scott
  
  I occassionally use RSS comment feeds, and I provide one to all my readers. But not all blogs provide them (WP does, but Blogger doesn’t), and they’re very hard to spot on the page.
  
  I just want something that’s simple.
7. Feb 14th, 2006
  Scott Hanselman
  
  Assaf - I hear you, but what I’m saying is that shouldn’t blog developers (many of whom are rushing to add CoComment javascript support) spend that energy with the spec we have that works today? Should the entire blogosphere’s comments be aggregated by this company?
8. Feb 14th, 2006
  Jack Mottram
  
  After a quick bit of testing, this looks great - thanks. I especially like that it tracks all comments (unlike coComment, which only seems to pick up comments left by other users of that service)
  
  Don’t suppose you fancy adding support for MetaFilter (which is where I found out about co.mments - http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/49168)
9. Feb 14th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  I will be adding support for MetaFilter, and Upcoming.org.
  
  Scott, I’d love to see more RSS support out there, and I’d like to see RSS get easier to use from the browser. I also want something I can use today to track comments.
10. Feb 14th, 2006
  Pedro CustÃ³dio
  
  Hum.. your idea hein?
  What about http://www.cocomment.com/ ?
  
  strange.. very strange…
11. Feb 14th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  MetaFilter added.
12. Feb 14th, 2006
  Abby
  
  I’m only commenting so I can follow the conversation. I’ve been wanting something like this that worked. I signed up for something similar last week that absolutely didn’t. Yay for working!
13. Feb 14th, 2006
  Aqeel
  
  Abby, you don’t have to comment to follow the conversation, just press the bookmarlet, and it will start tracking all new comments.
14. Feb 15th, 2006
  Jan
  
  Wow. Really like it. Your parsing the posts and comments is absolutely impressive.
  
  Tried something similar with http://commentstrack.net in late 2004, but we failed. Our requirements probably were to high. But you did a very good job.
  
  Only negative thing is the centralization and bondage to your server. Thought about releasing the script for everyone to use on his own server?
15. Feb 15th, 2006
  lucatogni.ch
  
  Dopo coComment ecco co.mments…
  
  co.mments Ã¨ un nuovo servizio, realizzato in stile coComment, che permette di monitorare i propri commenti nella blogosfera. Attualmente funziona con WordPress, Movable Type, Blogger, Flickr e Digg.
  
  co.mments helps you stay on top of the conversati…
16. Feb 15th, 2006
  Zoli’s Blog
  
  The Third and Best (?) Comment Tracking Tool…
  
  This has been quite a week for all of us unhappy about missing the other half of the Conversation: in rapid succession three comment-tracking products were announced.
  First came coComment with a spontaneous (?) yet well-executed viral campaign t…
17. Feb 17th, 2006
  Jon
  
  I love the idea–just what I’ve been looking for–but there seems to be something wrong with the RSS feed. I’m using NetNewsWire as my RSS reader, and it doesn’t appear to recognize the feed you provide.
18. Feb 17th, 2006
  Jon
  
  Hmm… Perhaps you’ve fixed the problem. That comment just showed up… If so, many thanks!
19. Feb 19th, 2006
  Jake
  
  Testing things out - I tried tracking a Typepad blog. It worked in adding to the tracking list, and correctly getting number of comments. However, it doesn’t show updates when I add more comments to that particular entry, even when I click ping.
  
  Let’s see if this thread is updated correctly!
20. Feb 19th, 2006
  Jake
  
  Nope, my comment above didn’t push the tracking count - any idea why? Am I missing something?
21. Feb 19th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  it’s still in the queue for updates.
22. Feb 19th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  it just popped out of the queue, so it looks like the queue size is about 10mins right now. there’s a test post from:
  http://countersink.blogs.com/sink/2004/09/test.html
  also out of the queue with 6 comments.
23. Feb 19th, 2006
  Jake
  
  Ah, ok. Thanks - I figured when you pinged it, it would be an immediate update.
  
  Now, the next question - I create BlogFusion (www.blogfusion.com) and want to make sure my upcoming release works as well as it can with your functionality. Do you have developer specs somewhere?
24. Feb 19th, 2006
  Assaf
  
  Jake, did you get my e-mail? I’m still working on developer docs, but I sent you a brief summary by e-mail.
25. Feb 20th, 2006
  co.mments, another comment tracker - JW
  
  [...] After coComment, another comment tracker launched: co.mments. Its goal is the same as coComment’s: bookmark a conversation you want to follow, and get all the new comments delivered on one page. However, this service has one feature coComment really misses: comment crawling. coComment only displays comments posted by other coComment users, while co.mments displays all comments. [...]
26. Mar 8th, 2006
  Sterling Camden
  
  I like co.mments better than cocomment.com: http://www.chipstips.com/microblog/index.php/post/117/
27. Mar 11th, 2006
  Betamode
  
  co.mments…
  
  Nach cocomments nun mit co.mments noch ein weiterer Player im Verfolge-deine-Kommentare-Feld:
  co.mments helps you stay on top of the conversation by keeping you updated of new comments. Just bookmark, track and follow.
  In einer Mail an meinen damaligen…
28. Jul 21st, 2006
  coconut
  
  It’s coconut. Assaf, I suggest beoing able to receive updates via email. I got this idea from feedwhip.com, which tracks comments plus any change in websites.
29. Jul 21st, 2006
  Assaf
  
  coconut, I’m working on just that feature.
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Stay on top of the conversation - co.mments.com