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tumblr essays

Saturday, May 23rd 2009
9:26pm:

tumblr essays is now powered by gooseGrade. Check them out.

Saturday, June 28th 2008
4:03pm:

Commenting using Disqus

Disqus is a comments system that’s new to a lot of people, so I thought I should initially take the time to run those of you who fit the profile through it to make you comfortable with and proficient at using it rather than having to rectify each instance of Disqus difficulties later on.

What is Disqus?

Disqus, pronounced discuss, is a service for blog comments. Disqus enables bloggers to make the conversations on their blogs more interactive and manageable. Our distributed comment system connects readers across blog communities, while empowering publishers in promoting their content.
In short, using Disqus is a better way for people to participate in conversations initially started by blog posts. Check out how Disqus enhances the discussion on your blog.

How does Disqus work?
Like your average blog comments system. With a few extra perks. I’ve compiled a little guide below:

Sort comments
What?… You can sort the order of the comments to your own whim:
By Oldest, Newest, Hot and Best.
How?… By pressing the above ‘OPTIONS’ button.
Please… Only reply when the Oldest or Newest setting is on, however, as this will mess up the structure and strived-for chronological and sequential nature of the comments.
Rate comments

This feature has been reworked—my reaction here.
How?… Comments can be rated using the arrows next to the display picture.
Why?… Rating comments can, amongst other things, remove said comments—and even the person behind the comment himself from the blog due to his clout.
Please… Only to use the ↓ rating for strictly inappropriate comments—not ones you formally disagree with in a discussion. Disqus allows the explicit feature flag as inappropriate, but I’ve chosen not to include this due to redundancy. The grounds for the ↑ rating are more subjective.
Undo your rating… by clicking the selected rating.
You can’t rate a comment, if… one of these conditions are met:
(1)It is your comment.
(2)The comment is a direct reply to you.
(3)You are not a verified user.
(4)Your clout is below a moderator-chosen threshold.

Editing your comment
You are able to edit your comment constantly, until someone replies to it. If you want to delete it, edit your comment to [DELETED], and I will delete it for you.

Advice and guidelines
Remember to reply to the proper post; if you reply to the blog post, type in the default field; if you wish to reply to a comment, use the reply field appearing by pressing the “reply” below that comment.
Do I really need to create a user?
Nope, you can settle on commenting as an unverified user, if you don’t mind the couple of seconds it takes to create one. Though you won’t be able to have a profile, rate comments and deter and reward users, or be able to follow the comments of users you like.
Or, use the brand new OpenID compatibility on the Disqus login page to log in using your username from services such as Google, Facebook, Hotmail - just to name a couple. At the moment, the feature isn’t integrated into the comments interface on the blogs themselves—yet.

Does Disqus support tags?
Some, yes. See below for a list I made after testing what popular and useful commenting tags Disqus supported.

Tags working
<blockquote>—Quotes, and indents, a long excerpt.
<hr /> Creates a horizontal line/rule.
<a href=”[link]”>[name]</a>
<b>
<i>
<u>
Tags not working
<li>—Creates a list.
<sub>—Subscripted text.
<sup>—Superscripted text.
<q>—Quotes a short excerpt.
<big>—Makes the text big. Duh.
<small>—Makes the text small. Duh again.
<del>—Strikes text (as the deprecated <strike>).
<samp>
<cite>
<kbd>
<tt>

Web and mail addresses posted without any formatting are automatically converted.

Last update: March 27 2009
Disqus guide©tumblr essays. Only replicate with granted permission

Tuesday, May 27th 2008
2:15am:

Intro

No autobiographical dealings, no ouverture and no vague manifest as for what the future of this “blog” will hold. Meaning no idiosyncratic metablogging in future posts.

What the blog will contain are long, elaborate essays—others might say musings—on various and oftentimes completely unrelated subjects. Mostly with the purpose of digging into a subject that either continues to boggle me, or something I would like to dissect and interpret intricately enough to learn of any incongruities in my theories on the matter at hand. All while honing my skills at English, too.

An invaluable addition to nurture this intention even further is the discussion—or attempted explanation of the posts on my part—of the subjects with others using the fantastic Disqus comments system, which is available through the bottom right link of each of the posts, or, by clicking the purple permalink box next to the post.
The inclusion of a comments system should not, however, lead you to conceive the tone of the blog posts as one addressing an audience per se, as this would suggest a notion of (normative, thumbs-up-or-down-instigating) reviewing rather than what you might call criticism, and as (self-promoting) dissemination rather than sheer, unadulterated random theorizing.

Before I can start writing, I need a functional computer, though. In time.

Sunday, May 25th 2008
8:48pm: