by David Gura

I'd venture to guess that, if you were a fly on the wall at any journalism conference, you'd overhear a conversation about the role of comments on news websites.

Some people have suggested that, because of anonymous commenting, discourse has suffered.  If the subject of a story is particularly controversial, the comment thread that follows can be, and often is, filled with ad hominem attacks, insults and profanity.

On the Media Decoder blog at nytimes.com, Jeremy W. Peters reports on how The Buffalo News plans to combat XX comments:

The newspaper is taking an approach similar to what it requires of people who submit letters to the editor. It will ask people to leave their names, their places of residence and phone numbers before they can leave a comment on the paper’s website.

The paper would then list the names and hometowns alongside the comment.

In a piece that appeared in The News yesterday, news editor Margaret Sullivan said "we've been shocked at how seemingly routine stories can elicit comments that veer off into offensive territory."

Online commenting began, a year or so ago, as a way to engage our Web readers and give them a chance to air their points of view and get some discussion going on the topics of the day.

Quickly, though, the practice degenerated into something significantly less lofty. Particularly on stories about inner-city crime — but not only on those stories — reader comments can be racist and ugly.

The goal of publishing reader comments, she wrote, "all along, has been to have a free-flowing discussion of stimulating and worthwhile ideas — something of a virtual village square."

Now that people’s names will be attached to their ideas, we’re hoping that aim, finally, will be achieved.