Open Comments 11/3/22
Early Shortie
TMD will appear here. Sending this a bit early so as to get ahead of a few busy days.
MG: Give us this day our daily thread…
…and lead us not into Trump-nation.
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Here's what I just sent Ryan as an attachment (sorry, long!):
Feedback on the new Dispatch as of, 11/3/22
Regarding the homepage:
The date of publication is still missing on many of the article titles on the homepage, and the articles linked on the right-hand sidebar appear solely by title. Not all users recall which articles they have or haven’t read solely by an article’s title. Dates and authors on every article along with the headline would be helpful for orientation. Further, a color change for the headline once it has been clicked (visited link) would also help.
If readers can tell what they have or have not read, they won’t inadvertently click on an article and give The Dispatch incorrect data as to usage, and it won’t unnecessarily resend data that users didn’t intend to reload.
Regarding comments, some enumerated issues:
On the plus side: Editing, collapsible threads, email notifications, and comment-sorting options are welcome improvements.
1. Email notifications of “Likes” and replies to comments are something of a mixed bag. As the comment volume approaches what it was at Substack, the feature is becoming increasingly frustrating for users who want to continue a conversation.
The main problem is that the link to a comment in most instances merely returns the user to the top of the article rather than to the specific comment. In comment threads that easily exceed the quantity loaded with the main article, it takes a considerable amount of time to scroll the the “Load More” button, click, and continue looking to the next “Load More” button at the page bottom, and so on. Some commenters have found this frustrating enough to be prohibitive and say they have simply given up.
Also, in one instance for me, and other instances for an even more attentive user, comments can simply “disappear” or fail to render after a page reload and all the “Load More” commands until all comments are theoretically displayed. Not even a page search could identify the user’s own comment even after several reloads—until the missing comment finally did display after multiple reloads. This is far too cumbersome if users want to carry on a dialog.
2. The four reporting system options for reporting abusive or otherwise objectionable comment posts are too specific to be of practical value. At least one commenter who has reported abusive comments at Substack and the new site remarked that the new system lacks a means of describing the abuse in the complainant’s own words. The four choices were not applicable, being either too vague or too specific.
3. As for the browser appearance of comments, whereas Substack puts the comment section for each article on its own sub-page, the new Dispatch site has the entire comment section beneath the original article. This causes at least two problems.
For one, the main article’s constrained margins carry over into the comments. Because those margins leave room on the right-hand side of the page for “Worth Your Time” article links, there is some one-fourth to one-third of the display that remains blank. The comments are squeezed to the left, and there is a lot of empty screen that limits the number of comments displayed on screen at once.
This is an inefficient use of the user’s screen real estate, and it also requires extra browser cache resources to keep the original article along with its images and linked Tweets on display, even if scrolled out of sight at the top of the page.
4. Because the comments aren’t active and don’t notify the user of new posts as other users post them, users have to reload the page. This reloading of the whole article, its images, and its linked third-party assets consumes resources for users’ devices, their browsers, and the Dispatch’s host servers.
5. A further adverse effect of the limited number of comments displayed at once is comment duplication. Unless the user scrolls to the bottom of the page immediately to click “Load More” until there are no more to load, there will inevitably be a delay as the user reads the comments moving down the page. The new comments posted since the last page reload push the existing comments below the “Load More” button, causing them to be displayed again.
Other features that many were accustomed to at Substack that are still sorely missed:
6. Some sort of visual indication (change in color, say) that a user has “liked” a comment.
7. Clickable user profiles and bios.
8. Clickable links within comments.
Today’s special animal friend is the Black Ghost Knifefish, Apteronotus albifrons. According to Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes, the Ghost Knifefish family, Apteronotidae, contains 94 species in 16 genera after the latest taxonomical rejiggering. They are native to the rivers of South America. The black ghost knifefish has a long, narrow body with a short tail; it can grow up to 20 inches long. It is all black except for white rings on the tail and a white blaze on the head. It moves by undulating a long fin on its underside. Photo:
https://aquaticarts.com/collections/oddballs/products/black-ghost-knifefish
The black ghost knifefish is mildly electrical, not a super Zot! like the electric eel. A specialized organ in its tail releases an electric charge up to 2,000 times per second. The electric charge helps the fish with navigation, communication, and detecting prey such as insect larvae.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4mwmS19Ftw
Black ghost knifefish are nocturnal predators. During the day, they lurk under snags, in holes in the river bank, or in other shelters. Their typical habitat is in the tannin-infused, dark waters of the upper Amazon basin, where they are very hard to see by night or day. According to the articles, some Amazonian residents believe the fish embody deceased ancestors, hence the name.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9qjXIId6dQ
Black ghost knife fish are captive-bred for the aquarium trade. They are a challenging fish to keep in an aquarium due to their size, aggression, and nocturnal habits. They are also very sensitive to changes in water chemistry. They are known to live up to 15 years in captivity.
Males are territorial. In the wild, breeding season corresponds to the rain cycles of the local habitat. Males and females locate one another by electrical signals: the sexes emit electric pulses at different frequencies. Eggs are laid in sheltered spots such as caves, and they hatch in about three days into little wiggling larvae.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1VLCxPcTQA
IUCN has not evaluated the black ghost knifefish. As with so many rainforest friends, habitat protection is the best way to support their continued flourishing. Rainforest Trust!