Who owns your comments?

Monday, June 09, 2008 by Dave Winer.

Last week, in the rush of news and new features in NewsJunk.com, I got an email from Daniel Ha, the guy who develops Disqus, the commenting software we use at Scripting News.  

I say "we" because it very literally is a we thing. When you place a comment on my blog, you're adding something to the record here, but you're also adding to the library of your written work.  

So the question is: "Who owns the comment?" 

I gave it some thought, before reading Daniel's essay -- and I decided that it's a mutual thing. I own the collection of comments on my blog, and you own the comments you've placed on my blog and all others. I should be able to back up a complete set of comments on my blog, and also back up a copy of all comments I've placed on all blogs. 

Technically it's not easy or even possible in most contexts, but with Disqus it certainly is. 

Then I read Daniel's piece and found that he more or less came to the same conclusion.