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People who comment on a video with only “FIRST!” are nothing more than a pancake. They don’t care about the comment, they only care to make comments before anyone else does. I love getting comments, really I do. I bring this up to ask you this… who owns your comments?

Does YouTube own them, or is that just the place where you put your thoughts? Do I own your comments when you leave them on my blog? No way, I’ve never believed that. If you leave a comment, you own it. That’s the way I feel. There are services out there, such as Disqus and Intense Debate that allow you to make a comment somewhere (if one of these services is installed) and have it tied back to your online identity. They federate commentary. This way, you aren’t just some random commenter. But who owns those comments? Do the services own them? Do the services you post them through own them? Or do you, the writer, own them?

This has been a debate for quite awhile now. Your comment is original information that is being shared. It’s an interesting debate, because it is so easy to leave comments, and contribute to discussions anymore. When you’re in an environment that exceeds in highlighting these social points, you can extend beyond your own reach. For years, the only way you could get comments is by having your own website, and hope someone would stop to post in your guest book. Now, you can have a profile on a social network, a blog anywhere on the Web, or your own website. Everything is melding together, to make up your online identity. These different services allow you to take your social identity and bring it full circle, back to your own personal space.

The easiest way to centralize this comment ecosystem is to bring it back in to wherever it was produced. In my case, that would be here in my blog. Why not leave a comment here, and let me know your thoughts on this.

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