Comments, feedback, fact-checking and banning – the joys of the modern news editor

The news ‘business’ has become a 2-way flow of information and engagement. Whilst this democratisation of news is welcome in many cases, it’s also causing news and information providers like Thaiger plenty of new headaches. The Thaiger website is now receiving around 300 – 500 genuine comments a day (plus a lot of spam). All this engagement is causing fresh problems, both locally with the current political protests, and globally, as news site comment sections are targeted to spread misinformation and propaganda.

The Thaiger aims to provide an accurate, curated, fact-checked news and information feed and random people spamming and posting content that hasn’t been through our editorial funnel has to be avoided. For us, for you, for our brand. We appreciate your support, your responses and your corrections when we get things wrong. But we also have to be responsible for the information provided on all our platforms.

As it is, most comments are withheld for approval by a moderator. “Moderation” means us going through each comment and making sure there’s nothing that’s going to get The Thaiger, or YOU, into trouble. Not every comment is going to be approved and we will delete other comments and even ban some authors.

Your IP Addresses and emails are stored in our server, but remain private information that will never be shared or sold.

We need to keep a tight rein on all content on The Thaiger. Whilst we usually have a wide latitude in regards to free speech, we also have to protect our business and have a responsibility to provide a “safe space” for everyone to express their views.

From an editorial point of view, The Thaiger will continue to avoid taking any sides in the current protest coverage and will remain unpartisan. Other news outlets are welcome to take any stand they wish but our role will remain merely to pass on what’s happening, without fear or favour.

To help us we would appreciate your following a few basic guidelines…

• Don’t include live links in your comments. They will automatically be unapproved. Whilst many links are a useful addition to your comment, a lot are just spam. Some are just unacceptable for reasons of liable or inappropriate content. Just copy and paste a passage from a site and quote it if you wish.

• Try and keep your comments on topic and about the story, and avoid making personal or defamatory remarks about other commenters.

• Criticism about the stories and our coverage is fair game. But avoid criticism about Thailand’s Head of State or making libellous or false comments about the Thai Government.

All we ask is a bit of common sense so we can continue providing a free, independent news and information pipeline.

Editor, The Thaiger Pte Ltd