Ramp Up Your Blog Comments with IntenseDebate
IntenseDebate is a blog plugin created by Automattic, and is available for WordPress, Blogger, tumblr, and TypePad. Simply stated in the plugin description, IntenseDebate includes: Comment threading, reply-by-email, user accounts and reputations, comment voting, along with Twitter and friendfeed integrations enrich your readers’ experience and make more of the internet aware of your blog and comments which drives traffic to you!
As I participate in commenting in other blogs, I’ve grown to appreciate the ability to post using my Twitter ID, and the only way I’d known of to offer that was to use the Disqus commenting system. The reason I decided to try the IntenseDebate system instead was the fact that Andy over at ComLuv is working on integrating the CommentLuv plugin wiht IntenseDebate. Ultimately, I would like to offer the features of IntenseDebate, as well as the CommentLuv feature of including a commentator’s latest blog post. Since the integration isn’t yet finished, I’ve opted to run IntenseDebate minus CommentLuv, for now.
Update: Andy’s right on top of things as usual, and has allowed me to beta test the CommentLuv functionality for IntenseDebate. It’s installed and working, so make sure to leave a comment and get your latest blog post seen! Thanks, Andy!
It’s all about the options
Using IntenseDebate enables me to offer my readers the kind of options I enjoy when commenting on other blogs. Most importantly, it gives them the option to comment under their Twitter, Facebook, OpenID, or InteseDebate member names. If a reader doesn’t have one of those, or simply prefers not to use them, they can also choose to comment as a guest.
This works well in my opinion because readers get to choose how they’re referenced. Do I want to send others that may read my comments to my Twitter account, or my FaceBook page? Blogger users can sign into their OpenID and have an automatic link to their blog, and IntenseDebate users can connect through their account there to increase their participation with the thousands of other avid commentators on that social site.
IntenseDebate also enables users signed in through Twitter to send their comment directly to their Twitter account, something that encourages discussion on that site as well. As an avid Twitter user myself, I like that option.
One of the most important aspects about offering my readers the ability to comment within their Twitter account IDs was the (oauth_token)… When you sign into your Twitter account to comment through the Intense Debate plugin, you are presented with a secure page to login to your Twitter account (https://). Knowing that I’m not giving away my Twitter account information when I comment on other blogs is important to me, so I wanted to make sure my readers are able to use this function safely, and with confidence.
My plugin has plugins!
Another feature I love about IntenseDebate is the list of Plugins that we can add to it. This is done through the IntenseDebate.com site, and plugins include a spell checker (which I installed right away), smileys, social bookmarking buttons through AddThis and AddToAny (for post and comments), FaceBook share buttons, TweetMeMe buttons, and even video embedding plugins. These plugins couldn’t be easier to “install”, simply click them while in your InteseDebate account, and they’re added to your blog’s comment area upon your next reload of your site!
This is handy because by using these functions within IntenseDebate enables you to get rid of other plugins within your WordPress install, or for other platforms, it may give you functionality that you can’t get otherwise. Valuable load time saver for WP users, and freedom for Blogger and TypePad users.
Features, Features, Features
Rather than listing all the features available through the IntenseDebate plugin, I’ll just direct you to their Features page. I love that it offers ‘Reply by email’, comment threading, and email notifications. Again, this saves WP users from needing additional plugins, saving load time. The FriendFeed Comment Retrieval is another great feature that increases interactivity on that social site, and I look forward to IntenseDebate doing something similar for Twitter Re-Tweets and/or mentions… that would help me get rid of another plugin!
Being an advocate of branding and brand marketing, I appreciate the integration of the Gravatars in IntenseDebate. The more places people see my GingerWench heart, the more people are aware of my brand.
I’m also looking forward to becoming more involved in the IntenseDebate community. Through the profile pages, we’re able to share information about our sites and social network with other commenting addicts… I love how I can see all my comments accross the entire IntenseDebate platform right there in one list… this makes it easier to follow discussions no matter how I set my ‘email notifications’.
If you have an IntenseDebate profile, feel free to link to it in the comments here, I need to build my list of blogs to follow there, and invite you to follow mine as well.
Do you use the IntenseDebate plugin on your blog? Let me know how it’s working out for you, and how it’s increased your blog’s comment participation! I’m looking forward to seeing increased comments to this blog, and welcome all forms of “intense debate”. 
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I'm a webmaster, designer, artist and consultant managing several full scale customized business web sites for clients. I'm also a creator of virtual goods on IMVU, and a casual PC game junkie.
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CommentLuv, Facebook, IntenseDebate, social networking, Twitter, WP plugins
[New Post] Ramp Up Your Blog Comments with IntenseDebate http://www.gingerwench.com/2009/11/ramp-... (RTs appreciated)
via Twitoaster
I can give you a beta version of the ID commentluv plugin if you want. You'd need to copy and paste some code to your custom css and plugin editor in your ID dashboard but it works pretty well. I've left out the fancy bits, just kept it to adding the last blog post so it shouldn't have any problems running here
Ooo, that sounds great, Andy! As long as I have clear editing instructions, I should be able to get that installed right away. I've never ventured into the plugin editor before lol. If you'd be willing to do that, I'd really appreciate it… I'll DM you my email on Twitter!
I'd love to be able to blog about the integration as well!
Thanks, Andy! Can’t wait to integrate ComLuv, I’ll be keeping my eyes open for that! RT @CommentLuv: great post! http://www.gingerwench.com/2009/11/ramp-...
via Twitoaster
Thanks to Andy at ComLuv.com for helping me to get CommentLuv working with IntenseDebate… awesome!
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Looks pretty good here! I have a little bit of extra code to add to it in case someone doesn't have jquery included with their page. I'll get to it as soon as I get some time
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You do great work! Thanks again, Andy!
thanks for helping me test it! I will look into making it all in one package and put the url field and pull down box below the form and see if that works out pretty. I'm a geek not a designer! lol
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That sounds good! I'm just thrilled to have it all working together LOL. Side by side below the comment text box would be good if it will work that way. Easiest for users to understand I think… eh, I design, not code… so together we should be able to come up with something
Thanks for your help!!
looks like you got the modification to put the url below the textarea right!
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Looking good! Thanks for giving ID a try, and for the great post. I just wanted to point out that the "tweet this" functionality is available for IntenseDebate users as well (in addition to twitter sign-in users). Check out your profile at http://intensedebate.com/editprofile and select "Services" from the sidebar. Please give me a shout with any questions – support@intensedebate.com.
Can't wait to have CommentLuv available for all of ID! Great work Andy!
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Hi Michael! Thanks for visiting (and retweeting lol). What I was referring to in the post was the ability to have Twitter RT's post as comments also, like the Twitoaster plugin does. This way, anyone that RTs a post, or mentions it in a tweet gets posted as a commenter too… did I miss that functionality somewhere? I have Twitoaster installed here, but I'm noticing that the Twitter retweets aren't hitting here as comments. *goes to look again*
Correct — unfortunately we don't offer that type of integration just yet. This is something that we're interested in for the future, but it's a longer-term project.
My recent post Featured Debates: Share & Discover Comments
Ohh ok! Hey, at least I didn't miss it! LOL I'll look forward to that functionality through ID, since Twitoaster doesn't seem to be playing well with it… just something else for me to troubleshoot to see if I can get working in the meantime. Thanks so much for your responses!
It's my pleasure. It would be a super-cool plugin. Maybe Twitoaster would be up for it!
IntenseDebate seems to be growing of popularuity of later im wondering is it dofollow configurable does anyone know?
Does anyone know? Can @IntenseDebate links in comments be "do-follow"? How? @CommentLuv
My recent post Ramp Up Your Blog Comments with IntenseDebate
Does anyone know? Can @IntenseDebate links in comments be "do-follow"? How? @CommentLuv
My recent post Ramp Up Your Blog Comments with IntenseDebate
Update: after looking at the source code, the links in an IntenseDebate comment do not include the "rel=nofollow" attribute. The links will be followed… according to theory
I'm currently exchanging emails with support to find out more!
This IntenseDebate with Comment Luv integration is the best! when will the final be available?
Hi Brad
As far as I know, the integration has been submitted to IntenseDebate, and is just waiting to be added to the plugin offerings. I'll post (and tweet) again as soon as I find out that it's been added. Thanks for stopping by!
My recent post Ramp Up Your Blog Comments with IntenseDebate
The CommentLuv plugin is available through the IntenseDebate system now
Just login to your ID account, and find it under "Plugins".
I love CommentLuv and love Disqus, but ID seems to have a lot of the features Disqus had. I am really tempted to try it as soon as it goes "live"
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As I understand it, Disqus doesn't give you the ability to remove the "rel=nofollow" attribute on the links in your comments, while Intense Debate has already removed it… so you're able to offer your commentators more with IntenseDebate.
Looks and sounds okay by your experience, But i have had a lot of problems integrating Intense Debate previously and i am reluctant to mess my blog up again. I will sit on the fence until the plugin is more stable.
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From my experience, the IntenseDebate plugin is stable, and the support is fantastic. Michael noticed my Tweet about having installed it, and offered me email support within minutes, even offered to help me with the CSS! Between the plugin working well, and the support for everything down to CSS integration, I'm not sure that you could do better than IntenseDebate.
I am sure I.D support is very good and they did try to help me before but couldn't resolve the issue. I will go through the testing phase on one of my blogs to see if it can be integrated. The problem i have is the importation of my comments which i don't want to lose.
Thanks' for the reply
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Let us know how you make out with ID on your test blog! The comment import made me a little nervous, but worked fine for me. Good luck!
I can't wait to install the new plugin IntenseDebate with Comment Luv integration.
Wow nice plugin fusion
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I have been a user of intense debate for a few months now, although I don't yet have it installed on my blog. The actual main reason was that I have the commentluv plugin and wanted to give a little link love back to my posters. This is great that Andy is almost finished integrating the two. Once it is tested and approved I will be downloading it on my site. I actually found your site through Andy's email about almost having the integration done. Thanks for testing it out for the rest of us. It appears that it is working well.
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Actually, the CommentLuv plugin is available through ID now… I just found it in the list of plugins lol. Thanks for clicking through from Andy's email… I was thrilled to test this for him, I'm very happy with the integration results!
Just found out ComLuv will be coming to Intense Debate–just what I've been waiting for to incorporate ID into my blog!
Thanks for stopping by, Kestrel
I actually found CommentLuv available in the IntenseDebate plugin listing today, so go for it! It's working great!
My recent post WordPress plugin updates bring CommentLuv to IntenseDebate
I found your blog through Andy's email on Intense Debate – which i had never heard of so I am off to do some homework and see what this is all about – thanks for trying it out for the rest of us
You're welcome, it was truly my pleasure, I had been looking for the sign-in capabilities for a long time, and had seen Andy's Tweets about working on the code… good luck, and check out my latest post for the advantages of using both together.
My recent post WordPress plugin updates bring CommentLuv to IntenseDebate
You're welcome, it was truly my pleasure, I had been looking for the sign-in capabilities for a long time, and had seen Andy's Tweets about working on the code… good luck, and check out my latest post for the advantages of using both together.
My recent post WordPress plugin updates bring CommentLuv to IntenseDebate
I loved comment luv, (with JSKits) on my Blogger blog. But when JSkits went to Echo, many of my readers became confused about how to leave a comment. I'm now looking forward to when Andy has CL integrated with Intense Debate. Thanks for the explanation!
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The CommentLuv plugin is now available in IntenseDebate! See my latest post for more info. Works great!
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Hi Ginger,
also here via Andy's email and great to see what you and he have been doing. Similar stories to others, using ID and hoping ComLuv would be integrated, but wondering if it would slip by.
Anyway here we are, the final hurdle, and hopefully Michael K and the guys at ID will complete their testing successfully. Looking forward to installing – nice one Andy!
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Thanks for stopping by, Mick
I see you went ahead and got it all working on your site, nicely done!
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Oh my Gosh! I'm so excited about this. I used to use ID but when I moved to WP I wanted CL. I'm so happy that I can use both now.
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Looks great on your site too, great job! Easy, wasn't it?
My recent post WordPress plugin updates bring CommentLuv to IntenseDebate
Looks great on your site too, great job! Easy, wasn't it?
My recent post WordPress plugin updates bring CommentLuv to IntenseDebate
Hi there.It would surely improve the type of comment that you get and it would get the bloggers chatting among each other, yeah?
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So, this is how commentluv for ID is going to work. Need to find some time to install this quickly.
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It's like the easiest plug-in ever. Thanks!
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You're very welcome, I was happy to see it working on your site already!
I love Comment Luv so interesting to see this developing.
I use both Comment Luv and Intense Debate and found your blog as Andy suggested taking a look at this post as a great example of the integration.
I like it! The only problem I've seen is the Intense Debate treatment of HTML in posts doesn't always show correctly. I've had instances of keyword links (something I allow for my regular visitors) showing up as the actual html
Great looking blog by the way – especially like the left sidebar.
Thanks, Wizzer!
I've yet to encounter a problem with the html in comments, perhaps it's an issue of plugin compatibility with whatever's adding the keyword links to ID? I'd ask Michael over at IntenseDebate 
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I hope this works out and that Blogger users of js-kit/commentluv can transition smoothly. Did you have any problems converting form Echo to ID (there's always the fear of losing comments…) Oh, I see in a reply that you did not lose anything, but it's not clear if you had Echo or not.
Also the threaded replies don't open unless you click the reply counter — can that be changed to always display all replies with the original comment (threaded.).
Thanks for being a frontrunner…
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I was running plain 'ol WordPress comments before this, so the import went very smoothly for me. (Dunno what Echo is, sorry) I just looked at the options in ID, and there's nothing about always displaying replies in the threaded format. I don't know if they have plans to add that functionality, but in the meantime I suppose the alternative of not threading the comments would ensure that all replies are always visible. You might want to ask Michael over at ID about that!
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I was running plain 'ol WordPress comments before this, so the import went very smoothly for me. (Dunno what Echo is, sorry) I just looked at the options in ID, and there's nothing about always displaying replies in the threaded format. I don't know if they have plans to add that functionality, but in the meantime I suppose the alternative of not threading the comments would ensure that all replies are always visible. You might want to ask Michael over at ID about that!
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Yes, the plugin has been activated! And it works perfectly! Awesome job! Thank you!
My recent post CommentLuv for IntenseDebate
Looks great on your site too!
Thanks for the linkage… have fun!
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I’m using IntenseDebate and am now excited to use the commentluv plugin. Came over to your blog via an email from Andy.
This is great to have your readers debate over topics you post!
You're gonna love it! Since you're already using ID, it's only a click of a button for you to add CommentLuv. Sweet, huh?
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I'm using this plugin of CommentLuv with IntenseDebate. Intense Debate is great value add to anyone's website.
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I enjoyed going through your article, you have a great writing style! I have forwarded a link to my bro, and will surely be returning for more.
we enjoyed going through the blog, you totally knocked it out of the ballpark! I have forwarded a link to my dad, and shall surely be back for update.
I agree about the crowded interfaces… so much so that I'm considering cutting out a couple of the sign in options, to get rid of some of those buttons. I'm giving it a while to see what options people actually use first. Thanks for stopping by and commenting!
First time I've seen this comment system. Looks great. And on Joomla will work
Will it? I saw no mention of Joomla on their site. *confused*
Ok, I want to try this out on my Blogger blog. The js-kit with commentluv wasn't working for me so I had to uninstall it, and echo seemed even more confusing. Thanks for giving a review of intensedebate. I'm off to research it further!
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I just started using it on a new blog to see if it works well.If the performance matches the great look i will add it to my main blogs.
Thanks for the information
Paul.
Hi Ginger,
I've just installed ID – swayed by integration with Commentluv & the great plug-ins – and am looking forward to seeing how everything develops. Definitely a good feeling from the beginning ….
Cheers
Will
I'm looking to replace js-kit with Intense Debate as a first step to moving to WP commentluv plugin.
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It works well, and it bring more people to comment , I also love the commentluv plug-in!
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I love Intense Debate. I found the design much better than the Disqus Comments design.
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One of my favourite plugins, CommentLuv encourages other bloggers to comment and looks good at the same time.
Power to the CommentLovers.
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i love intensedebate! thanks for the post. It has great features and keeps your info in there as long as your in the same browser even like firefox. It's very open and flexible.
I've finally tried installing IntenseDebate on some of my blogs. And I must say, it is really showing some great results. I think this is one of the best comment system around. The other is Disqus.
I just installed commentluv on my intensedebate wordpress blog and absolutely love it. It is such a great way to comment, find similar sites which you might enjoy and target which posts you send possible readers to so that they are tailored to the one which you are commenting on. Brilliant! Combined with tweeting your comment and even FB share, it's
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Thanks for this, I'm trying this plugin on my blogs.
sweet! I just installed this on my blog