Here's why we'd like you to register to be a commenter in our interest.co.nz community

Since we relaunched interest.co.nz in late May we've had plenty of feedback from commenters on the site about the comment system.

Our new Drupal system is different from the 'old' Wordpress system we used. Some people liked the new system. Some people didn't. Plenty gave suggestions on how it could be improved.

Our number of comments and commenters increased dramatically. Sometimes that was good. Sometimes not.

Many said they'd like to be able to edit comments and push the vote button. Many said they they wanted to avoid the 'Captcha' spam filter thing whenever they put in links away to other sites.

Many said they wanted to reserve their own name or pseudonym so that others couldn't pretend to be them and say grumpy/nasty/incorrect things in their name.

Most were unhappy with the name 'Anonymous' being used (and abused).

Some were very unhappy with the tone of what some people were saying and the 'direction' the conversation was taking.

Some said they were going away and wouldn't come back until things improved.

We've listened and now we're ready to try something a little different.

We'd like to encourage our regular commenters and even our irregular commenters to sign up to be registered commenters on interest.co.nz. We'd love you to become a regular member of the community.

What does that mean?

Firstly, it's free and we'll never charge for it. Secondly, it doesn't mean you're about to be spammed with stuff you don't want. We don't like and it's illegal.

Thirdly, we hope it will make it easier, safer and more satisfying to be a commenter.

Registered commenters will be able to edit their comments. They will be able to include a link outside the site without having to fill out the fiddly Capthca spam filter thing. They will be able to vote on other people's comments.  This is what powers the Readers' Choice section.

Registered commenters will 'own' their name or pseudonym. No one else will be able to comment in their name.

So what do you do?

Click on the 'Register Now' box under the Comment Stream on the right hand column, just fill in your name or pseudonym and give us your email address. We'll then send you an email to verify you're at that address. You then click on the link back into our site and you're in. You can change to own password once you're back in.

We won't be sending you emails you don't want. Later on you'll be able to opt in to news and rates tables emails if you want. We're still working on these emails and other features for a 'My Interest' feature.

But the key thing is any emails we offer will be opt in. Simply joining the community as a registered commenter won't mean you're about to be spammed.

What if you don't want to register? Can you still comment?

We're going to leave open the ability to comment anonymously without registration open for a month. We want to give people time to change and we want to avoid the risk of everything going dead from day one if only a few people are in the community of registered commenters.

But eventually everyone who comments will have to register.

That way we can avoid the 'anonymous' problem and people can 'secure' their own identities, even if they are pseudonyms.

We like to do things out in the open and listen to our community.  Our community of people discussing the economic and financial issues of the day is really important to us. We have a lot of fun watching and being involved in the debate. We always want to see how quick Wally is and what he says. We've even grown to like The Many. We want the community to grow and thrive.

We just want to do it safely and in a way people enjoy and feel comfortable with.

Come and join in. Register below.

Again, we welcome your feedback. Tell us what you think below.

Please let Wally take his own name.

But otherwise, first in first served.