An anonymous community weblog. How do I do it?
March 26, 2010 1:30 PM Subscribe
How can I start a weblog that allows anonymous contributions for posts (not just comments)?
I have an idea for a website kind of like pleasedumpme.com or fmylife.com. I want people to be able to contribute an original post anonymously (but with the ability of me to moderate and approve, if need be), and also allow people to contribute comments. I'd love to do this with a wordpress site. Is there a plugin that allows this kind of anonymous community contribution? Or, if not, are there other platforms (preferably free) that would work?
I have an idea for a website kind of like pleasedumpme.com or fmylife.com. I want people to be able to contribute an original post anonymously (but with the ability of me to moderate and approve, if need be), and also allow people to contribute comments. I'd love to do this with a wordpress site. Is there a plugin that allows this kind of anonymous community contribution? Or, if not, are there other platforms (preferably free) that would work?
Response by poster: As original posts or as comments? I can't find where people can actually contribute the posts anonymously.
posted by visual mechanic at 1:39 PM on March 26, 2010
posted by visual mechanic at 1:39 PM on March 26, 2010
Whatever platform you use, you'll have to do a lot of moderating if you don't want the site to be 90% spam.
I use Drupal for the forum on my site; it was free, but the site itself was not. People don't have to use their real names when they register, but they do have to be able to receive e-mail (nobody besides me can see their addresses), and they have to send me an email that shows that they are interested in the subject of the forum. Most of the registrations come from robo-spammers.
posted by Ery at 1:46 PM on March 26, 2010
I use Drupal for the forum on my site; it was free, but the site itself was not. People don't have to use their real names when they register, but they do have to be able to receive e-mail (nobody besides me can see their addresses), and they have to send me an email that shows that they are interested in the subject of the forum. Most of the registrations come from robo-spammers.
posted by Ery at 1:46 PM on March 26, 2010
Well, if you want someone to make a "blog post" then have to literally log in to wordpress.
I suppose you could create an "anon/anon" account and let them use that- just make sure to give it limited privileges so they can't mess with the blog! You might be able to hook this up to post-by-email so they don't have to go through the sign-in process and such.
But honestly I think the easiest thing would be to make one "open thread" and let them use comments as posts.
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:46 PM on March 26, 2010
I suppose you could create an "anon/anon" account and let them use that- just make sure to give it limited privileges so they can't mess with the blog! You might be able to hook this up to post-by-email so they don't have to go through the sign-in process and such.
But honestly I think the easiest thing would be to make one "open thread" and let them use comments as posts.
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:46 PM on March 26, 2010
Best answer: In Wordpress you can create a guest user ID, set it to an Author profile, and then you can publish the password.
posted by cross_impact at 1:47 PM on March 26, 2010
posted by cross_impact at 1:47 PM on March 26, 2010
To piggyback on what Ery said, WP also has pretty good built-in spam protection for comments, which is another reason to consider doing it that way.
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:47 PM on March 26, 2010
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:47 PM on March 26, 2010
Blogger has an 'email to blog' feature, with the ability to set it so that emailed posts are saved as 'draft' for moderation. You post the email-to-blog email address on the blog and ask the people to have at it; sure, once spammers get a hold of that email address...
I believe most weblogs that take anonymous contributions accept submissions by email to the site-runner, or by a 'contact form', but the anonymous contributors don't get to directly blog. The site-runner then selects from submissions and makes the post themselves. Even if you set up Wordpress, created an "Anonymous" user, and let people know the password, you're just inviting a lot of anonymous crap being submitted.
posted by AzraelBrown at 1:48 PM on March 26, 2010
I believe most weblogs that take anonymous contributions accept submissions by email to the site-runner, or by a 'contact form', but the anonymous contributors don't get to directly blog. The site-runner then selects from submissions and makes the post themselves. Even if you set up Wordpress, created an "Anonymous" user, and let people know the password, you're just inviting a lot of anonymous crap being submitted.
posted by AzraelBrown at 1:48 PM on March 26, 2010
here's some info on post via email:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Post_to_your_blog_using_email
It is strongly recommended that you use a "secret" address - that is, an e-mail account name that is very difficult to guess and known only to you, such as those suggested by WordPress. Any e-mail sent to this address will automatically be posted to your blog.
So an address you intentionally tell to people would be an easy solution.
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:50 PM on March 26, 2010
http://codex.wordpress.org/Post_to_your_blog_using_email
It is strongly recommended that you use a "secret" address - that is, an e-mail account name that is very difficult to guess and known only to you, such as those suggested by WordPress. Any e-mail sent to this address will automatically be posted to your blog.
So an address you intentionally tell to people would be an easy solution.
posted by drjimmy11 at 1:50 PM on March 26, 2010
Now depending on what you wish to achieve you would have to flush various stores of ip address and such from the people who do log in to the account, so that they will not be available to use after the fact to unmaks various posters.
Here is a link to an article with a lot of infomation in it
http://www.techsoup.org/learningcenter/internet/page6042.cfm
posted by digividal at 1:50 PM on March 26, 2010
Here is a link to an article with a lot of infomation in it
http://www.techsoup.org/learningcenter/internet/page6042.cfm
posted by digividal at 1:50 PM on March 26, 2010
Best answer: Wordpress + TDO Mini Forms can do what you want
posted by Memo at 3:00 PM on March 26, 2010
posted by Memo at 3:00 PM on March 26, 2010
I think you can allow submissions on Tumblr, but I'm not sure if it's anon. People could always make anon accounts to submit.
posted by ishotjr at 3:09 PM on March 26, 2010
posted by ishotjr at 3:09 PM on March 26, 2010
Response by poster: The TDO mini forms were exactly what I was looking for, thanks!
posted by visual mechanic at 12:13 PM on April 26, 2010
posted by visual mechanic at 12:13 PM on April 26, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by Madamina at 1:33 PM on March 26, 2010