The Last of Us alone is a modern masterpiece.

I don't understand why they don't just limit the ability to post gifs until star approval. It just seems like throwing the baby out with the bathwater to me.

This. It's frustrating when you make a well written, enlightening post only to have it remain unseen by the masses. As self-centered as that sounds, some of us are actually looking to engage in conversation with other humans on the internet to gain prospective into other trains of thought. The grey system is awful…

A long time ago, comments used to have to be voted in my approved commenters. We used to have a star. It guaranteed that the conversation was legit or funny, but made more work for star commenters, who had to wade through shit. Then nick Denton "redefined" gawker by criticizing "star" commenters with a ruthless…

Amen to that. I know I'll be commenting a lot less (and therefore coming here a lot less) now that I know that no one will ever be seeing my comments once again.

That's what it says it is going back to.

I +1 hiring moderators. If you want to run a blog and have one of the main attractions be a robust comments section where you can actually have a real conversation about the topic, you need to ensure 100% that it's going to be free of people trying specifically to disrupt the system. Asking for volunteers is inviting…

I agree, Gawker should hire moderators or have regular commenters volunteer to do it but the last time they did this they put the responsibility on the writers and it failed.

I see what you're saying. I also.... have just never used the private view feed or the blog.... it's just not why I'm here. Well, gee, here's hoping someone out there likes me! Guh. I really hope this is just a temporary approach.

What a shame. I guess I won't be engaging in anymore conversation.... I had been really enjoying it the last few months.

Thank you all for your efforts; I have a question.

I agree that users with 'stars' should be somehow notched in as an automatic 'approved to post' rule. I have probably 500 or so stars, around there or maybe more, but that's a great idea for approved users because one would imagine that a regular starred poster, at a certain level, has proved we're not…

Why doesn't Gawker Media have some kind of 'flag post' option? I know there's 'dismiss' for replies, but there are plenty of situations where flagging could help.

i think the problem with the last time they did this is that none of the writers took the time to go through comments and approve people.

Agreed. They need a clear procedure for getting out of the grays. I posted for months (sometimes sporadically), I always posted relatively good quality posts (I check my spelling and try to stay on topic), and I sometimes even managed to get lots of recommends. I don't mind doing my time, but I need to know I'm…

And that is exactly why I stopped reading and commenting at The Huffington Post. Their comment system went to "Tie your ID to your Facebook page or you don't get to comment." Fair enough. I refuse to allow HP that much access to my personal life. That is, literally, way too close to home. That's just inviting doxxing…

I know. I don't care if you're a gun-nut who doesn't agree with anyone here. As long as you're not a troll, asshole, spambot, or racist/sexist, you shouldn't be in the greys.

I have to say that I understand how this was a serious problem for many many people ( I didn't at first but the more I read into it/heard from those effected I understood) but on the flip side this is a botched job of fixing the issue at hand if I do say so myself.

The old comment system made me feel like commenting was pointless. im pretty excited to have just learned I no longer need an account here because commenting is pointless again.

I'm all for bringing back the greys, with one condition: