Commenting And Commentaries

Commenting & Commentaries

Commenting and Commentaries

The student or pastor with a small but growing library, as well as the pastor possessing an extensive one, will welcome the opportunity to secure this reprint of Spurgeon's catalog of Biblical commentaries and expositions. Once you begin to dip into this volume it will become a faithful friend by your side. Worth its weight in gold! "New commentaries on the Bible abound, but often the cutting edge is dull. With few exceptions, the old works are better by far. Spurgeon's Commenting and Commentaries is invaluable for identifying the best works of past generations, many of which have been reprinted in our day." - Dr. Robert P. Martin

Reading the Comments

What we can learn about human nature from the informative, manipulative, confusing, and amusing messages at the bottom of the web. Online comment can be informative or misleading, entertaining or maddening. Haters and manipulators often seem to monopolize the conversation. Some comments are off-topic, or even topic-less. In this book, Joseph Reagle urges us to read the comments. Conversations “on the bottom half of the Internet,” he argues, can tell us much about human nature and social behavior. Reagle visits communities of Amazon reviewers, fan fiction authors, online learners, scammers, freethinkers, and mean kids. He shows how comment can inform us (through reviews), improve us (through feedback), manipulate us (through fakery), alienate us (through hate), shape us (through social comparison), and perplex us. He finds pre-Internet historical antecedents of online comment in Michelin stars, professional criticism, and the wisdom of crowds. He discusses the techniques of online fakery (distinguishing makers, fakers, and takers), describes the emotional work of receiving and giving feedback, and examines the culture of trolls and haters, bullying, and misogyny. He considers the way comment—a nonstop stream of social quantification and ranking—affects our self-esteem and well-being. And he examines how comment is puzzling—short and asynchronous, these messages can be slap-dash, confusing, amusing, revealing, and weird, shedding context in their passage through the Internet, prompting readers to comment in turn, “WTF?!?”