I rarely delete non-spam comments, but have killed two that were posted late last week in the April 28 entry about the Hertzberg child support court dispute. One claimed to reveal personal details about the dispute and the Hertzberg's minor children; it was posted with a false email address, so I had no way of confirming that the name used was authentic. The other claimed to be from Hertzberg's ex-wife, but she informs me she has never posted on L.A. Observed and doesn't intend to start.

I'm pretty easy about comments that use real names and contact info; if you stand behind your words and they aren't hateful or obscene, I mostly don't object to what you say on my bandwidth. But I have no tolerance for posing as someone else or anonymous personal vendettas. I try to delete those soon as I see them, and will ban (and publicize) the IP addresses that post the comment. The comment posing as Hertzberg's ex came from IP 67.125.214.245.

On the spam front, I'm happy to report much less gets posted in the blog's comments archive since my recent upgrade and move.

I've also taken a slightly new tack when it does get through. Sometimes, instead of deleting the spam, I will render it useless to the spammer by stripping out the URL (so it won't be counted by Google, as the spammers want) and alter the text to urge people not to buy the product. Then I leave it in the comments as a counter-ad. I figure if it's posted here without permission, it's my property...