Reader Questions Answered: Comments, Anonymous Tips

By Matt Van Hoven 

A few of you have called the tip line to let us know you’re having trouble with a couple things. Our tech team is on it, but in the meantime, here’s what’s going on.

Comments

Question: “how come sometimes your comments link includes the number of comments, and sometimes it just says ‘(view comments)’? much prefer the number, so i can see if stuff has been added since my last visit.”

Answer: There’s no definitive answer to this question, but I do have some quick thoughts.

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&#151 If you use Firefox, you should always see the number of comments versus “(view comments)”. If you don’t, click refresh and that should take care of it.

&#151 Internet Explorer and Safari tend to display “(view comments)” only.

Anonymous Tips

Question: “sometimes when I try to send an anonymous tip, it says i entered the code wrong. wtf?”

Answer: First off, we added the code thing because we were getting spammed up the whazoo, and that was annoying. Literally, thousands of e-mails pimping all sorts of unsavory wares were coming in. Yet again, there a few solutions to the code problem.

&#151 We promise not to identify you in a story. I know it’s scary to e-mail us, but if you have something to share, e-mail us if the tips box isn’t working. agencyspy at mediabistro dot com.

&#151 Set up a fake e-mail account on gmail. It takes a few seconds.

&#151 Call the anon tips line at 212-547-7935.

&#151 Try the anon tips box in a different browser. Again, FireFox seems to be best optimized for us.

&#151 If you are viewing stories by clicking on categories (you’ll know if you’re doing this because the URL will read like this (ie for Op Eds) mediabistro.com/agencyspy/opeds/. This view returns “(view comments)” rather than the number of comments.

Our tech team is working out the bugs, so keep sharing your secrets. You’re safe with us. When was the last time we outed a source? Exactly.

More:
How to Tip More Anonymouser

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