Title:
Modify disable comments function

Area:
entries

Summary:
1) Let journal owner see comments on entry where comments are disabled.
2) Provide option for disallowing future comments, while allowing current posts to remain visible.

Description:
People sometimes disable comments on an entry after comments have already been posted to the entry. People sometimes disable comments to their entire journal after people have made comments in it. While this is sometimes an effort to erase the record, more often, it is a signal from the journal owner to their audience that they do not wish any future comments.

1) I propose that the disable comments function, instead of making comments already made 'disappear', allow the journal owner to continue to see those comments. However, these comments should be presented without replyto links, and the replyto for each comment should redirect to the thread link. This will prevent the journal owner from repeatedly commenting to those who are no longer able to respond.

For a journal entry which is originally posted with comments disabled, the current behavior is preserved. For those journal owners who prefer the current behavior to the suggested behavior (i.e., they want disabling comments to prevent <em>them</em> from seeing comments already made) they can add this line to their customized css.

div.comments {visibility: hidden; speak: none; }

2) As I said, often disabling comments is not an attempt to hide prior discussion, but to stop future discussion. In certain circles in LJ, disabling comments on a contentious post is viewed as a cowardly coverup. Allowing past comments to remain visible to everyone able to the view entry, while disabling the replyto function, would let the historical record remain clear. Of course, the account which posted a comment should still have the ability to delete the comment, but they should not have the ability to *edit* any comments, even if they are paid users and the comment was never replied to.