Interview With Andy Bailey – The Man Behind Plugin CommentLuv
November 20, 2008 by Shanker Bakshi
Filed under Blogging, Recent Interviews
We bloggers are living in a world where we need Plugins to show our love (or hate for that matter) towards our readers and commentators. Andy Bailey understood this need and crafted one of most downloaded Plugin for WordPress – CommentLuv. At the moment it is processing approximately 150000 Comments per day, that’s enough to establish the fact that how much bloggers love this idea. CommentLuv is a WordPress Plugin which enables bloggers to reward blog readers by leaving a titled link to their last post automatically whenever they comment. This also encourages readers to make more comments.
Andy is a busy man, he has been associated with some other popular projects elottery affiliate, Magnetic Sponsoring, Oceanside Wealth etc. In the following short interview I will ask him about his brain child CommentLuv and some other cool features that he wish to add up in CommentLuv.
Shanker Bakshi: When exactly you got this idea to create a WordPress plugin which rewards readers on a blog?
Andy Bailey: it was at the time that blogrush came out with a widget that showed links to other sites on your blog. I thought it would be better to show links to the sites of the people that contribute to the blog rather than some stranger who already gets traffic I spent a while on a test script and it worked, so I installed it on my own blog after a while, some people asked if they could have it too. The rest is history (in the making) 
Shanker Bakshi: Yes it’s a History in the making, how were the initial reactions from its users?
Andy Bailey: Great, if it wasn’t for the reactions I wouldn’t have made it as a release. My only goal at that time was to reward my own readers and it seems to be a common want among bloggers (especially the nice ones!)
Shanker Bakshi: You are totally fallen in love with CommentLuv or there are some other projects you are handing at this moment.
Andy Bailey: I have quite a few projects on and a company to run, I have to do CommentLuv stuff in my spare time or fit it around doing a project by slipping a couple of extra hours in here and there (mostly late at night)
Shanker Bakshi: what’s your take on Automattic acquiring IntenseDebate? What kind of changes in whole commenting system you were expecting with WP 2.7?
Andy Bailey: I’m not sure on the merits of ID being integrated into WP 2.7. One of the things I like most about CommentLuv is that it creates the community on your own blog, you don’t have to go to a 3rd party site with different details to see what your community is up to. I have tried it out on 2.7 Beta 3 and got CommentLuv to work on it in a rough form so when it comes out I will have an option for it.
Shanker Bakshi: would you like to share some of the new features that you are going to introduce in CommentLuv?
Andy Bailey: The JavaScript file will be remotely hosted this time so I can implement updates without the user needing to download/upload files and more secure and reliable feed handling with easier to understand error messages and the contest is going really well so I want to put in a way of notifying the user that they have won. A long distant future feature would be a way for blogs to allow an ad to be shown as the last blog post when the user doesn’t have a feed. Something that works as a revenue share using a generic term for the anchor text like “just bought a new LCD TV, my review” so it can point to a product page that’s a long way off though.
Shanker Bakshi: Okay – What else Andy Bailey has in store for us?
Andy Bailey: that’s it I’m afraid, CommentLuv takes every sliver of my spare time. the forums, the help desk, the site, the newsletter, the new versions, the updates, the help requests by email, the twitter requests, interview requests (lol!), promotion, prize sending, address getting… it goes on! it’s a great way for me to pass the time doing something I enjoy I have other Plugins I have written but not released but the maintenance time is what stops me , any other plugin would take away time from CommentLuv and I luvs my CommentLuv
Shanker Bakshi: which are other things that excite you besides coding for your projects and all?
Andy Bailey: I have been going to the gym and swim regularly for the past 5 months, that’s pretty good and makes me feel awesome (especially when I have to buy new trousers coz the old ones are too big!) I really like reading sci-fi books but I don’t have the time these days so I have been listening to the dragons of pern series by anne mccaffrey while I am driving on business mostly I like to spend time with my partner, she is the glue that stops me falling apart I like helping too, running a business and an affiliate network is fun (when it doesn’t go wrong or deliveries get lost)
Shanker Bakshi: tell us about your inspiration, the Idol you follow.
Andy Bailey: I’ve been really impressed by Barack Obama speeches, I guess you could say I look up to him in a way. My inspiration is a quote I heard once saying “you can have anything you want just by helping others to get what they want” and the instructions for life taped to the wall behind my monitors , my favorite is number 5 – “Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly”
I’ve always thought Richard Branson was a good role model.
Shanker Bakshi: Any other thing you want to convey to your Comment LUV user and to Shanker Bakshi dot Com Readers.
Andy Bailey: spread the luv!
Shanker Bakshi: that’s so cool, Thanks very much for your time, all the best for all your future assignments.
Andy Bailey: thanks, you too.
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Amazing plugin, simple and effective…
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Great interview, buddy. Andy is one guy (read: plug-in developer) who goes to such a great length to help those who are using his plugins and that actually catches my attention of him and the rest is history.
I love him more now that we both love Obama and his quote of the year, “You can have anything you want just by helping others to get what they want”.
Yan
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Uh yea, Andy is the only plugin-developer i remember cause of the way he helps every one of his users individually and gives them all unique responses (even going as far as to tell them their layout rocks
). Of course that takes up alot of time so I’m glad he came up with the ticket system and can now spend more time on other thigns. XD
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Andy is someone who knows his stuff well and has lots of ideas within him. His effort in improving commentluv is indeed commendable. Great interview.
Wei Liang
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I do want also to make an interview with someone else but I don’t what to ask.:)
I want to ask something to Andy.. Does he have any plan to make CommentLuv a paid plugin?
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@Hussein,
Start interviewing someone you know first which could probably be Yan. You will soon get the hang of doing an interview. Questions just flow in naturally when the interviewee makes his statement. Looking forward to seeing the first interview being posted on your blog. =)
Wei Liang
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@Wei Liang & @Hussein: Please check my schedule from my secretary…;) If the time permits, I’ll oblige….(*wink*)
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@ yan -Its good to see YAN , you are learning every aspect of becoming a celebrity.
@ Hussein – Lets Andy Answer this whether he want to make money out of this Plugin. but am pretty sure he will never do that.
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Thanks for the exposure Shanker!
to answer Husseins question: I don’t have plans to make commentluv a paid plugin, it kind of defeats the whole “it’s good to share” concept that makes it so popular.
I think there are options for related products that could be classed as “premium”, they would only be of use people that aim their blogs at making money so it makes sense to keep them separate, keep all the things everyone can use as free is the best way I think.
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Yeah, I”m also a fan of that quote! Nicely done interview. I picked up a few tips myself.
@Wei & @Yan, good to both of you here… Andy seems like a stand up man.
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Awesome interview! I can’t believe after all the time I’ve spent in email with Andy, I never did an interview; d’oh!
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How come no commentluv here?
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@ dennis Please forgive me for my that SIN. I will reinstall it soon. Actually i’m experimenting something.
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This is interesting Shanker. I admire this man for sharing the CommentLuv to us. Technology and knowledge should be free
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I absolutely love this plugin. Not only does it get me an extra link with each comment but it also gives my commenters an added incentive!
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oooooooo I like experiments; gonna share with us soon?
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This is one plugin I haven’t tried, but of course I’ve seen more bloggers are using this. So I guess it’s time for me to follow the trend.
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@Marlene: You will never know what you miss in blogging till you have this plug-in.
Yan
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I also have CommentLuv Plugin installed, I like it because I can easily see my commenters’ latest post.
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I am new to blogging learning slowly-n-slowly but yes I agree “you can have anything you want just by helping others to get what they want”
Claps !!!
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CommentLuv is all over, Congrats to Andy Bailey for making it big! Great interview too
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I’m still having problem with the plug-in on my blog. I guess that’s mainly because I’m using WordPress 2.7 RC1 and it’s not supported yet by CommentLuv
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Can you provide more information on this?
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Very nice information. Thanks for this. By the way, did you create this layout yourself?
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Does commentluv only reward comments if the “NO FOLLOW” tag option is turned off?
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interesting interview, but put your money where your mouth is.
where is your commentluv Shanker?
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You made some good points there. I did a search on the topic and found most people will agree with your blog.
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I enjoy reading your blog . Excellent!!!
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