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November 29, 2006

Quick Embed Code to Add Comments To Any Site

Nick Gonzalez

93 comments »

It may not be a multi-million dollar venture-backed startup, but Lev Walkin has an elegant solution to a common feature of the social web, commenting. JS-Kit is an entirely free little javascript embed that allows you to add threaded comments to any web page in one line:

"<script src="http://js-kit.com/comments.js"></script>"

JS-Kit works by running Lev’s javascript code, which along with the website’s referral, fetches the appropriate comment data from his server. The comments are fully customizable by CSS and multiple comment instances can be displayed on the same referring URL by changing the “path” attribute of the comment. That way you could have a photo page with unique comment threads for each picture. However, while JS-Kit allows for a lot of customization, it still lacks some of the more advanced administrative features of fully integrated comments, such as those of our Wordpress blog.

Lev Walkin is a Cisco Security Engineer out of Santa Clara, and originally came up with the idea as a way to help he wife, a web designer, easily add comments to her sites.

Feel free to test the script after the jump…

Note: JS-Kit will forward comments from your thread to your email if you provide it.

  • Sphere It

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 29th, 2006 at 6:54 pm and is filed under Company & Product Profiles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  1. TechCrunch Japanese アーカイブ » どんなサイトにもエンベッドで簡単にコメント欄を作成できるコード

    November 29th, 2006 at 8:26 pm

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  3. Web2.Office» Blog Archive » JS-Kit,在任何网站上添加评论

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:05 am

  4. Quick Embed Code to Add Comments To Any Site at fresh + new

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  8. Kommentare in statischen Seiten einbinden - mit eine Zeile Code. | agenturblog.de

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  9. Quick Add Comments to any Web Site / Pages » Dee’s-Planet! Blog

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  10. DashNote Weblog » Blog Archive » Limitations of sequential conversations

    November 30th, 2006 at 4:30 pm

  11. Search and Find » Open Question: What is “a jump” in blogging? I’ve read alot of blogs that say “after the jump” or “more after the jump” etc.?

    November 30th, 2006 at 8:25 pm

  12. links for 2006-12-04 at Webmercial.dk

    December 4th, 2006 at 6:28 am

  13. ::lemonup::News, Technology, sports, cars, movie, video, blog, travel, mp3, picture, computer, notebook » JS-Kit: Web 2.0 For Lazy People

    May 1st, 2007 at 12:06 am

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    June 28th, 2007 at 6:20 am

  15. From Garage to Cubicle: JS-Kit Closes $1.2 Million Seed Round | Tekjuice.com

    August 10th, 2007 at 1:16 am

  16. Интервью со Львом Валкиным — MacRadar

    October 24th, 2007 at 7:04 pm

  17. HaloScan Partners with JS-Kit to Distribute Ratings Widget: tech product reviews, tech news, daily videos, free downloads, and podcasts, tech, products, computer, mp3 players, cell phones, digital cameras

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Comments

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  1. Sean

    November 29th, 2006 at 7:13 pm

    I like that you dont even have to register, it does everything automatically by referal data. Nice idea :)

  2. SearcH EngineS WeB

    November 29th, 2006 at 7:36 pm

    hmmm……this makes a :-D Great Idea :-D for an Instant, Embedable GuestBook -

  3. Paraag

    November 29th, 2006 at 7:49 pm

    really good..

  4. Media Blog

    November 29th, 2006 at 7:56 pm

    And this is different from HaloScan how?

  5. Tom

    November 29th, 2006 at 8:07 pm

    No account needed. Just one line of code. It takes care of the rest. I’d say that’s pretty damn different.

  6. jimmy

    November 29th, 2006 at 8:41 pm

    I’m starting to read between the lines here….There is a lot of Nepotism and In Group bias going on at techcrunch…you scratch my back, and I’ll scratch yours type off stuff

    techcrunch is getting less and less objective all the time and is starting to become real superficial in their reviews

    check this statement in an earlier post today about yahoo answers “but isn’t it possible that community asking services such as these will become extinct as people learn to better navigate the Web themselves?”

    I just think techcrunch has the power to make or break a site, and should therefore start exercising a bit more objectivity in their reviews, and a little less back scratching of mates and friends

    mkay

  7. Peter Cooper

    November 29th, 2006 at 9:05 pm

    This is incredibly cool!

    I see only one major downside. If his site goes down / is slow / whatever, then your site is also slow. If the JavaScript include lags, your page could take a long time to load. This is a problem with all JavaScript include-esque services though, and so far this one seems very fast. Nice job!

  8. Lev Walkin

    November 29th, 2006 at 9:13 pm

    This one was designed to load the static script (no server taxing), then this script would pull in the comments asynchronously. No database lags will ever affect your site drastically.

  9. Laurent

    November 29th, 2006 at 9:33 pm

    This is very nice Lev. Congratulations.

  10. Faisal

    November 29th, 2006 at 10:21 pm

    Beautiful , really beautiful idea and service , i wish he gets funding so the services becomes reliable and scalable.

  11. Faisal

    November 29th, 2006 at 10:37 pm

    By the way , after playing with it a pit , i found its missing some basic features :

    1- Comments moderation

    2- Comments SPAM filter

    3- Distinguished admin comments (Like techcrunch green comments:) )

    4- Commenter site (link the site to the name)

    5- Option to show total number of comments on top , or under the post summary.

    This is what came to my mind.

  12. Lev Walkin

    November 29th, 2006 at 10:41 pm

    1. Comments moderation is there. Just create your own website and try it out. It’ll treat you as boss and you’ll have more features than the visitors.
    2. SPAM filter is under way.
    4. Is really related to #2.
    3. Need to think about it. Easy to do.
    5. Good idea, thank you!

    I am still developing bits and pieces, so feel free to email your suggestions directly to me.

  13. People Finder

    November 29th, 2006 at 11:01 pm

    And what happens if and when this site goes OOB? You loose all your comments

  14. Lev Walkin

    November 29th, 2006 at 11:22 pm

    What happens if Google goes OOB? You loose all your email, which is a bit worse.

    Comments is not content, it has a bit lower expectation of availability.

  15. Daniel

    November 29th, 2006 at 11:42 pm

    Nice script, Lev!
    I think you should release the script under open source licence while continuing seving script from you site. Sooner or later
    someone will come up similar open source script. Now you have firstcomer advantage an all the buzz is yours. Exploit this attention to become another WordPress of comments.

  16. Lev Walkin

    November 29th, 2006 at 11:57 pm

    The script is already open source.

  17. Martin Winkler

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:32 am

    What are the options for the webmaster Lev? I tried it at one of my German pages http://web4health.info/de/answ.....m-adhd.htm and I really would like to have it at more pages to allow a very very easy kind of discussion / comment.

    I really like the idea !!!!!

    Martin

  18. Lev Walkin

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:34 am

    Just add it to every web page of your site. It’ll just work.

  19. Darren

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:07 am

    Congratz I love this idea. Just shows you don’t needs a large amount of money to implement a good idea.

  20. Web2.0jump.in

    November 30th, 2006 at 5:05 am

    Super Idea! Great stuff. You’ve been added to the web2.0jump.in index!

  21. Jason McMinn

    November 30th, 2006 at 5:45 am

    Hey Lev!

    Awesome idea! How do I delete inappropriate comments / spam from the list on my site?

  22. Drew Olanoff

    November 30th, 2006 at 6:00 am

    Lev, I really really dig this. I just wanted to comment on something you said though:

    “Comments is not content, it has a bit lower expectation of availability.”

    Comments are most definitely content. There are many times where the thread of comments on a post or a website or a picture that are 10 times more interesting than the original posted content itself. And even if it’s not as interesting, it’s an important compliment and also validation.

    Again, great work on this, can’t wait to see it grow!

  23. Lev Walkin

    November 30th, 2006 at 6:15 am

    Jason, you can delete inappropriate comments by just clicking the “remove” link. You’ll have this link for every message, since you’re the webmaster of your own site (the system knows this).

  24. Tommy

    November 30th, 2006 at 7:49 am

    Hi Lev,

    I’m curious…_HOW_ does the system know who the webmaster is? Is it by IP or is there some special login for the webmaster? I’m just curious because I worry that someone else could be mistaken for webmaster if your code is a little “too clever” :)

  25. Michael Arrington

    November 30th, 2006 at 8:51 am

    Lev - “Comments is not content, it has a bit lower expectation of availability” - I disagree completely. Many, many TechCrunch readers have told me they have no interest in what we write, and they come to the blog only for the discussion in the comments. :-)

  26. Elliot

    November 30th, 2006 at 9:31 am

    I don’t think I would use this for ‘mainstream’ commenting on a site but this is superb for allowing designers/clients to share their thoughts on a website or app in production.

  27. garyL

    November 30th, 2006 at 10:46 am

    Why why why - when just about every content management system has a commenting system built-in?

    Also - your comments are dependent on a third party and they won’t get indexed by search engines.

    Ease of implementation isn’t worth reduced search engine visibility, more spam comments and the risk of relying on a third party.

  28. Jason Sperske

    November 30th, 2006 at 11:25 am

    I think the OpenID argument works here rather well. Not everything needs a fully indexed, search engine visible, super powered comment engine. Sometimes all you needs is a quick threaded comment system. This enables that. You know the code is open source, you can always download it, modify it to your needs and deploy it from your own server. Think long tail here. Imagine all of the static web pages out there that are not designed by web programers but could benefit from a simple threaded discussion system.

  29. rr

    November 30th, 2006 at 11:47 am


  30. rr

    November 30th, 2006 at 11:48 am

    cool

  31. zac

    November 30th, 2006 at 11:49 am

    omg wtf cool saucE>!>>!>?!?!?

  32. tester

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:15 pm

    Cool.

  33. JonD

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:31 pm

    “No account needed. Just one line of code. It takes care of the rest. I’d say that’s pretty damn different.”

    Haloscan.com requires a 20 second registration. Oh my goodness. You spent more time typing out that comment than it would take to register at Haloscan.

    Haloscan uses two lines of code and you can have an unlimited amount of separate comment pages in one page.

    And Haloscan has a ton more features and has a full-featured admin section–edit/delete comments, ban visitors, comment moderation, trackback support, (extremely good) spam filters. And haloscan has been around for years unlike this startup and I’d trust them with my comments than this amateur looking thing.

  34. Madd

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:37 pm

    PrettyDamn Sweet, love when someone pays for the hosting of free JavaScript.

  35. HoiPolloi

    November 30th, 2006 at 12:46 pm

    Just checking this out. Seems pretty cool.

  36. Lev Walkin

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:01 pm

    JonD,

    Haloscan is easier in some ways and a bit more complicated in others.
    It has tons of features. Js-Kit has a nice mascot.

    But that’s besides the point.

    Are you jealous, or what? Why there can’t be TWO systems, with one of them younger than the other? I don’t understand your position.

    When google started, there was already Yahoo and Altavista around, established pretty deeply. I am not trying to compare the substance, only reminding you that diversity is good.

  37. JonD

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:14 pm

    Lev Walkin: I wasn’t trying to insult you and am definitely not jealous but was simply pointing out some facts to “Tom” since “Media Blog” asked how its different from Haloscan (comment #4) and “Tom” (comment #5) replied that:

    “No account needed. Just one line of code. It takes care of the rest. I’d say that’s pretty damn different.”

    My comment above simply addressed those points by Tom and I agree diversity is good. I just don’t see how the js-kit site warranted any attention from Techcrunch considering it doesn’t bring anything new to the table.

  38. Lev Walkin

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:42 pm

    Understood.

    By the way, what did Google bring to the table? Besides a bit greater relevance to the user’s needs?

  39. Does it work

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:50 pm


  40. Lev Walkin

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:55 pm

    Michael,

    Regarding [“Comments is not content, it has a bit lower expectation of availability” - I disagree completely. Many, many TechCrunch readers have told me they have no interest in what we write, and they come to the blog only for the discussion in the comments.].

    The comments might be something that attracts the users, but it is not the particular comment that does it. It is the possibility to share thoughts.

    In this respect, there is no much difference between some comments and some other comments. Provided the large enough user base, the comments will be generated if they don’t exist, and will be re-generated if they are lost somewhere due to a technical glitch, or temporarily unavailable because of network problems.

    That is why I think of them as having “a bit lower expectation of availability”. That is, given the hard choice, what would you rather offload to a third-party JavaScript based service: the display of articles or the commenting engine?

    I think latter is a bit more acceptable candidate for that.

  41. Me

    November 30th, 2006 at 1:57 pm

    Wow

  42. hoaxMail

    November 30th, 2006 at 2:10 pm

    http://www.hoaxmail.co.uk - anonymous email and sms.

  43. Fnarf

    November 30th, 2006 at 3:30 pm

    What is it they put in bleach that makes it taste so funny?

  44. NICCAI

    November 30th, 2006 at 4:18 pm

    Nice, but it is a security risk. You need to be sure that the domain you are adding the script from is trusted. Otherwise you open your site up for Cross Site Scripting (XSS). By imbedding this code, the trusted domain could manipulate any page which has it embedded. With that said, it is a great way to add third party services to a site - like AdSense.

  45. David Mackey

    November 30th, 2006 at 8:17 pm

    This is a pretty nifty idea. I think it might just catch on.

  46. 0000la

    November 30th, 2006 at 10:03 pm

    HMMMM how it works?

  47. Alex

    December 1st, 2006 at 7:11 am

    Dev, have you figured out how to solve the problem of Google not being able to index the DHTML generate comments? An important part of people’s site is comments and want google to be able to index them, so I’d think that this is a big issue.

  48. Ham

    December 1st, 2006 at 9:10 am

    GIVE ME A DOLLAR

  49. jared

    December 1st, 2006 at 2:27 pm

    cool

  50. slava

    December 3rd, 2006 at 9:44 am

    I think, it may be interesting for sites on free hosting without PHP.

  51. Master

    December 3rd, 2006 at 12:31 pm

    Good post.

  52. Colm

    December 4th, 2006 at 10:22 am

    Hmmmmm, Lev, I used this script on my website, but it does not recognize me as webmaster and I cant remove comments.

    Possible solutions?

    Thanks

  53. Matt Tucker

    December 5th, 2006 at 6:34 pm

    We’ve had this feature in Jive Forums for quite some time: http://www.jivesoftware.com — we call it “community everywhere”. Definitely a nice way to add messaging capabilities in a simple way.

  54. Testyah

    December 15th, 2006 at 4:34 am

    schalom!

  55. K12

    December 15th, 2006 at 4:58 pm

    Why is this thing free? How much do you pay for the hosting and how do you plan to monetize this?

  56. xxdesmus

    December 29th, 2006 at 8:28 pm

    I just grabbed a copy of the JS and put it up on my own server, everything still works just fine. I don’t like the idea of fetching a script off someone’s remote server with every page load.

  57. Hammad

    January 1st, 2007 at 7:52 am

    Cool Lot people helping….What about JSPST

  58. Hammad

    January 1st, 2007 at 7:55 am

    there is a problem with utilizing WEP with JSPST anybody have any idea

  59. alain

    January 5th, 2007 at 5:43 am

    just cheking!!!

  60. sboj

    January 11th, 2007 at 7:44 am

    this is kool

  61. femikey

    January 23rd, 2007 at 10:53 am

    i used this comment code on my site and it works good, thanks js-kit! more power!

  62. Kevin

    January 23rd, 2007 at 12:09 pm

    nice, but how is this used?

  63. adf

    February 13th, 2007 at 12:44 pm

    j.d.s.
    http://www.burzs.com/edit/arg.php?id=14118

  64. Aşk

    February 13th, 2007 at 4:42 pm

    Good news, thanks

  65. dj

    February 21st, 2007 at 2:45 am

    test

  66. Annelisa

    February 21st, 2007 at 7:17 am

    I’m going to try it… sounds like a good idea, but a bit worried about the spam angle…

  67. Animose

    February 22nd, 2007 at 3:26 pm

    Ok, now What do I do?
    Seems really kewl. Good job mate.

  68. Ed Traxler

    February 24th, 2007 at 6:01 am

    Interesting. This is what I need, I think

  69. Fated Shadow Muse

    March 9th, 2007 at 12:49 pm

    Thank you for making my journey through the interwebs to look for this stupid code so much shorter. :3

  70. stress

    March 9th, 2007 at 7:06 pm

    very nice

  71. ansia

    March 9th, 2007 at 7:06 pm

    so good

  72. depressione

    March 9th, 2007 at 7:07 pm

    so cool!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  73. Christine

    March 10th, 2007 at 2:14 am

    Lev, I’m curious as well. HOW does the system know the webmaster? Like Tom said, is it the IP? Please answer. Please.

  74. Dmitry

    March 12th, 2007 at 2:22 pm

    Wow!
    I wanna try it immediatly! =)

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