Good point about not aiming for comments and other things overall, since having password protected entries does result in majority of the visitors to go away unsatisfied. I wonder if such bloggers, who use password protected entries, actually realize that they are losing visitors or even friends in that manner, or if they realize it and they only care or focus on the readers who do have the passwords.

Business wise, you are right too; people would feel like customers, and they would feel that they either can afford to pay, or that they would simply go somewhere else. Hmmm, I thought whale videos were premium content too? And yes, it is indeed more about the money than a password on many commercial websites. Even a personal website which revolves something, or maybe anything, related to passwords around the concept of money in probably any form or many forms, can probably be considered a commercial website because it is also aiming for money.

Some newspaper websites, like NY Times or LA Times may require people to register with their site before they can view anything, which does indeed become frustrating. For passwords to many popular sites, check this website out:

Bug Me Not

Interesting, isn’t it? I have been thinking of starting a similar website myself. It allows you to use the already created usernames/passwords to log into many famous websites, so you don’t have to create a dummy username/password yourself.

You do have a “The Reasoner account“, right? 0_0

Anonymous 1, thanks for the comment. A question: do you have passworded accounts on commercial sites?

Yes, password-protected entries can be annoying sometimes, specially if it becomes hard to find out forgotten passwords on many websites. However, the issue of forgetting passwords can be something that a website cannot be blamed for, unless a website makes it very hard to retrieve forgotten usernames or passwords.

Thanks again.

On personal blogging sites, I think it can let you feel safer to have passworded entries. But I also think, if one were to have passworded entries, they also wouldn’t be one to care a great deal about comments, hits, visitors etc. Sometimes you can’t expect visitors continue happily visiting and commenting, when half the visitors don’t have access to whatever is on the other side of those little asterisks. They may feel… shunned, maybe, and not bother since they don’t get the ‘whole package’.

On commercial sites, or pay-for content, I don’t think people would complain as much. They may think “Damnit, Why don’t they have this stuff for free? I just wanna see the whale, -cry-”. But if it really is ‘premium’ content, such as cheats/edits for games, software, online services (such as someone making content or layouts for you), then you can expect some $$ involved. Actually, that’s more about the money than the password huh.

Hmmm. Well, some passworded entries or information you can only get if you subscribe/make an account with that website. Which can be frustrating if you just need something for research or some little piece of info, but you have to go through the whole she-bang to make an account. Then never use it again. That could be annoying.