Lots of websites are shutting down comment sections, chess.com should too.

Damn!

lol

The sites shutting down comment sections are the problem, not the ability to comment.  They probably hate that we have the First Amendment that protects our freedom of speech. It's because of all these indoctrinated wimps that can't handle "offenses" and need the word police to come to their rescue. If people want to show their ignorance, stupidity, arrogance, whatever it is through forums, let them, because on the flip side we get to see intelligent debates/conversations also that people really learn from.  Everyone loves to talk until someone disagrees with them, then all the sudden they shouldn't be allowed to speak. Deal with it, let freedom of speech from all sides roll on!  

Really? Where? Tell me now, quick! Gimme a link. Can't wait. Come on already. Please.

People who post on forums are generally an extremely small percentage of the total number of people who visit the website.   The majority of posts are made by a relatively few number of people who post to the forums at all.  (In the current stretch Whip_Kitten and JamieDelarosa and a few others.)  

The impact on the customer base at large would be neglible.   I agree with the OP.  There is so much display of ignorance, stupidity, bad manners, and useless nattering it serves no good purpose providing a forum enabling people to endulge in their narcissistic behaviours.   

I'm all for shutting it down.

First Amendment

The First Amendment is silent on the preference for Bishops or Knights.

Look at the points, sweetie.  I'm never on the front page of "Most active members", even with all the admin stuff I do.

Vexacious trolls frequently make it ... before I get rid of them.

http://www.chess.com/members/search?mostactive=1

I've recently played a few games on another site that used to have the most active chess forums on the internet. They are dead now, but not shut down.

I did have a post removed last week that mentioned chess.com. 

The First Amendment is silent on the preference for Bishops or Knights.

. . .not to mention what strictly private parties do with respect to social consequences for speech they dislike--including closing down discussion forums that get out of hand. The government, and hence the First Amendment, are nowhere implicated in this debate.  

The FA protects us from government censorship; it's not a hall pass to escape all consequences of ones speech acts.  Why it's even mentioned in this context baffles me as a lawyer, and, more importantly, truly saddens me as a human being.  Aside from just the shoddy but common misunderstanding of the Bill of Rights, it also proves Bear Bryant's old quip that most cannot distinguish between freedom and license.

Good post!!

I recall John Calvin saying something like that. Bear Bryant was probably quoting Calvin.

Calvin was concerned about the gaudy costumes favored by some archers. 

So you basically want to tell everybody your opinion and you dont want to hear anybody say any different? Sounds like my baby mama.

The only reason I'm still at chess.com is its forum. What really keeps chess.com on the top is that it is a social enterprise rather than being merely a platform that allows playing online games.

If the only thing you want to do is playing on a high quality user interface at a liquid site, this can be done open source. And it has been done. Interestingly the open source site that does it at a very high level, has an explicit policy to keep forums minimal. Just as the OP demands.

Now, I just don't like this policy. I hate when I cannot post a picture in the forum, I cannot format the text, I cannot even edit my posts. Also the forum is not liquid. This is absurd.

So I now have the optimal mix: play completely free on a very high quality user interface and post in a high quality forum also for free. This is paradise.

It's paradise for certain category of people.  Just not a very large percentage of people fit in that category.

What is there, about 500,000 people who have signed up for chess.com?

Probably less than 1000 active posters on the forum give or take 500?

Look, I know what the top chess sites are. Alexa ranking. Simple.

I post at the first and play at the second. Simple.

I highly doubt I could entertain you with any as you are only out to look for the negative side.  And if you weren't, you wouldn't need me to show you, there are plenty. This thread started is obviously not one of them and you posted (seemingly in favor of) in the very thing you want removed, hypocrisy at its best. 

I was expecting something about the right to Bear arms.  

Are the 2nd ten amendments the Bill of Lefts?

sorry.

Is this question of numerical sufficiency?  Should chess.com shut down blogs because only a handful of members write and read them?  Should chess.com do away with articles because seldom does any one article attract 15,000 readers?  Are features only valuable if they appeal to some arbitray number or percentage of members?  

Of all the features on chess.com, the forums are the most interactive and lively. Eliminating forums would devolve chess.com into the stodgy, stagnated carcass that many less auspicious sites have become.