I think it's more like my doctor telling me I'm going to be examined by a different doctor at my appointment, right before my examination starts.

Suspicious? Of what?

You think people on the internet need a reason to be suspicious of changes to how they log in to online systems made within hours of their announcement?

Well, not to be the crazy conspiracy guy, but changing over to a whole new comment system, with literally hours notice, but reminding everyone that they could always just use their already-existing Facebook or Twitter account instead does seem like it might just encourage a lot of people who don't really understand the privacy implications of using their Facebook or Twitter accounts to log in to non-Facebook/Twitter services to do so nonetheless.

I wouldn't recommend people use their Facebook account to log in to ANYTHING that's not Facebook, and while I'm sure there's no great conspiracy there, I can certainly see why someone's eyebrow would be raised, particularly since the current system only recently started prompting us to consider sharing every single comment we make on Facebook, every time we comment. I know that Macleans is just using this social network as a means to provide a convenient service that users want, but I'm not naive to the fact that from Zuckerberg's point of view it's just one more vector to get that much more data about everything I ever do or say online, so that he can use that data himself, or sell it to the highest bidder (not my individual personal data of course, but the records of my habits and thoughts aggregated with those of my family and friends, and tied to information about who I am, where I live, what I like...).

This is why I said it's a bad idea to roll out a major change to an online site that people log in to without at least a few days notice first.

So, my actual use of the word "hyperbolic" in my post gave no indication that I my rhetoric was deliberately hyperbolic?

As I said, my problems not so much with Macleans announcing "Here are the changes and why we're making them", it's with Macleans announcing "Here are the changes we're implementing in the next few hours, and why we're making them".

Sure, but you couldn't announce the decision you've come to a week before implementing it? A day even? I'm not saying that you even should have asked for our input. You SHOULDN'T design by committee. However, "Here's the change we've decided on, and the switch over should be happening in the next few hours" just doesn't seem like good PR. I don't think that commenters need to know months in advance what's about to happen to one of their favourite places to comment, but people who check the site once every two or three days shouldn't ever show up to some big change without having any idea it was going to happen before it happened.

What I find fascinating about the Cabinet photo example is that one of the newspapers involved didn't simply remove the two female Cabinet Ministers, but REPLACED THEM WITH TWO MEN. Which begs the question (not addressed in the article) which two men did the newspaper insert into Netanyahu's cabinet???

First, let me say goodbye to all of the dozens of commenters (some of whom are quite good) who are surely about to disappear.

Second, I agree with several people above that some of these changes are decidedly not for the best, but let's see how it goes before criticizing too harshly.

Third, however, let me just say that the roll-out of these changes, such as it is, is terrible. Macleans has one of the most thriving, and imho one of the BEST communities of commenters in all of Canada. I don't mean to get all uppity, but is it really too much to ask that major changes like this not be rolled out with no more notice than a single blog post mere hours before implementation? I feel like I had better advanced notice that President Obama was about to announce the killing of Osama bin Laden. These changes may end up being great, or they may ruin the place, who knows, but I don't think online social communities like these are the place to be making sweeping changes with little notice to the people effected, even if the changes are all to the good. It kinda feels like you just showed up at our village, announced the great plans you have to improve the village by taking it all down and rebuilding it on higher and more stable ground, and oh, by the way, the bulldozers will be here in a few hours. Even if the plan is to give us all nicer and bigger houses in a better location, you couldn't have given us more than a few hours to pack up our stuff and say goodbey to the old place? We have to literally hear the engines of the bulldozers in the background while you're making the announcement over the megaphone?

I suppose that's all a bit hyperbolic, but still, given the quality of what's been built here (imho) why rush?

Finally, like others above, I will say nice and early that I think separating the comments from the articles is a BAD IDEA. So, on that score I don't feel I need to "wait and see" before saying "booooooo!".

I'm quite certain that chet doesn't get paid.

You don't have to pay robots.

Then again... Rob Anders.

it will also allow all the opposition parties to actually oppose things without having to worry if it will be put to the test of a confidence vote

Plus, for the first time in a long time NO ONE has to worry about who's getting support from the Bloc. I think that even a lot of Tory supporters giddy from the majority win might agree that the decimation of the Bloc is arguably the best thing that happened last night.

LOL, good point.