We’re making a few changes to how our WordPress.com automatic login feature works on the backend and we have temporarily disabled it.  Users are still able to log in to IntenseDebate manually using their WordPress.com account both at IntenseDebate.com and in the comment sections on your site.  Auto-login will be returning very soon and will work the same as it did before once it’s back.  We apologize for the inconvenience.

We are extremely excited to introduce WordPress.com user accounts and auto-login to IntenseDebate and open up the debate to more than 12 million commenters and bloggers.  Now WordPress.com users can comment on IntenseDebate-enabled websites anywhere on the Web without having to re-enter their account information.

While we’ve added Facebook Connect and Twitter Sign-In support, there are still too many steps and mouse clicks between you and posting a comment. We’re all about making commenting easier and more accessible to as many people as possible, and we think you’ll agree that this is a huge leap forward.  Commenting with IntenseDebate is now easier, faster, and simpler.

WordPress.com users post nearly 400,000 new comments every day, and now they are all automatically logged in to comment on your blog. And that’s not to mention the addition of over 20,000 new users every day!

So what does this mean for you?

• If you’re a WordPress.com user and you’re logged into your account, then you’ll automatically be logged into IntenseDebate as well.  All you have to do is type your comment and hit submit.
• You can login with your WordPress.com account directly from the comment section and at IntenseDebate.com.
• If you already have an IntenseDebate account then you can just keep on commenting as normal.

This means that unlike Facebook Connect and Twitter Sign-In, there are no extra clicks, and no need to remember another set of login credentials. It also means that more than 12 million WordPress.com users will be able to comment on your blog with full-fledged IntenseDebate profiles, without having to create an account or enter any details. How’s that for motivating the conversation?

Better yet, since these profiles aren’t third-party accounts, you (and all your new users) will have access to all of the awesome features that IntenseDebate is famous for: email notifications, reply-by-email, reputation scores, comment voting, comment history, Twitter integration, and more.

If you already have both IntenseDebate and WordPress.com accounts, don’t worry – we will be merging your accounts in the next phase of our integration, so keep commenting!

Commenting on your site just got a whole lot easier for millions of existing bloggers and commenters.

Welcome to the debate WordPress.com lovers!

I’ve received a lot of emails lately from IntenseDebate users interested in moving their blog from Blogger to WordPress, along with their IntenseDebate comments. Moving your IntenseDebate comments from one blog platform to another may seem like a simple task, but the changes in post ID and URL structures can lead to some difficulties.

Luckily our good buddy and fellow Boulderite, Josh Fraser, wrote an excellent plugin for moving your IntenseDebate comments from Blogger to WordPress. Josh’s plugin has been around for some time now (over a year!) and it’s been tested pretty thoroughly – so far it has performed flawlessly (a testament of Josh’s coding wizardry).

So, if you’re planning on moving from Blogger to WordPress, you can download Josh’s Blogspot2WP plugin at http://www.intensedebate.com/misc/blogspot2wp.zip. You’ll need to install it the old-fashioned way, via your FTP client, and drop it in your WP-Content → Plugins folder. Make sure you install, activate, and run the Blogspot2WP plugin before you install the IntenseDebate WordPress plugin. Give us a shout at support@intensedebate.com with any questions.

Please note: IntenseDebate is and will always be platform agnostic, and will always be available for use with any CMS and blog platform.

Some info if you’re interested in moving your blog from Blogger to WordPress:
Making the transition is pretty painless thanks to the Blogger importer built-in to the WordPress core. You can use the importer to transfer all of your Blogger posts, native Blogger comments, and users.  The importer is available in your WordPress admin panel under Tools → Import → Blogger. You can learn more about importing in the WordPress Codex.

We recently reached a major milestone for the IntenseDebate WordPress plugin: we’ve passed 100,000 downloads of our plugin through the WordPress repository!

Even cooler yet, that statistic does not include the total number of Blogger, Typepad, Movable Type, Tumblr, Joomla, Squarespace, iWeb, Ning, Omeka, Drupal, or Generic installs of IntenseDebate.

Thanks for your continued support and for helping us spread the word about IntenseDebate.  Here’s to the next 100,000!

We will be closing support for two days this week in order to spend time with our families whilst trying not to overcook the turkey, coping with relatives, and staying sane (err… warm).

Support will be unavailable from 8pm EST on December 23rd to 8am EST on December 26th. Of course our systems include monitoring and our network/operations folks are always here, keeping an eye on the debate.

Happy holidays!
The Fellas at IntenseDebate