You remember the blog comment? Back in the day, it was the thing to do on social media. What a novelty to opine, correct, rant or inform about a published article in real-time to a global audience.

Then along came Twitter and Facebook, and the comment got shoved into the corner like an old toy with chipped paint and a missing wheel. There have been valiant efforts to resuscitate the comment by start-ups such as Disqus and IntenseDebate but the comment remains a social media second-class citizen (arguably along with the podcast).

But is there new hope for the comment? Does the launch of Facebook Comments mean the comment could regain some of its lost lustre? While it has only been a week since some blogs were able to start using it, Facebook Comments shows interesting and intriguing potential.

Putting aside any issues you may have with Facebook gaining access to even more of your data (no small task given the magnitude of Mark Zuckerberg’s ambitions), Facebook Comments has a real shot of revitalizing the blog comment because it offers a new way to provide it with a universal platform. Rather than being stuck inside a blog post, a Facebook-powered comment benefits from the social clout of that having more than 600 million users offers.

For bloggers, it means the dividend of attracting a comment – no small task in the scheme of things – can be distributed to a much wider audience, who can then discover the comment and, hopefully, click through to the blog. Given comments are one of the things that sustains most bloggers, the ability to use a comment system on steroids is a serious temptation – even if means selling your soul to the devil.

For people who leave comments, Facebook Comments provides a much broader platform to have their opinions seen and read. You have to understand the blog commenter is a strange beast. Not only do they read blog posts but many actually leave insightful commentary. It’s an investment of time and energy, which is why their efforts are so appreciated by bloggers who slog away with little financial reward.

Of course, there is no such thing as a free lunch, and Facebook Comments come with a pretty high price tag. For bloggers, it means surrendering your comment system and its data to Facebook. For commenters, it means there’s no such thing as an anonymous comment. As well, a comment can appear on Facebook as well as other blogs using Facebook Comments so there’s no such thing as just leaving a comment for a particular forum.

Facebook Comments may not be perfect and it may not be the best solution to the plight of the blog comment, but it does illustrate a new approach to bring the blog comment back from the social backwaters.

One final note: You’ll see that I’m not using Facebook Comments despite some of the benefits it offers. Why not? The biggest obstacle is I have little interest in giving more information to Facebook. Second, I want to control and manage my comments, which is I’ve tried and backed away from Disqus and IntenseDebate.

For more thoughts about Facebook Comments, check out TechCrunch, which has has discovered the critics and trolls have strangely disappeared.

Smashing Magazine also has a lengthy and insightful post with the provocative title “Where Have All the Comments Gone?”. Robert Cringely weighs in on how Facebook Comments is another blow to the loss of anonymity on the Web.