Doesn't work if the newspaper publishes total nonsense and smarter or better informed comments point that out, which is 50% of the value of comments.
I'm pretty sure a big part of the reason the Guardian stopped opening comments on most stories was the cost of 'moderation', except the reason their moderation costs were so high is that their moderators would routinely plough through comments by hand to remove people pointing out mistakes or absurd statements by the journalists, and as the Guardian changed over the years the articles became ever more extremist, so that started to be most comments. That is, they defined making their own staff look bad as abuse (regardless of whether it was written in vitriolic style).
Even now if you go read one of the few open threads they have, you can find commenters pointing out logical or factual problems with the column.
I'm pretty sure a big part of the reason the Guardian stopped opening comments on most stories was the cost of 'moderation', except the reason their moderation costs were so high is that their moderators would routinely plough through comments by hand to remove people pointing out mistakes or absurd statements by the journalists, and as the Guardian changed over the years the articles became ever more extremist, so that started to be most comments. That is, they defined making their own staff look bad as abuse (regardless of whether it was written in vitriolic style).
Even now if you go read one of the few open threads they have, you can find commenters pointing out logical or factual problems with the column.