Today, Disqus is wisely responding, letting its customers know that they will soon be integrating Facebook Connect. According to a blog post from CEO Daniel Ha, the service will add support for Connect by the end of the year, allowing readers on blogs with Disqus installed - which now numbers more than 45,000 - to login using their Facebook credentials, and have the comments they post sent to Facebook.
Problem solved for Disqus? Maybe. The service still has lots of advantages over simply integrating Facebook Connect into your blog, like giving users their own profile to keep track of their comments, easy installation including a WordPress plugin, video integration with Seesmic, and support for trackbacks. And, turning on Facebook Connect will apparently be as easy as checking a box and entering your Facebook API key in your Disqus account settings.
That said, it’s hard to argue that Facebook Connect on its own isn’t a competitor to Disqus and services like it (IntenseDebate, SezWho, JS-Kit, etc.). Connect has the significant advantage of having the brand recognition of Facebook, so it will now be the comment plugin services job to actively market the added benefits of their products, now that they are hugely outnumbered in terms of potential users.
For more on why adding Facebook Connect is so key to Disqus, check out Svetlana Gladkova post on the subject from last week.