"Can you think of any reasons it might not be a good idea to “lock” the icon until the reader is past the 30-second mark?" LOL. Believe it or not, I didn't even realize there was a clap button at the top of the page. I know it's obvious that some people are merely clapping and running, but I just assumed they scrolled to the bottom of the story to do it. Hell yes! Make that darn button disabled until at least after 30 seconds. It sounds like common sense to me :-)