Until the upgrade to 3.2, I used a script that allowed me to open and close comments and trackbacks for multiple entries at once. This worked great.
However, because of the changes to the way comments and trackbacks are handled in 3.2, the script no longer functioned. Fortunately, there's the AcceptCommentsPings plugin to the rescue.
After you install the plugin, go to your entries listing and select some entries. Then click on the "More actions" drop-down menu. You can select to accept comments, accept pings, accept comments and pings, unaccept comments, unaccept pings, or unaccept comments and pings. So if you need to open or close comments or trackbacks on a number of entries at once, just go to the entries listing, select all the entries you want to change, then choose the desired option and click Go.
Very neat. I'm glad to have this functionality back. MT 3.2 has a kill switch that allows you to override blog and entry settings and shut down comments and trackbacks across the entire system at once. But if you just want to shut them off on some older entries, it doesn't work very well. AcceptCommentsPings does.