Live data from Hacker News

StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

wired.com

81–86 of 86 posts

Re: StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

#81

No nesting. Is this 2004? How are you supposed to follow a conversation more than two posts deep? This is PHPBB with more javascript.

Turns out people are actually very, very good at following a conversation. They hold the state in their heads. Try going to a bar and sitting at a table with eight or nine people at it. If you could write a transcript you'd see the conversation spiralling, branching, merging and branching again. And nobody gets lost. All a forum has to do is record who said something and in what order. Threading is a ridiculous "solu…

Isn't that an oversimplification?

Say a newcomer joins the conversation (at the bar) halfway through. He is missing a lot of context. His kind friends would then fill him in, unlike the internet.

A threading like structure however, allows you to quickly scan the parent, and if need be the parent's parent. It's within the user's perogative to choose how much information he needs to be caught up.

That being said, I'm very open minded about seeing the new approach develop. Heavily nested threads are a far from perfect solution.

Re: StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

#82
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nesting (and reordering by votes or activity) works well for divergent discussions: expressing views, exploring the possibility space, brainstorming. Or: exhibition . Flat (and stably ordered by time) offers some hope for a convergence of viewpoints, or at least shared-narrative and common-knowledge. Or: deliberation .

How about: Nesting: discussions converging towards separation, isolation, protectionism and flamewar ;) Flat: discussions converging towards consent. EDIT: Getting downvotes, but face the facts: HN, Reddit are pretty exceptional. Look at the legacy from the 90s and try to proof me wrong.

You can't just declare evidence against your claim "exceptional". Reddit has a large userbase, and includes numerous communities. Nested discussion seems to work pretty well for it.

Re: StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

#83
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about: Nesting: discussions converging towards separation, isolation, protectionism and flamewar ;) Flat: discussions converging towards consent. EDIT: Getting downvotes, but face the facts: HN, Reddit are pretty exceptional. Look at the legacy from the 90s and try to proof me wrong.

You can't just declare evidence against your claim "exceptional". Reddit has a large userbase, and includes numerous communities. Nested discussion seems to work pretty well for it.

Yes I can!

The point is this: reddit has a certain demographic that you don't find on most websites: mostly tech geeks that embrace modern web technology and a very high proportion of programmers. On the other hand look at slashdot, horrible discussions, just a random pile of opinions with many flame wars.

That said, discussions in News forums (news paper, news agencies etc) are often very stupid or unpolite. But I have seen that they are at least slightly more polite in flat forums. There is less repetition and if someone complains about unpoliteness, this is taken more seriously by the followups. Of course flat forums are way more work for the commentator because he needs to read all the posts that were before and make conclusions based on them. This can be next to impossible on an article's comment section with high load.

Re: StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

#84
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't just declare evidence against your claim "exceptional". Reddit has a large userbase, and includes numerous communities. Nested discussion seems to work pretty well for it.

Yes I can! The point is this: reddit has a certain demographic that you don't find on most websites: mostly tech geeks that embrace modern web technology and a very high proportion of programmers. On the other hand look at slashdot, horrible discussions, just a random pile of opinions with many flame wars. That said, discussions in News forums (news paper, news agencies etc) are often very stupid or unpolite. But I h…

I think reddit's moderation system has more to do with the relative success of its discussions than its audience. Are you implying Slashdot didn't have a high proportion of programmers?

Re: StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

#85

No nesting. Is this 2004? How are you supposed to follow a conversation more than two posts deep? This is PHPBB with more javascript.

Turns out people are actually very, very good at following a conversation. They hold the state in their heads. Try going to a bar and sitting at a table with eight or nine people at it. If you could write a transcript you'd see the conversation spiralling, branching, merging and branching again. And nobody gets lost. All a forum has to do is record who said something and in what order. Threading is a ridiculous "solu…

There are some parts of a conversation I don't want to follow.

Threads allow me to skip them faster than any other method.

Re: StackExchange Founder Vows to Reinvent Online Discourse

#86
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I can! The point is this: reddit has a certain demographic that you don't find on most websites: mostly tech geeks that embrace modern web technology and a very high proportion of programmers. On the other hand look at slashdot, horrible discussions, just a random pile of opinions with many flame wars. That said, discussions in News forums (news paper, news agencies etc) are often very stupid or unpolite. But I h…

I think reddit's moderation system has more to do with the relative success of its discussions than its audience. Are you implying Slashdot didn't have a high proportion of programmers?

Yes, at least a lower proportion than Reddit. But maybe I'm wrong.
Post reply on HN