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Top-level
 @tinyrabbit My wish is to be able to reply to multiple toots, thus drawing a sprawling conversation back together. Then, additionally, have the ability to render the discussions as graphs, like this: https://www.solipsys.co.uk/Chartodon/106860815077351260.svg I've written a discussion system that lets you do that. It's currently find for small numbers of users, and extremely helpful, but pig-ugly, and very parochial. CC: @humanetech 18 comments
@tinyrabbit In what way do you see this discussion as different from how it would happen in a forum? To me, this is a forum ... in what way is it not? What do you mean by "A Forum"? CC: @humanetech @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech On a typical forum platform you have a thread-starting post, and then every other post is visible for every other poster. In this discussion I really only see our little break-out thread. If I want to see the whole thing it takes effort. This interface isn't centered around discussions; it's centered around individual posts. @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech And by "forum" I mean typical forum software like phpBB, XenForo, and similar. @tinyrabbit Right, so in what you're calling a "forum" you see literally a linear collection of posts, each being a comment in the thread. So if I want to reply to some comment further up the (single) thread, I somehow need to make that clear, and it's not in the structure. That's a trade-off, and I can see why it's a "Good Thing(tm)" in some contexts. I find that limitation extremely frustrating in more complex discussions. Equally, ... (1/2) CC: @humanetech @tinyrabbit ... I find the inability of platforms to provide a sensible and usable rendering of the more complex discussions *also* to be enormously frustrating. The platform I wrote as an experiment feels much more usable, but (a) it's pig-ugly, and (b) it's really not ready for a wider audience. If I had more 'net programming skillz then I think it would be the way to go, but I have neither the skillz nor the time. CC: @humanetech @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech To me this sort of discussion tree looks quite horrible 😆 I can't imagine the effort it takes to follow that discussion in all its branches, or how frustrated I would be to see virtually the same discussion taking place along a number of different paths. To me it looks like a great way to *socialize*, but a horribly inefficient way to *discuss*. @tinyrabbit That discussion tree would benefit from navigation tools, and I have those, and that makes it a real pleasure. Open some branches, close off others, hide nodes that don't really contribute, and you end up with the "Real Content" distilled. As I say, I don't have the skillz to make those tools more widely available, but the chart, when displayed on a decent size screen, can be scrolled around,and the many threads can easily be followed. Takes a little practice. CC: @humanetech @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech I imagine it could look and work similar to a thread-based forum platform (like UBB.threads for example). And the age-old battle between threaded view or flat view in forums has no objective winner, only different preferences 😄  > To me it looks like a great way to *socialize*, but a horribly inefficient way to *discuss*. If you refer to #fediverse ( #pleroma, #mastodon et al) then I fully agree with you here. And it is very frustrating to see how much good information is lost in unobserved branches that immediately sink into history to be forgotten about. @humanetech @ColinTheMathmo It's in the nature of social media to have low information density and short cycles, though. It's an ephemeral medium (and I don't really think we should hold on to posts forever). I've never understood why people try to use facebook (even facebook groups) or twitter for serious discussions. Each to their own, I guess, but it doesn't work well for me. @tinyrabbit This is why I create the charts. I started using the original C2 wiki shortly after it was invented, and the original idea was to have free-flowing, free wheeling "Discussion Mode" pages which, over time, got distilled down into "Document Mode" pages that captured the information in a form appropriate for future reference. It worked beautifully, until it got too big, and was invaded by people who refused to be enculturated. So it died. To me ... CC: @humanetech @tinyrabbit ...I see many discussions and exchanges on "Social Media" that have really, *really* useful information scattered in the social exchanges, and I want to capture that knowledge for my future reference. So I've developed tools to help me do that. Charting discussions here is a part of that. Serious discussions don't belong on FB, Twitter, or here, but they don't really belong in "forums" either, because again, the actual information is lost amongst the "discussion". CC: @humanetech @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech I've had similar thoughts to your "Discussion Mode" wiki; my idea was to have a forum platform where some users have the role Curator. After a certain time of inactivity in a thread the Curators would be notified of it, and if they deemed the topic/conclusions/posts to be worth the effort they could mark posts in the thread for archival. It would then remove all other posts, change all the usernames in the thread to Anonymous, and set the thread as read-only. 1/2 @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech Of course more advanced export features could be added in order to transform fruitful and informative discussions into persistent information. 2/2 @tinyrabbit In the original C2 wiki that's what happened, but there were no "admins" or "advanced users". That was fine in a small community, but it's abundantly clear that wider access needs to be controlled. Heavily. People don't like to be censored, though, and don't like their words to be changed, and their "contributions" to be discarded, so there are problems. And now people say: "But we have wikipedia ... why bother?" But yes, to all you've said. CC: @humanetech @tinyrabbit With a little effort in the reading, @Chartodon is doing quite well with this widely branching discussion: https://www.solipsys.co.uk/Chartodon/106860815077351260.svg As I say, I have tools to collapse nodes and branches, and may eventually distill the conversation, but even so, I'm finding it useful. CC: @humanetech @ColinTheMathmo @humanetech Also: your tool is probably a great help if the goal is to curate and archive information when a discussion has run its course. I can really see the benefit of using it there. |
Gregory's Server
@ColinTheMathmo @humanetech I guess this all comes back to how one likes to discuss things online. Fediverse is only functional for shorter discussions, imho. I prefer forums for longer discussions, and in forums I prefer flat views rather than threaded views.