July 23, 2014 - 10:45
unfinished is good, in a different way. i like it in terms of an evolution, but not in the way the nowness of the article ascribes. to respect the evolution of discussion, i think i would prefer reverse chronological order.
as a person who suffers from FOMO (fear of missing out) more often than i'd like, i can say with confidence that to follow a stream of discussion in this format, i would have a FOMO by only consuming the nowness/more recent posts. i think it defeats the purpose of the discussion-based format if others will only see my post, and not anne's, the post that inspired this one. it seems like taking the easy way out.
"The necessity of nowness plus the professionalization of content production for the stream means that there are thousands and thousands of people churning out more crap than can possibly be imagined." only seeing the partial picture (or being encouraged to because of the format) would hinder thoughtful engagement. i would hope for students to produce more "stock" than "flow."
one thing that bothers me about this article is that it acts as if this behavior is something we should just sit back and watch. i think we can challenge this way of thinking and foster dynamic discussion in doing so.