As someone who recently took part in a LONG debate with Mr. Spool on this forum, I'm a bit sheepish about weighing in here, but I kind of feel compelled to react. In fact, that experience was actually somewhat frustrating from my point of view as an active participant in the debate - mainly because a forum (not just this one - any forum) is a terrible tool for ongoing debates that involve multiple parties. The format encourages a kind of "last-word" mentality that can be irritating to experience from outside the discussion itself.
However, at least in the particular case I'm referring to, several people told me (outside the forum) that they found the debate to be interesting, and that the back-and-forthing highlighted aspects of the issue (eyetracking, in this case) which they hadn't considered. Go figure. So, I guess there are a lot of factors that will determine whether someone is interested or not in a particular discussion - many of them subjective to the reader. Now, I'm all in favor of the "don't post too much every day / week" rule - as in: give other people a chance to add their opinion to the mix. That's sensible and courteous. However, I think there is *potential* value in a 20 post dialogue between 2 people - if those 2 people are actually progressing the debate instead of restating the same thing over and over. And assuming they are not crowding out other views. In any case, given how easy it is to simply ignore or delete a thread - I propose that we err on the side of tolerance and openness. The quickest way to kill this forum (quicker even than a bunch of constant-posting blowhards) will be to make everyone feel that the frequency (and, by implication, the quality) of their posting is being judged by all the experts out there as being worthy or not. It's my personal opinion that our profession is playing dangerously close to an unappealing and unproductive form of elitism these days... I'd hate to see this board (or this organization) embrace that direction in its policies regarding public debate. Just my $.02. NG . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=45693 ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [email protected] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
