TypedThreadedDiscussion

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An idea for a DebateTool. (Also discussed here : http://www.nooranch.com/synaesmedia/wiki/wiki.cgi?TypedThreadedDiscussion)

This is a simple threaded discussion forum, but one where contributors are required to give each posting a "type" selected from the following set : ("counter-argument", "counter-example", "gainsay", "supporting argument", "supporting example", "agreement", "extrapolation", "exegesis", "summary", "reminds me that", "joke", "troll", "garbage") to describe the relation to the parent post.

Some points :

"garbage" would be the default, forcing the user to choose another type

all comments would be displayed, but would be sorted by type. (Ordered as above)

moderators would be able to change the type of a comment, but not it's contents nor remove it.

There's a basic sketch of TypedThreadedDiscussion up and running [here](Link was broken, but it's now fixed). It's very preliminary but demonstrates the idea. I invite everyone to come and play with it. I'd be interested to see how it compares to ordinary threaded discussion.

-- PhilJones

I like the idea a lot. See also Ka Ping Yee's [CritIcons], the IBIS ML, and the other dialog mapping links below. I like your more detailed types, though. Discussions from your system could be fed right into other DialogMapping? types of databases if discussions, with types, could be exported to something like [ThreadML]. I don't like the idea of unchanged comments being "garbage", though --- my preference is that as you add more power to a program, try do it in such a way so that users who don't want to deal with the extra complexity can ignore it and pretend the new feature isn't there. And people don't like to be insulted by their computer. -- BayleShanks

Similar but different: I once made up ThoughtMarkupIcons. -- LionKimbro

Similar but different: CollaborativeCriticism and [CriticalResponse]. Why not let the TypedThreadedDiscussion and the types be emergent? Following the example of a wiki, the types and the discussion markup could be determined by the participating community.

Links

http://www.visualizingargumentation.info/
[Argumentation Mapping]
DialogMapping? ([at SSA:dialog_mapping])
DialogMapping? ontologies:
[KaPingYee's CritIcons]

Not exactly threaded, but I saw an interesting very simple variant on this idea in FlexWiki -- a TextFormattingRule? that if you have a new line followed by a single word and a colon, it puts that wiki paragraph into an HTML fieldset tag with a CSS style that makes it look different. This allows for Question: Answer: Summary: Analysis: Keywords:, etc. to be typed information. Interestingly, if they recognize the type as being something useful for html metadata, they'll copy that information into that page's metadata. For an example page see http://www.flexwiki.com/default.aspx/FlexWiki.ExamplePropertyPage -- ChristopherAllen

CategoryInformationVisualization

CategorySocialSoftware CategoryCollaboration

CategoryUnimplementedWikiTechnology