I don’t know the explanation for the difference. Several possibilities present themselves—some reflect poorly on me, some on you, some on both or neither of us.
I’ve definitely facepalmed reading rationalists commenting on FB.
My guess is that it’s not “Facebook” that’s the relevant factor, but “Facebook + level of privacy.”
Comments on Public posts are abysmal. Comments on my friends-only posts, sadly, get out of hand too; although not quite as bad as Public. Comments on curated private lists and groups with <300 people on them have been quite good, IME, and have high quality density. (Obviously depends though. Not all groups with those params have this feature.)
LW is very clearly better than some of these. But I think it compares poorly to the well-kept gardens.
(( I am making these points separately from the ‘echo chamber’ concern. ))
Huh. I’ve generally had very good conversations on my Facebook statuses, and all of my statuses are Public by default. But I also aggressively delete unproductive comments (which I don’t have to do very often), and also I generally don’t try to talk about demon thread-y topics on Facebook.
On this, sadly, I cannot speak—I do not have a Facebook account myself, so I am privy to none of these private / friends-only / curated / etc. conversations. It may be as you say.
Of course, if that’s so, then that can’t be replicated on Less Wrong—since here, presumably, every post is public!
I’ve definitely facepalmed reading rationalists commenting on FB.
My guess is that it’s not “Facebook” that’s the relevant factor, but “Facebook + level of privacy.”
Comments on Public posts are abysmal. Comments on my friends-only posts, sadly, get out of hand too; although not quite as bad as Public. Comments on curated private lists and groups with <300 people on them have been quite good, IME, and have high quality density. (Obviously depends though. Not all groups with those params have this feature.)
LW is very clearly better than some of these. But I think it compares poorly to the well-kept gardens.
(( I am making these points separately from the ‘echo chamber’ concern. ))
Huh. I’ve generally had very good conversations on my Facebook statuses, and all of my statuses are Public by default. But I also aggressively delete unproductive comments (which I don’t have to do very often), and also I generally don’t try to talk about demon thread-y topics on Facebook.
On this, sadly, I cannot speak—I do not have a Facebook account myself, so I am privy to none of these private / friends-only / curated / etc. conversations. It may be as you say.
Of course, if that’s so, then that can’t be replicated on Less Wrong—since here, presumably, every post is public!