I’ve been ignoring Open Threads throughout my time on LW, but I’ve found out recently that this was to my detriment. While there is much noise (i.e., stuff I personally don’t care about), there are some genuinely interesting things here.
At the same time, I feel like Discussion for me has just died out and no longer has anything interesting, apart from the Open Threads.
The problem (for me), is that Discussion was very easy to follow, while Open Threads are very hard to follow.
Is there an easier way to follow Open Threads? And/or a way we could start moving some of the Open Thread stuff back to Discussion?
As MathiasZaman said, there is a big push right now to move OT content back into Discussion, and from the increased volume I’m seeing in Discussion lately, I think it’s succeeding.
I think discussion would be more useful if the threads were sorted by something like reddit’s ‘hot’ algorythm, rather than being just displayed in order of posting, which causes good threads to be buried by duller new ones.
Open threads are sort of like this as they are essentially “top posts this week”
The default is “Best,” not “New.” It appears to me to be dominated by old threads. “Hot” has probably been renamed “Leading” and could be made default, but I doubt you are actually seeing the default.
I’ve been ignoring Open Threads throughout my time on LW, but I’ve found out recently that this was to my detriment. While there is much noise (i.e., stuff I personally don’t care about), there are some genuinely interesting things here.
At the same time, I feel like Discussion for me has just died out and no longer has anything interesting, apart from the Open Threads.
The problem (for me), is that Discussion was very easy to follow, while Open Threads are very hard to follow.
Is there an easier way to follow Open Threads? And/or a way we could start moving some of the Open Thread stuff back to Discussion?
As MathiasZaman said, there is a big push right now to move OT content back into Discussion, and from the increased volume I’m seeing in Discussion lately, I think it’s succeeding.
There has recently been a push towards having more discussion in Discussion as opposed to the Open Thread, so your problem might already be solved.
There is an RSS feed, I don’t know if you consider that easier.
If you find something excellent in OT, you could mention it in a Good Stuff from OT post.
A Best of OT post, much like the Best of Rationality Quotes post, sounds like a wonderful idea.
I phrased it as Good Stuff from OT rather than Best of OT because good stuff (possibly as a more dignified phrase) is easier to identify than best.
Do these kind of posts exist?
Not yet.
Unless I wan’t to post something myself, I just read open threads when they are already closed. Very convenient.
I think discussion would be more useful if the threads were sorted by something like reddit’s ‘hot’ algorythm, rather than being just displayed in order of posting, which causes good threads to be buried by duller new ones.
Open threads are sort of like this as they are essentially “top posts this week”
There’s a sort by in the upper right corner above comments, but below the post.
yes but the default setting is what determines most people’s behavior. Trivial inconveniences etc.
The default is “Best,” not “New.” It appears to me to be dominated by old threads. “Hot” has probably been renamed “Leading” and could be made default, but I doubt you are actually seeing the default.