Insular in the sense of being incapable of adopting an idea created elsewhere even when useful
I agree with Luke that LW is not insular in this sense, at least compared to any alternative I’ve seen. I’d be willing to bet that if found a comparison site (such as Reddit) that we would have more outgoing links.
Posting & discussing a link is something that in practice overlaps but isn’t identical with people updating on the material behind the link enough for it to become part of the expected background knowledge on LW.
Reddit is all about outgoing links. Insularity may be a complaint because so many users have experience with hacker news and reddit which lack insularity through their very structure.
I agree with Luke that LW is not insular in this sense, at least compared to any alternative I’ve seen. I’d be willing to bet that if found a comparison site (such as Reddit) that we would have more outgoing links.
Posting & discussing a link is something that in practice overlaps but isn’t identical with people updating on the material behind the link enough for it to become part of the expected background knowledge on LW.
Reddit is all about outgoing links. Insularity may be a complaint because so many users have experience with hacker news and reddit which lack insularity through their very structure.
A traditional forum might be a better comparison.