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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • Great questions! I hope I can jump in without being too short.

    I wonder if something like debatemap.app or kialo-edu.com would offer a better UX (“user experience”) than Lemmy. I’ve also heard that substack.com has done a good job of attracting high-quality discussion (but I worry, what’s stopping them from traveling down the enshittification path like all the rest?)

    OTOH, I think online discussion itself has some weaknesses that can’t be easily overcome–perhaps in-person, local discussion is (usually/almost always?) better. For example, one study indicates that engaging in political discourse with people online leads to an “uncivil comment rate” of 10%, while a “mixed political / non-political” discourse has a lower uncivil comment rate [1].

    Personally, I find it to be generally true that I need to trust someone in one or more non-controversial areas of life before I take their controversial (to me) opinions seriously. Simple time and familiarity also helps.

    [1] https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/political-science/articles/10.3389/fpos.2021.741605/full