I think this is fair. And I should be clear that I'm not so worried about someone digging to find something stupid I said here on HN. Or in a chat. I'm more thinking about people that are afraid of saying something stupid, to the point that they just don't engage.
I think my mental model is more for chat rooms to take the place of coffee room chats. Ideally, some of those do push on something to happen. I'm not sure that forcing them into the threaded structure of conversations really helps, though?
Maybe it is based on the aim? If the goal is a simulacrum of human contact, then I think ephemeral makes a ton of sense.
I also kind of miss the old tradition of having a "flamewars" topic in newsgroups. I don't particularly love yelling at each other, but I do hate that people can't bring up some topics.
(I also miss some old fun newsgroups. I recall college had Haiku and a few other silly restrictive style groups that were just flat fun.)
I think my mental model is more for chat rooms to take the place of coffee room chats. Ideally, some of those do push on something to happen. I'm not sure that forcing them into the threaded structure of conversations really helps, though?
Maybe it is based on the aim? If the goal is a simulacrum of human contact, then I think ephemeral makes a ton of sense.
I also kind of miss the old tradition of having a "flamewars" topic in newsgroups. I don't particularly love yelling at each other, but I do hate that people can't bring up some topics.
(I also miss some old fun newsgroups. I recall college had Haiku and a few other silly restrictive style groups that were just flat fun.)