That is the best explanation I have ever read about fragmented discussions. I used to agree with the "others", if I liked it once why not like it on every other story? Friendfeed's separate communities are great...sometimes they overlap, sometimes they don't; but distributing likes/comments across every community just wouldn't work. - Benjamin Golub

but, paul, you're not actually my friend, but here i am commenting on your feed. what do your actual friends, or you for that matter, care what i think? also, your post's intro called to mind something i saw in the theater on saturday right after "funny games" ended: http://missionmission.wordpress.com/2008... - Allan Hough

I can see that there's a lot of hoopla going on about FF's strengths or weaknesses and how it's going to succeed or fail. I agree that it's not out to replace anything, it's just another option for socializing online. Frankly, I like options. The more the better, I say. - April Buchheit

I actually like the fragmented discussions for the reasons that you pointed out. But there are times where I'd like to see a wider view of the conversation. Have you guys given any thought to taking all of the separate conversations that are going on about a specific object and providing a view of all of the "swarms" on one page? It would also be cool to see a list of the most talked about objects listed somewhere - i.e. a "What's Hot" version of the "Everyone" feed. - Mike Doeff

Excellent article! Well said on many fronts. - Bwana

Good points made. (Added to all that, sometimes the blog or article or what-not doesn't allow comments, or requires registration before commenting, making the FF option superior.) One thing though; the problem of fragmented discussions *within* Friendfeed is partly a different beast, and larger than "there are separate communities at Friendfeed so of course they should have separate discussions." The problem within Friendfeed is that even in your personal subscription prism, you often don't know where to comment due to fragmentation... as the same item pops up in related or similar friend groups. - Philipp Lenssen

PS: In regards to the more options the better, it would still be neat to more easily allow people to re-integrate discussions happening on Friendfeed into their own blogs. For instance, using a Creative Commons license here might clear up things. Perhaps even "content gadgets" somewhat similar to what Anil recently suggested. http://www.dashes.com/anil... - Philipp Lenssen

A future visitor to your article is never going to know if this, or other fragmented discussions took place, which as a blogger I think is a shame. Blogging for many is about the discussions it creates, I think it is the same for Twitter users, thus anything that might take something away from that conversation potentially has problems. I get links from forum discussions on a daily basis - I see the traffic in my stats, and often get a pingback or trackback - Andy Beard

pt.2 Taking your example, if the star of the movie was at the screening and was going to hang around afterwards and answer all questions, one on one with the audience and address their views, or maybe the author of the book it was based upon, wouldn't that then have an effect on where you decide to discuss the movie? - Andy Beard

Andy, I agree that there's also value in linkage, and something like a pingback might provide a good balance between between fragmentation and coordination. As for your movie star example, absolutely, and that's a great example of where a larger, public discussion can be quite interesting. My point is not that one type of discussion is better than the other, but that both types are valuable. - Paul Buchheit

Andy you got some valid points. But in a way, in this case Paul Buchheit's post itself was a comment on discussions that happened elsewhere -- many blog posts are. Do we find something truly original that is not in a way output based on other input? And then if we look at these fragmented discussions from a broader view then the end result is still global thought progress; every piece and bit whereever it may be written leads to better understanding of the situation, which influences future discussions in yet other, disconnected places. It's enough if just some of these fragmented discussion nodes are connected through some degrees, with -- ideally -- good arguments more easily spreading & mutating in this global idea pool. And this progress, to get back to your use-case, is also visible to future users researching a topic. But... again, that is just the ideal. - Philipp Lenssen

One of the nice things about FF-within-FF is that the discussion groups aren't tightly sealed from each other; conversations can "leak" fluidly across communities of people. It would be interesting to think about how to syndicate that, but it seems like we're still experimenting with the social substrate: witness all the discussions about FOAF and resolving "duplicates" and so on. There's a sense that people want more control, but nobody is sure what the knobs should be. - ⓞnor

Is this feature available? I'd definitely be interested in checking it out... I tend to watch movies at home with no people in site (just the way god intended it) but then I can't discuss it with anyone... so this would be very useful to me ;) - Noam

very well said. (Though as Philipp says, in the case of ff there isn't even a movie, most blog posts are somebody discussing something else that someone did/said elsewhere.) - j1m