The thriving threads I am talking about are the discussion topics found on various discussion boards that just seem to go on and on endlessly and apparently effortlessly. There are some, but not many.
Two examples I have are from LinkedIn, but that is just where my main focus has been. I am sure there are thriving threads on many discussion boards or forums.
The normal patterns are either that a post gets a small initial burst of response ( or possibly none) and quietly dies, slipping down the listings and into digital oblivion, other than the possibility that some future Google (or similar) search will lift it back to visibility for at least one person.
Other threads, but not many, will enjoy an active and engaging exchange of posts for a while. A while being a few days or a few weeks. This activity may be reinvigorated from time to time, by the original poster, but eventually the thread becomes inactive and slips into the same digital oblivion as the previous set.
A very few though seem to inspire a steady and long lasting set of responses from a wide range of correspondents. The two I had in mind were these.
Firstly a thread on a group linked to my old university that just asked people to introduce themselves, what they were doing and what interested them. This would receive many additions from all over the world each and every day, and dumperelated emails in my inbox. The group hosting this thread just disappeared one day and it's loss spawned a fairly active thread from those looking for it. Unfortunately it has no reappeared nor have any similar attempts been so successful.
The second is one on the Harvard Business Review group and asks what is the true value, if any, of an MBA? This has been running for a while now and I have seen at least six additions today. The response is mixed and, I think, surprisingly downbeat, but then maybe many had unrealistic expectations. That is not the point; instead the point is that it is thriving.
The commonality seems to be an open question, to a large and diverse community that many feel able to comment on. The questions are also non-threatening.
Has anyone else seen a "thriving thread" and are prepared to share it here.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
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