I entirely agree with you on this. I find it hard to imagine how a 5-on-1 interaction is going to benefit anyone, including any imagined “lurkers”. It will probably be more likely to 1) Harden and entrench people’s positions, 2) Discourage lurkers (because the conversation becomes harder to follow, with multiple sub-threads on a post), 3) Drive away the person you’re conversing with because engaging on the forum becomes psychologically tiresome.
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