bogus comments on Open thread, Nov. 3 - Nov. 9, 2014 - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (310)
Disregarding your use of the word "community" for what's best described as an online social club, who's to say that we're not doing this already? The "forum system that is most conducive" to our goals might well be a combination of one very open central site (LessWrong itself) supplemented by a variety of more private sites that discuss rationality in different ways, catering to a variety of niches. Not just Eliezer's Facebook page, but including things like MoreRight, Yvain's blog, Overcoming Bias, Give Well etc.
This makes me a little suspicious as a solution, only because there doesn't seem to be anything particularly special about it besides being precisely the system that is already in place.
What do you see as being the distinction between a "community" and a mere "online social club"? Genuinely confused.
Because, y'know, communities actually exist, like, in the real world. More relevantly, they have a fairly important goal in protecting real, actual people from bodily harm and providing a nurturing environment for them to thrive in. Since this does not apply to virtual, Internet sites, calling them "communities" is quite misleading and can have bad side-effects if the metaphor is taken seriously, either by accident or through sneaking connotations. So I think it's better if folks are sometimes encouraged to taboo this particular term.