As ever, Mr.Coates (Tom to his friends) moves things on in terms of the recent discussions concerning Kinja. His post, Sharing multiple digests could be kinja’s killer app, makes some excellent points and I believe he is correct in thinking that Kinja’s best chance at success would be to promote the ‘sharing’ aspect of it’s digests. In a comment, Mike suggests what I’d already been thinking, namely that a few well honed digests would/will replace the blogroll.
However there is one statement in Tom’s post that I don’t wholeheartedly agree with:
“how do we get people to think in terms of their engagement with others”
Whilst I agree that in a corporate environment (which is already using blogs as a way of communicating ‘informal’ information) Kinja could be a killer app, but it lacks one things. Discussion.
The easiest way to ensure other people are aware of the expectations placed on them, and for them to communicate the expectations they have of others, is through discussion. Where that discussion takes places could be crucial.
I think most blogs have their own comment system installed, and that is the rightful place for discussions concerning a post, but extending Kinja to allow comments on a digest post would allow others to add more weight as to why others should click the link and ‘read the rest’. Of course it may not be a commenting system that is required, just some way of adding ’emphasis’ and showing interest may be enough. Presently the only way I can think of using Kinja to do that would be multiple digests of multiple digests – with different digests representing differently weighted topics.
The more I play with Kinja, the more it feels right, above all else, I just hope they keep the aim of the product simple.