This feels a lot like Google Docs's commenting system, and seems to have the same issue in that it requires a lot of clicks to open each side thread one at a time. It's hard to "finish" digesting a series of replies at once.
I think I'd prefer Discourse's current linear format, where all new replies are stacked at the bottom (but ideally with a quoted snippet for context). It makes catching up on updates easier, since you just keep scrolling and reading like any other document.
IMO it often isn't super useful to go through each individual comment piecemeal unless you're working on a document together (ie tracking changes and commenting on them). Otherwise, being able to read through several comments at once and THEN replying to the whole of them in a summary can save everyone time.
It's the infinite back and forth on every minor point that makes long form discussion impossible to track. That's the sort of thing that probably IS better dealt with in real time, over Slack or a call, and then summarized briefly back in the main convo. You don't need to have every sentence recorded in the main convo, just something like "Re: point 4, after talking it through with Joe and Jane, we all agreed it would be best to use blah blah".
> This feels a lot like Google Docs's commenting system
This was my first impression as well. The summary tree of replies to a thread seems like a possible improvement over Google Docs but the basic interaction workflow seems the same as Google Docs.
Perhaps there is more innovation to be had by looking at the various specs for webpage annotation systems that have been proposed over the years?
I think I'd prefer Discourse's current linear format, where all new replies are stacked at the bottom (but ideally with a quoted snippet for context). It makes catching up on updates easier, since you just keep scrolling and reading like any other document.
IMO it often isn't super useful to go through each individual comment piecemeal unless you're working on a document together (ie tracking changes and commenting on them). Otherwise, being able to read through several comments at once and THEN replying to the whole of them in a summary can save everyone time.
It's the infinite back and forth on every minor point that makes long form discussion impossible to track. That's the sort of thing that probably IS better dealt with in real time, over Slack or a call, and then summarized briefly back in the main convo. You don't need to have every sentence recorded in the main convo, just something like "Re: point 4, after talking it through with Joe and Jane, we all agreed it would be best to use blah blah".