News: The United States Government killed Iraqi citizens today, using bombs and famine.

Affordances and Constraints of Electronic Discussion:

"...written discussion itself is a contradiction in terms. In this view, the physical and oral situation around an oral, face-to-face conversation -- the facilitative mechanisms like expectant silences, visual cues for turn-taking, the pressure of occasion -- are necessary to keep any extended dialogic exchange going, and that without them, any written discussion that is not driven by a specific and immediate necessity like a shared task will simply evaporate."