Rob Wiblin: Right, yeah. I was going to say, one part of your vibe is that people should be able to share their opinions, they should be able to make the tools that they want, society should be very open, we want people to contribute their ideas. But then I’ve heard on your other interviews, you say that a key design aspect of Polis is that there is no reply button, so people can’t —
Rob Wiblin: Why do you think that sort of closure to response is really valuable in that case, even though in general, we want people to be able to provide their opinions? That’s the key goal.
Audrey Tang: Because we’re talking about a public issue, which is by definition interpersonal. And taking an interpersonal statement and making it personal — as in a personal attack — is almost always unconstructive.
Audrey Tang: You just press “disagree” on the statement. Then you frame your own feelings, your counterargument, in an independent statement that other people then agree or disagree on.
Rob Wiblin: I see. Do you think that in general, this is a useful way that people could have better conversations? Not just on this platform, but in general: rather than responding, instead you just state more clearly your view and then try to get people to agree with that?
Rob Wiblin: The key difference there is that because you are not attacking or directly responding to a specific individual, it doesn’t become personal. You don’t get as strong negative feelings coming up.