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NY Times Commentary Takes On Cagey Commenters
By
Billy Parker
Published Jan 11, 2009
Modified Jan 11, 2009
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By
Billy Parker
Published Jan 11, 2009
Modified Jan 11, 2009
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This weekend a Times reporter gets his hands dirty (but keeps his fingers unsmudged) while diving into the cutthroat world of commenting on New York neighborhood blogs. They discover that the city's "fabled brashness" often leads to "raucous New York-style debate." The writer then falls prey to something that a lot of us have been guilty of on more than one occasion—following insane comment threads. After introducing us to a Brownstoner post where commenters had a familiar battle over parents in Park Slope, the story ends with (Spoiler Alert) a get-together of Brownstoner regulars that was "bearing a notable absence of ill will" where "virtual friends didn’t look like what they had expected." The whole thing leaves you with so much of a virtually warm feeling that you almost begin to imagine a world where a couple who met as fellow Gawker commenters could end up betrothed—oh wait.
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