His description of the public reviewing system---and the idea of a review as a versioned public document that might itself contain new ideas---made me think of

His description of the public reviewing system---and the idea of a review as a versioned public document that might itself contain new ideas---made me think of the state of affairs in the infancy of modern science, where the forerunner of the modern journal article was literally a letter to another scientist, which they would respond to with their own comments and ideas.