Isn't that an oversimplification? Say a newcomer joins the conversation (at the bar) halfway through. He is missing a lot of context. His kind friends would th

Isn't that an oversimplification? Say a newcomer joins the conversation (at the bar) halfway through. He is missing a lot of context. His kind friends would then fill him in, unlike the internet. A threading like structure however, allows you to quickly scan the parent, and if need be the parent's parent. It's within the user's perogative to choose how much information he needs to be caught up. That being said, I'm very open minded about seeing the new approach develop. Heavily nested threads are a far from perfect solution.