[jonathanrstern]

Hey HN! I’m Jonathan, co-founder of Pairagraph.

Pairagraph is a platform for written dialogue between pairs of notable individuals—politicians, CEOs, philosophers, novelists, technologists, religious leaders, and more.

We love Twitter, but it can be annoying. It’s loud and noisy, it’s replete with echo chambers, and 280 characters is not enough to make a real argument. Pairagraph is our attempt to push back on these trends and build a proper town square for the digital age.

We’re still fairly new but already have hosted 60+ dialogues, with contributors like Niall Ferguson, Joe Lonsdale, Balaji Srinivasan, Francis Fukuyama, Martin Gurri, and Om Malik.

In the short run we’ve decided to keep our community closed—only certain people are able to participate in dialogues. The idea here is not to exclude anyone but to establish a track record of quality discussion before opening it up. We think that if we start with quality and move gradually to quantity, we’ll have a better shot in the long run of preserving both.

The good news is that we are discussing opening it up, so there is some chance we will do so soon. We're also contemplating allowing dialogues with >2 participants.

To recap: For now, Pairagraph is gated, but we’re wary of elitism and committed to including as many people (and perspectives) as possible. This is also why we have a ‘Suggest’ page on the website for readers who are interested in recommending future authors/topics.

If you’ve read this far, here are a few of our favorite exchanges:

https://www.pairagraph.com/dialogue/354c72095d2f42dab92bf427...

https://www.pairagraph.com/dialogue/77d7e5451ea3467eaed19686...

https://www.pairagraph.com/dialogue/5e569e6fbc944e998c795028...

Along with adding more content, we’re focused on three things:

(1) Improving retention and expanding reach

(2) Polishing the site’s design/UI. Neither Carter (my co-founder) nor I are expert designers, we’ve done almost all of it ourselves, recognize that it needs help, and are working every day to add polish and professionalism

(3) Eventually turning enough of a profit to make Pairagraph sustainable

That’s our grand vision, but ultimately we’re just two friends from college working on a project that we think matters. What do you think?

[jjj123]

Hey Jonathan,

My biggest issue with this site is that it presents these arguments as two-sided. Depending on which two sides you pick, this usually limits the window of possibility.

The most galling example I found was in the “Medicare for all just isn’t going to happen” discussion. Both sides agree that true M4A is a ridiculous fantasy that needn’t be pursued. This felt no different from typical mainstream media framing of M4A, manufactured consent and all.

I guess my point is if your goal is to reiterate WaPo/NYT talking points in a more conversational medium, you’ve done it. But if you want to actually move the conversation forward you’ll need to change the format, or at the very least bring in some new voices.

Part of the issue could be the reliance on traditional symbols of prestige to determine who’s an expert. I would think about how you could broaden this a bit, maybe pull in specific people for certain discussions they have relevant experience in?

For example: a pro vs anti union debate with a corporate executive on one side and an organizer on the other would be informative and entertaining, and is uniquely suited to your medium.

Edited to fix a typo

[treis]

> a pro vs anti union debate with a corporate executive on one side and an organizer on the other would be informative and entertaining, and is uniquely suited to your medium.

IMHO, those are the last people that I want to read. Both sides would present the same talking points we see every where. There'd be a lack of meaningful engagement as these people hold little nuance in their positions. Or, at least, the positions they're willing to present in public. It's just each side hitting the notes to fire up their base.

[EDIT]

This article about Israel/Palestine is an even better example:

https://www.pairagraph.com/dialogue/8c47026d6af148588f3ad8f4...

There's little to be gianed by reading that unless you want to know the two extremes to the point of view.

[/EDIT]

As an example, take this one about breaking up big tech:

https://www.pairagraph.com/dialogue/ff5d6b5332124e59b081c5a5...

One side wrote "Break ‘Em Up: Recovering Our Freedom from Big Ag, Big Tech, and Big Money (2020)". The other side is wrote "Antitrust Law, which is the most-cited antitrust authority in the country". Predictably, the first is pretty bombastic and mostly preaching to their choir. The second is more nuanced and less definitive.

[jjj123]

I think you’re right that you’d hear a lot of trite arguments you’d heard before in that pairing. I do think it would be worthwhile for one reason: it illustrates that politics are about deciding who gets what, not about some objective “correct” solution.

You’d have the boss on one side, who would lose money and productivity with a union, and an organizer on the other, who stands to gain benefits and stability. That is an interesting pairing _because_ it is directly about what each side wants.

It’s exactly what you don’t get in traditional media, where it’s mostly disingenuous hemming and hawing by opinion columnists. I’m showing my biases here, but I think the reason you don’t hear politics talked about in “who gets what” terms is because those in power benefit from obscuring material realities.

[jonathanrstern]

Couldn't agree more.

We're proud of what we've built with Pairagraph v1, but the conversations are definitely limited by two things: (1) who is involved, and (2) the format: 2 authors, 4 installments, each 500 words, A-B-A-B.

I floated this idea in response to a different comment, but what if we allowed readers to vote on who they'd like to hear from in the future? Or what if we tweaked the format to allow more than 2 authors to participate in a conversation?

[jjj123]

I think both of those are interesting suggestions worth trying!

About the audience voting thing, personally I think a curated list of speakers is okay, and isn’t necessarily going to be any more biased than audience voting. I would just prefer that list is curated in a way that is 1) transparent in it’s biases and 2) represents my side a little better (selfish preference).

I know I already mentioned this, but be sure to widen your criteria for what makes someone an expert. I haven’t done an exhaustive search, but I don’t see many artists, teachers, union members, organizers, members of the working class, local politicians, etc. in your list, even though they often have more direct expertise related to these topics than an opinion columnist does.

[jonathanrstern]

We'll be sure to make this a top priority. We mean it when we say we're committed to including as many people (and perspectives) as possible, but there is always room for improvement so thank you for bringing this to our attention. Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have suggestions for artists, teachers, union members, organizers, members of the working class, local politicians, etc. that you'd like to see on Pairagraph. We would be thrilled to get them involved!

[teryyy]

I think it's worth exploring having two primary sides to the conversation, but each side should be able to have multiple nuanced takes, such as in https://alternativeenergy.procon.org/questions/should-nuclea...

[stunt]

Great that you are exploring new concepts.

I think you could highlight categories better on the homepage.

Don't add user votes to the dialogues. We know what happens to politics category after you do that.

But, add some user interactions like following a dialogue to receive updates about it. And also following a contributor to receive update about his/her dialogues.

[jonathanrstern]

Yes, that would be great! One of our most important short-run goals is to figure out how to increase user engagement. Allowing users to follow dialogues/contributors is definitely one way to do that.

Comment sections are another idea we've had; however, we've noticed that most comment sections tend to degrade quickly. Substack is doing better with a pay-to-comment model, but still, I think we're going to stay away for the time being.

[munk-a]

On the topic of the design I don't like the layout flow to the conversations with each blurb being a page that is scrolled through vertically and flipped through horizontally. I think it'd be more natural to have the blurbs in series vertically along with rearranging the quick skip bit at the top to be vertically oriented to match the consumption orientation.

[jonathanrstern]

Some people love the current layout; others hate it. I'll confess that at this point we're leaning towards making everything vertical, but there's something I love about the horizontal flow. Really appreciate your feedback.

[munk-a]

I would mention that the horizontal flow is at least consistently signaled to the user - having the flow of statements go across as

(1) (2) (3) (4)

and being anchor jumps to the relevant content is in line with the current horizontal flow. Part of my feeling toward this might also be from these two other factors:

1. A lot of text consumption is done on mobile platforms and, while I didn't check your site on mobile I am leaning more toward vertical infinite scrolling on desktop due to how many mobile things go that way today.

2. I tend to associate sites that page content and require horizontal movement with cheap advertisement exploitation - most times when something is delivering a big block-o-text as several pages it's either purpose built for or leverage to make sure they can cram as many ads as possible in the content.

So I guess my lean toward verticality is also a general usage expectation coupled with abuse of the horizontal flow.

[munk-a]

Given the informed bent to discussions on Pairagraph I feel like you're much closer in competition to video essays and far less close to something like a combative spar on a news show. I'm not certain I'd get more out of reading these two sided arguments than I would listening to a one sided (but relatively balanced) presentation. I haven't hung out much in the twitterverse so I might just be missing the space you're trying to occupy but while these are thoughtful and literate they remain relatively brief on the subject so they'll loose out against the more in depth researched presentations along with (I think) losing out against more back-and-forth style forums like this one where many ideas can be surfaced in a rapid fashion.

[jonathanrstern]

I think you're right that Pairagraph in its present form probably won't be 'the last word' on a given subject. That may be a point in favor of expanding the format and allowing >2 people per dialogue.

[munk-a]

I'd urge some caution here though - going to more than two people will require some careful planning to allow for statements and rebuttals in a format that doesn't eventually die out to just two speakers or which drags on longer than your intended reading time.

I might point out fivethirtyeight's live blog as an example of how this can go wrong[1] - there is an unpredictability to discussion here which is partially covered by the fact that they are responding to live updates but suffers from the fact that discussion threads will suddenly die off.

1. One random example: https://fivethirtyeight.com/live-blog/biden-inauguration/

[jonathanrstern]

Yep, that's exactly why we haven't pursued something like this in the past... we're still sorting through the logistics!

Thanks for the link for an example of how not to do it!

[rrosen326]

I love the idea. Keep it up.

Here is a nitpick - I tried to find a way to send it to you privately, since it is trivial, but I couldn't find a link or your email anywhere. 1) Remove your photos - this feels like a serious site and your photos are so young that to me, and perhaps others, it detracts from the seriousness. And adds nothing. 2) Have a feedback link!

But more importantly - great idea.

[jonathanrstern]

A handful of people have used our Suggest page for feedback, but that's not ideal. We'll set something up soon. Thanks for bringing that to our attention.

Also, my email is [e-mail]. You're right... we should probably add contact info to the site.

[bavent]

I actually found this a while back and loved it. I get to see perspectives I wouldn’t normally seek out, and to see their arguments for a position I wouldn’t ever see in my filter bubble, so thanks!

[treis]

It's a cool format, but I find most of the actual debate lackluster. There's only one that I've read where they specifically addressed each others arguments. Half the time one or both sides just puts up their talking points without real engagement. The other half the pretty much agree and make essentially the same argument in different ways.

[sterlind]

this is a tough problem to solve. it'd be nice to see each talking point separated like a line item, or have arguments visually hang from other supporting arguments, each of which could be challenged, rebutted, or marked "agree to disagree."

but without heavy moderation, it'd result in something like a Presidential debate - candidates only paying lip service to the prompt while going off-topic to bash their opponents.

[aj_nikhil]

I saw this on reddit and instantly loved it. Well done and good luck.

[iagovar]

It's a nice idea, hope you translate it to spanish, cheers!