I’d like to point out an example of the sort of conversations that are happening across blogs that demonstrate the market, if you will, for dyalogues.

1. On Feb 12, Glenn Kelman, CEO of real estate startup, Redfin, compares Silicon Valley, where he spent 16 years, to Seattle, where he’s based in now.
2. Three days later, Michael Arrington of TechCrunch writes a response on his blog. Readers interested in first reading the blog post he’s responding to must follow a link to Glenn’s blog. Then they come back and read Michael’s response.
3. Glenn finds out about Michael’s post (maybe via an email from Michael, maybe by monitoring his trackback pings, maybe a tip from a friend who follows TechCrunch) and posts a response on his blog. Of course, the only people who understand the conversation absolutely clearly are those who follow both TechCrunch and the Redfin Blog, and have a pretty good memory. Everyone else has several browser windows/tabs open as they weave through the conversation chronologically.
4. Michael finds out about Glenn’s response post (again, we have no idea how) and posts a link to it at the bottom of his original post.

If this sounds complicated, it’s because it is. It’s not, by any means, an impossible conversation to follow - it’s just a bit clumsy because blogging platforms are not designed for deep interaction between bloggers. It can feel a little like an online scavenger hunt to follow the conversation.

This is where Dyalogues shines. Dyalogues is a web platform for two-way interchanges between two bloggers. The dyalogue starts with a premise and an initiator, and then proceeds in a conversation-like pattern. It’s easy to read, and the system handles notifying both parties about when the other person has responded, and when it’s time to write a reply. The conversation can proceed as quickly as the participants want it to.

We hope Michael, Glenn, and other bloggers take the time to engage with each other via a dyalogue or two, and have a permanent, easy-to-read record of it with which to share with their readers, both current and new.