There needs to be a great deal of organization and a clear framework structuring discussions, then regular followup to ensure people are using it. I have not found it effective for interaction in this particular course. Additionally, I have a concern. Ideas are often the only thing someone has to market themselves through. It seems to me very easy to take profound insights from someone and claim them as your own.
Intellectual property becomes mute.
I find that idea dismissing of the power of communication. It almost makes words platitudes. Almost like using symbols where the meanings are diminished. A form of mathmatics, divorced from the original meanings and placed in some universal crock pot where the reciever's interpretation takes precedence over the sender's meanings of the words. You can give us sharper pencils, paper, interesting pens, or computer.