As far as the readers know, it is like a firing squad in which all but one soldier is firing blanks. Only the participants know who said what. Interests are focused in the moment, by the conversation's dynamics and personalities. This being a career, the writer has a set of personal interests that influence the writing's content and position, facts which are usually taken for granted or ignored by readers. In Mob, stakes for the participants are not much different than in any confrontive social situation on prized turf, like an art opening.
Strategies are mostly immediate.
Which is to say, the stakes are higher in written criticism, and the opinions are more candid and fluid in Mob Rule. The Awful Truth I believe there are no disinterested opinions in the artworld and my experiences with Mob Rule have been instructive in this. All opinions come from a position, and there is no neutral position from which to opine. Interesting to me was to discover that I could induce some generalities about participants simply by the category of art world person they belonged to. That one might do so does not diminish the fact that nearly all these people are bright, educated, well-spoken and frequently brilliant.