Board Thread:The Panopticon/@comment-2378-20131206145913/@comment-188432-20131206195725

No worries. And, not trying to be a "control freak" about where conversations are held. Just trying to future proof discussions. It's generally best to keep conversations about a topic with a topic, since talk pages are far more accessible a year from now than are forum threads.

Yes, that does mean that sometimes questions about a topic can languish until someone drops by a talk page. But in the long run the issue tends to get settled and stay settled if it's attached to the article page.

One way that you, or any user, could flag talk page discussions that haven't generated a response is to come to Board:The Reference Desk after, say, a week has passed since you've asked your question and just say, "Hey, take a look at this question I posted on this talk page."

That way, you can use the dynamism of the forum environment, but still keep discussions in the right place.