You are a fool. You are a moron. Nothing you write is worth reading. Please go away and contemplate just how stupid you really are.

That's neither my opinion of Technology Review's readers nor the feedback I get from writing these columns. But those comments fairly represent the disgraceful level of discourse at such online publications as salon.com, slate.msn.com, and nytimes.com. Talk about lucrative opportunities missed. Talk about failed innovation. Talk about misunderstanding a medium.

The New York Times, for example, may be a superbly edited newspaper, but it has a horribly moderated online forum. The Times publishes a dazzling array of Pulitzer Prizewinning columnists and invites registered readers to respond online. It's a tantalizing proposition. What policy wonk wouldn't want to post a clever rejoinder to a provocative column by Thomas L. Friedman or William Safire?

I can easily imagine the Times' online op-ed forums becoming the well to which the global intelligentsia come for their daily drink of conventional wisdom. Numerous think tanks, foundations, and public relations firms might cheerfully pay a premium to post their takes on what the newspaper of record declares the hot topics of the day. The site could build both the brand and the business and could prove a profitable complement to the paper. It hasn't happened.