Kialo is a great platform for decision-making and seeing the reasoning behind different sides of issues. I like that it offers a better alternative to discussing things than social media platforms. If you see it more as a Wikipedia-type site, rather than a chatroom or comment thread, then the moderation aspect makes sense. It's not a place to go if you want to shout your opinions, but if you want to offer well reasoned and well sourced arguments, it's a pleasant and informative way to have discussions online.
I've spent some time using Kialo now and I find that it is a fantastic resource to develop critical thinking skills while also allowing one to engage in some interesting discussions. One of the debates I've been most active on is:
https://www.kialo.com/which-political-party-is-best-for-america-32876
Please consider adding some pros/cons, particularly in the discussion on "other" political parties.
The binary set-up creates false 'noise'. The moderation could be more neutral (and more intelligent, frankly ) but more so it could help shape an argument rather than 'tidy' . Sometimes the mods seem to be machine bots reacting to single words and not context. Overly dependent on US English and US culture. Commonly held, but None-USA , thoughts are challenged to the point of attrition but others are allowed as unsupported, and unchallenged, statements. It would be dangerous to encourage students to access this.
If you want a nice place to quickly scrub over an issue and grab some pros and cons, Kialo is a good place. Unfortunately, the restrictions that plague interacting with the site can be detrimental. For instance, a topic on PETA was composed mostly of bunk science, but posting factual, supported evidence was rejected by the moderator before it was made available to view by others for various reasons.
It's a neat idea, and the internet is in dire need of a platform that enforces some form of stricter moderation for nicer debate and discussion. However, with the strict level of control Kialo forces among its users, and potential bias that's been shown in certain topics from anonymous moderation, I can't recommend it to the wider internet at this moment.
Discovered this site when searching for pro con lists for my students. Wonderful resource to teach them the pros and cons of issues and have them write their own argument maps.
