[Air-l] TalkBacks

Dear Friends, In Israel "talk-backing" is quite common over the net. That is public responses to news items, which are published in a newsgroup's "string" style. I haven't seen this phenomena on news websites (e.g CNN.com ; nytimes.com) and was wondering: a) Are "talk backs" practiced in other countries? b) What is the origin of this activity? c) Are there references which discuss this form of communication? Hoping to hear from you… Jacob Hecht, Ph.D