This paper presents preliminary fi ndings and is being distributed to economists and other interested readers solely to stimulate discussion and elicit comments. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and are not necessarily refl ective of views at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York or the Federal Reserve System. Any errors or omissions are the responsibility of the authors.

When students read textbooks in the classroom, they usually apply active reading. The practice of marking in university textbooks is a familiar one. They scribble comments on the margin, highlight elements, underline words and phrases, and correlate distinct parts to foster critical thinking. While the use of annotations during active reading supports the students themselves, these can also be ...

A reader of a news article would often be interested in the comments of other readers on anarticle, because comments give insight into popular opinions or feelings toward a given piece of news. In recent years, social media platforms, such as Twitter, have become a social hub for users to communicate and express their thoughts. This includes sharing news articles and commenting on them. In this...

Various news sites exist today where internet users can read the most recent news and people’s opinions about. However, usually these sites do not organize comments well and do not filter irrelevant content. Due to this limitation, readers who wonder about people’s opinion regarding some specific topic, have to manually follow relevant comments, reading and filtering a lot of irrelevant text. I...