Reminds me of the "discussion" assignments we were given in a couple college classes I was in. The idea was that students would write a top level response, then respond to someone else.
In reality, I would write my response, then come up with 2-3 sentences of reply that basically amounted to "I agree with that guy." It never really fostered the type of debate the professor was looking for, because most other students had the same approach, and nobody else cared enough to go back and read the replies to themselves.
This must be the standard distance learning process because both my son and my wife (working on her masters) have to write a post and then respond to 2 other posts. It seems like fake discourse to me, all comments are written for the instructor to read and not for the OP. There is never a response to a response, thus no real discussion.
In reality, I would write my response, then come up with 2-3 sentences of reply that basically amounted to "I agree with that guy." It never really fostered the type of debate the professor was looking for, because most other students had the same approach, and nobody else cared enough to go back and read the replies to themselves.