Carol wrote an interesting post, and I would like to respond at length to her questions/comments:These categories seem to be in a hierarchy. Do we progress through them sequentially as our blogging life matures? Carol, I don't view the processes as sequential/hierarchical; rather, they represent inclinations learners display through the overt activities as bloggers. These behaviours change dependent on the circumstances the learner finds oneself in, and the demands and expectations placed on individual learners by their instructors and others. Hierarchies are perceived by me as higher order/lower order. All these processes for me hold equal status, and rather than progressing sequentially from lower to higher level processing, assuming an evolutionary, deterministic path of development, I would rather think that individuals are quite unique in their personal contexts, so that a combination of experiences and skills and knowledge and attitudes provide us with a unique mix of preferences for which processes we will more likely engage in. The processes described are all crucial for a learner to become a balanced member in a participatory culture, engaging in a lifelong journey that will lead to them traversing over several learning communities and mastering various processes. Learners will encounter the potential to develop these processes repeatedly. In effect, the processes represent to me a transformative learning cycle. Rather than a hierarchy that limits and constrains learners, the processes are indeed cyclical, hopefully opening up potentialities and possibilities for ongoing personal growth.An absolutely excellent example of the conceptual process occurring can be found on Stanley Fish's blog, Think Again, located online at http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/ . In this case, the well-known, well-respected New York Times journalist gives a well-considered opinion on educational issues, and through his moderation and feedback, provides a model for thoroughly thought-provoking, ongoing discussions among his readers. In this case, the language and terms and concepts are carefully scrutinized, and the posters are clearly motivated to seek truth and work with ideas within what I would characterize as a mature “ideal speech” setting. The commitment among participants is clearly working/playing with ideas and concepts. It is an excellent example of a discursive community.Another interesting example which I would consider a learning community that exemplifies causal processes is from The learning Circuits Blog, located at http://learningcircuits.blogspot.com/ , which presents a BIG Questions and invites bloggers to comment on the topic from their own perspective. In this case, the participants comment on a set of questions, and draw ideas from others' comments, and further reformulate their own views. In some cases, the author posts links to more than 30 participants' responses to the questions posed. For me, the core differences between a blogger learning to engage in conversation with others using the conceptual process and the causal process, is that in the case of the conceptual process, learners, or participants, are committed to developing a consensus, and sharing a common language, in which they share the same messages and commit to staying on task. In the case of causal process, however, learners respond to others' ideas as autonomous participants, responding from their own unique perspectives, yet also tend to interact meaningfully with others' ideas, exploring and synergistically developing ideas both independently and cooperatively. Thank you, Carol, for the link to Gilly Salmon's work. It is timely, as I am exploring strateguies for effective animation/facilitation of edu-blogging communities.