Today's metacontroversy concerns "BREAKING!" headlines. I try to stay away from these metacontroversies but I have an idea about this one that I want to share.
I've long thought we need to supplement the diaries with a similar service devoted to supposedly "BREAKING!" news, posted on an opposite principle; no MORE than 50 words in a post, a links interface in place of the poll interface, and that's it. That way when 10 people simultaneously alert us to what we've known for years (say, that John Hannah is probably cooperating w/ Fitz), it won't displace someone's beautifully-crafted think piece.
Duplicate "BREAKING!"s: no harm, no foul. When things scroll away, well, that's the point, they're no longer "BREAKING!" then are they? It would be a kind of dkos news ticker. Comments and updates could be used to direct people to other links or to where the main discussion of a thread coalesces. Some sort of recommendation system would be an option but would perhaps not be necessary.
I realize that scoop wasn't built in a day, but this feature could be really useful. People could even make it their home page, at least on days when they're expecting, say, indictments to come down, but don't want to have to leave CNN blathering in the background the whole time.
Finally, anticipating an objection: I know, I know, open threads are supposed to be the place for this. But the reason people diary news they think is "BREAKING!" is because (1) they want others to have the pleasure of seeing the news, which happens more efficiently on the front page; and (2) they don't really care about discussion (what is more efficient in an open thread, which is, you know, a thread).
So given that we're never going to exile the BREAKING! from the diaries (even if we force a nomenclature change), why not go with the flow and give the BREAKING! its own place?