Internet flaming is only interesting for a little while, and then it gets boring and a little sickening, like a sugar high. Actually, it's usually not even interesting (in the intellectual sense) to begin with. It's exciting, agitating, activating—things that are easy to confuse with interest. Real interest is quieter and a little more stable.

I'm a big fan of classic hard-hitting literary wit, but it doesn't work on the internet. You need a smaller, closed system for it to work—like the literary salon Monty Python were making fun of here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uycsfu4574w.