[{"user_id": 3210, "stars": [{"date_created": 1298584361.1951909, "user_id": 12973}, {"date_created": 1299729834.3809249, "user_id": 7862}], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298504000.729233, "message": "Is it possible or does it make sense to initialize backbone models from the DOM?", "group_id": 160, "id": 193275}, {"user_id": 1101, "stars": [], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298504374.0098009, "message": "+++ to this question.\nPerhaps you are loading the page with data in DOM. User sees the content right away. But the content isn't yet \u201cenhanced\u201d with interaction. Then you serialize the content to JSON and add interaction, synchronization etc. to it with backbone.", "group_id": 160, "id": 193345}, {"user_id": 1101, "stars": [], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298504463.6939139, "message": "I am still thinking about actual implementation and if it makes much sense really. But \u201cprogressive enhancement\u201d behind this and the availability of the content for javascript-off clients sounds like a good enough reason for a bit more (or maybe not so little bit) complexity to me.", "group_id": 160, "id": 193355}, {"user_id": 3210, "stars": [{"date_created": 1300844901.6084499, "user_id": 942}], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298504542.3855181, "message": "And my backbone specific question: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5098719/does-it-make-sense-to-initialize-models-from-the-dom-in-backbone-js.", "group_id": 160, "id": 193370}, {"user_id": 3210, "stars": [{"date_created": 1300844899.588141, "user_id": 942}], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298504519.225431, "message": "Yeah that's where I am stuck. I am finding this question on stacko somewhat helpful: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3926838/best-way-to-manage-and-initialize-js-objects-that-represent-dom-elements.", "group_id": 160, "id": 193365}, {"user_id": 6648, "stars": [], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298507864.4788511, "message": "I know it's a *little* bit redundant but you can also just dump the relevant json into the dom when you're rendering it: http://documentcloud.github.com/backbone/#FAQ-bootstrap", "group_id": 160, "id": 194175}, {"user_id": 3210, "stars": [], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1298508432.67049, "message": "@poswald I kind of like that solution.", "group_id": 160, "id": 194321}, {"user_id": 3795, "stars": [{"date_created": 1299729842.871932, "user_id": 7862}], "topic_id": 8507, "date_created": 1299715850.85604, "message": "We just dump a `raw to_json` of our models into global vars when rendering the page from Rails, then initiate/populate the collection on page load.", "group_id": 160, "id": 309494}]