> The ones I frequent are insulated from the wider internet. I'm starting to feel like that is what allows them to survive as communities. It's a weird balan

> The ones I frequent are insulated from the wider internet. I'm starting to feel like that is what allows them to survive as communities. It's a weird balance: too little visibility and your forum dies from attrition; too much and the conversation devolves into, well, Reddit. (This is true even within Reddit: the smaller and more obscure the sub the less likely it is to be a garbagefire.)