4 ms·

I occasionally wonder where forums have gone. There are communities still out there, but there seems to be no modern forum software? They have either been arou

I occasionally wonder where forums have gone. There are communities still out there, but there seems to be no modern forum software? They have either been around forever or, if a bit newer, do nothing without mbs of JS. Now that activitypub is here, there seem to be half a dozen reddit clones in development. Microblogging and social media are also everywhere, but what about forums? What about topic-centric, lasting conversations instead of hot-topic and people-centric chats with no history?

dbrgn 6y ago
https://threema-forum.de/ https://threema-forum.de/ was migrated to "WoltLab Suite Forum" a while ago. I didn't know that software before, but everything seems to work really nicely. Still has the classic forum features but it doesn't feel like it's from 1999. (Note: It's not open source and costs 100€ per year to license. I'm not affiliated in any way, just a user.)
toyg 6y ago
> there seems to be no modern forum software? Discourse is pretty modern.
foxhop 6y ago
Would you pay $15/mo or $100/yr for a new age forum? (I run Remarkbox and I'm trying to find product market fit)
giantrobot 6y ago
For niche areas forums are still doing alright. More general purpose forums sort of melted away and moved to Facebook and the like. Forums require a lot moderation and maintenance. If you don't keep the software up to date they're easy pickings for hackers. Without active moderation they're quickly overrun with spam. For most people forums end up expensive pains in the ass. In terms of ActivityPub, the lasting conversation topic-centric nature of old school forums doesn't really fit in the model of pushing new activity. A hot-topic Reddit clone fits that model much better.
KajMagnus 6y ago
> topic-centric, lasting conversations Discourse, Flarum, Talkyard (which I'm developing). GitHub's new Discussions feature? Lemmy? https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy, "Building a federated alternative to reddit in rust" (how does it matter that it's a reddit alternative? it can still be topic-centric etc?)

dbrgn 6y ago

https://threema-forum.de/ https://threema-forum.de/ was migrated to "WoltLab Suite Forum" a while ago. I didn't know that software before, but everything seems to work really nicely. Still has the classic forum features but it doesn't feel like it's from 1999. (Note: It's not open source and costs 100€ per year to license. I'm not affiliated in any way, just a user.)

toyg 6y ago

> there seems to be no modern forum software? Discourse is pretty modern.

foxhop 6y ago

Would you pay $15/mo or $100/yr for a new age forum? (I run Remarkbox and I'm trying to find product market fit)

giantrobot 6y ago

For niche areas forums are still doing alright. More general purpose forums sort of melted away and moved to Facebook and the like. Forums require a lot moderation and maintenance. If you don't keep the software up to date they're easy pickings for hackers. Without active moderation they're quickly overrun with spam. For most people forums end up expensive pains in the ass. In terms of ActivityPub, the lasting conversation topic-centric nature of old school forums doesn't really fit in the model of pushing new activity. A hot-topic Reddit clone fits that model much better.

KajMagnus 6y ago

> topic-centric, lasting conversations Discourse, Flarum, Talkyard (which I'm developing). GitHub's new Discussions feature? Lemmy? https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy, "Building a federated alternative to reddit in rust" (how does it matter that it's a reddit alternative? it can still be topic-centric etc?)