I think the "image" part of it forces a certain type of content – typically more jokey / meme-like content which can be appealing to some. The other thing that

I think the "image" part of it forces a certain type of content – typically more jokey / meme-like content which can be appealing to some. The other thing that makes imageboards interesting is that they differ to how most platforms work today where the most agreeable thing (Reddit / HN) or the most controversial thing (Facebook / Twitter) gets surfaced. Imageboards in contrast tend to be a free for all. People don't follow users or like posts, they must simply participate in whatever conversations are happening on the board or create a new conversation which others might ignore or engage with if they find it interesting. I have an unpopular view that imageboards are some of the most tolerant places on the internet, and they are this way because there's no expectation of quality. I come to HN because I want quality discussions and articles, but I might go to an imageboard because I want to participate to some extent in the unknown. Someone could choose to post inflammatory stuff to an imageboard and there's little anyone can do if it's not against the board's moderation policy – you can't downvote or dislike. As a result imageboards tend to have a very diverse range of opinions because on an imageboard every view is equal. Of course, this has the downside of incentivising trolling, but having to engage with trolls is partly why imageboards are interesting and unique places. Users expect trolls and must learn to deal with them instead of demanding the platform solves the problem with some kind of censorship or moderation (flagging, downvoting, reporting, etc). For this reason users on imageboards tend to be quite self aware because users are so used to trolls poking fun at them and sometimes those trolls are touching on something true. I don't think they're for everyone, but they're interesting places when contrasted with most places people go to discussing things online today. Old school forums capture some of this too, but most forums for whatever reason tend to have a culture of heavy moderation so tend lack some of what makes imageboards most interesting.