I understand that people believe this to be important, and I see the value in interesting communities. It's just that I don't consider the forum model something

I understand that people believe this to be important, and I see the value in interesting communities. It's just that I don't consider the forum model something to emulate, but rather a regression from earlier models - I much prefer mailing lists or Usenet groups, both of which allow a user much more control via their client, and both of which seem to, on average, suffer less from "the idiot problem" than their web-related counterparts. Part of the reason may have been that many web fora try to appeal to the broadest possible audience, while many mailing lists and Usenet groups have a formal or informal charter.