I spent some time today to set up the forum here.
Why?
1. I'm concerned that Discord is not a healthy environment for discussions.
Yes, really. James York is saying this. The Discord advocate.
Don't get me wrong, I think Discord has its uses, but it's not the ONLY format that exists.
I have been using basecamp for another project, and while it is also not a perfect tool (does a perfect tool even exist?), I really felt a connection to the forum-like message board.
They also have a very thought-provoking section on the issues of "chat" based software like Discord, Slack, Teams, etc. and the negatives of that type of communication. Some highlights:
- An ASAP culture.
- Thinking a line at a time rather than a thought at a time.
- Group chat feels like you’re chasing something all day long.
- An inability to review and reference later.
2. Opening discussions to the public/search engines
Every month I'm seeing threads on Hacker News about how closed, and non-indexable Discord text is. Forums are inherently public. You don't need to log in to see the text. It can be searched easily, conversations are grouped together under a title...
3. Nostalgia (a bit)
I grew up on BBS forums..!
So, here we are... let's see what happens. 🤔
