Discussion Board
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are at least temporarily archived. Also, depending on the access level of a user or the forum set-up, a posted message might need to be approved by a moderator before it becomes visible.
Forums have a specific set of jargon associated with them; e.g. a single conversation is called a "thread".
A discussion forum is hierarchical or tree-like in structure: a forum can contain a number of subforums, each of which may have several topics. Within a forum's topic, each new discussion started is called a thread, and can be replied to by as many people as so wish.
Depending on the forum's settings, users can be anonymous or have to register with the forum and then subsequently log in in order to post messages. On most forums, users do not have to log in to read existing messages.
Read more about Discussion Board: History, Forum Structure, Discussion, Common Features, Rules and Policies On Forums, Comparison With Other Web Applications
Famous quotes containing the words discussion and/or board:
“It was heady stuff, recognizing ourselves as an oppressed class, but the level of discussion was poor. We explained systemic discrimination, and men looked prettily confused and said: “But, I like women.””
—Jane O’Reilly, U.S. feminist and humorist. The Girl I Left Behind, ch. 2 (1980)
“Midway the lake we took on board two manly-looking middle-aged men.... I talked with one of them, telling him that I had come all this distance partly to see where the white pine, the Eastern stuff of which our houses are built, grew, but that on this and a previous excursion into another part of Maine I had found it a scarce tree; and I asked him where I must look for it. With a smile, he answered that he could hardly tell me.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)