I’ve been thinking about the concept of effective communication and forum structure for several years, as I created and maintained the Effective Communication resource for Acclaim Game’s Project Top Secret. For those who don’t know, it was a volunteer driven project where anybody could join the design team. During the time of the project over 60,000 people participated in some way, but in the end the community faded and the project was canceled. I’m one of the last active people from that project, and have noted several interesting patterns from that forum, and several others that I’d like to share. So, let’s go.
First thing to think about is that forums are groups of sub-forums, which are groups of sub-forums and/or threads. Threads are finally individual discussions/conversations on a particular topic. This structure is wonderful at breaking down large, complicated topics into smaller, manageable topics. This is both it’s strength and it’s weakness. It’s wonderful at focusing solely on one small topic, but that also means that the topics are separated from each other to be discussed without relation to other topics, unless we intervene.
Second thing to think about is that the display of a forum can be compared to real terrain in a geographic and topological way. This means that topics that may be close in content can be vary far apart in their locations in the forum structure. While it is great to organize the threads by reverse chronological order to know where activity is in real time, it also means that relevant content in another thread may be hard to find.
Those two points both organize the threads in a way to show the most recently active discussions on manageablely sized topics, and hinder cross/inter-thread discussion. In many ways the smaller topics help us focus our efforts and the recent activity help us find topics that we can discuss with other interested parties. Unfortunately this mimics specialization, that while it gives us a deeper level of understanding of the topic also limits itself to that topic. Interdisciplinary discussion are only allowed to discuss the original topic, not to facilitate the exploration of a topic, by the strictest application of the forum design. To explore to far afield would be considered off-topic, and thus not allowed.
That overly zealous focus on a particular topic is the weakness of the forum design, enforced by our unconscious reading of the intentions of the design. Because of this we say that something “off-topic” should be made into it’s own thread, to be discussed on its’ own and to allow the topic to continue as originally intended. This fractures more exploratory discussions and distributes the parts across the expanse of the forum.
If we consider the essential role of interdisciplinary, and exploratory, discussions to innovative and adaptive problem solving, it becomes obvious that the structure of a forum is not naturally conducive to innovation. It segregates the topics into their “disciplines” like professors into subject departments. However, that doesn’t mean we can’t adapt it a little and make it more conducive to innovative thinking and thinkers. The first step is to be willing to adapt our plans, because that allows us to change what we are discussing and how we are discussing them. We need to apply some wiki thinking to our forum.
Forums are very linear in nature, but the content within the forum (like links) can make it very non-linear, like a wiki. Where a forum fractures and disperses, a wiki collects and organizes. Sub-forums are an application of wiki thinking to forums, even though sub-forums existed before wikis. Yet, sub-forums are exclusive, meaning that a thread can only be in a single sub-forum, rather than part of several. If we have several broad topic sub-forums, it makes sense that some discussions could fit into more than one. More specific sub-forums usually have more restrictions to what kinds of threads fit within them. They are like wiki categories. The other common way to connect wiki pages is to include links to relevant pages, and that is also fairly standard in forums, though it can be a bit more cumbersome and troublesome to do.
Unfortunately the old adage, “out of sight, out of mind” applies to forums, and compounds the problem of a forum’s weakness. If it’s not brought up in a thread, it’s not likely to be considered. If the reference is just a link to another part of the forum, it’s likely to be skipped. If it’s posted in a long post, it may be skipped along with much of the post. If it’s posted in the thread, it could be deemed “off-topic”. This is where we have to consider community culture to find solutions.
Community culture is a strange mixture of design impressions, perceived leader views, views reflected by common behavior and perceived competence of those in charge. If the more exploratory posts are allowed by the culture, then there is a good chance for the innovative approaches to be voiced with decent reception. If changing the plans is allowed by the culture, then the innovation may be given room to flourish. However, the key points I’ve seen are in the actions and participation of the leaders.
Community founders, moderators and staff all come across as leaders and are held in a sort of celebrity position when it comes to their points of view, as a combination of role and power. If they come across as competent, it’s natural to follow what they say, sometimes too much to the letter. If they come across as incompetent, it’s natural to blow them off, sometimes completely. The designs implemented by the leaders influence the perceived level of competence. What the community deems as competent varies from individual to individual and community to community.
A special note should be made about enforcing the rules, which is the role of the moderators. The designs of the moderators are rulings, not features like with founders, admins and developers. Their actions also have a subtler, but just as important role in the culture of the community. Rules that are badly enforced, in any way, makes the leaders seem incompetent if allowed to persist, OR are construed to reflect the views of the leaders on how important the rules are. For this reason, the moderation of a forum is probably more critical to success than features, because the moderators are an extension of the founders and admins. They are a reflection of the views of the highest of the leaders, and the competence of those same leaders.
My view is that discussions and forum structure are closely related. Depending on the culture and structure of a community different kinds of discussion will be encouraged and discouraged. Both the culture and the structure are heavily influenced by the actions and views of those in charge, putting the leaders in a position to guide the kinds of discussions on their forums. However, it takes understanding of communities and digital communication tools to shape a forum into the kind of community you wish it to be.
