Adapted from Wikipedia: The Free Online Encyclopedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_forum (3 Nov 2008)

Internet Forums

An Internet forum, or message board, is a bulletin board (somewhere where people can leave public messages) system in the form of a discussion site. Forums allow anonymous visitors to view the content, and consist of a group of contributors who've registered into the system, becoming known as members. The members submit topics for discussion (threads) and communicate with each other using publicly visible messages (posts) or private messaging.

Participants usually build bonds with each other and interest groups will easily form around a topic's discussion, subjects dealt within or around sections in the forum. The term community can be used to refer to those people participating in the website.

Registration

Registration is the process through which one becomes a member of the forum. Registered users of the site are referred to as members and are allowed to submit or send electronic messages. The process of registration involves verification of one's age, followed by acceptance of terms and conditions of the site. A web-form can be used to fill in a username, password and possibly an email address. Often full registration (eg allowing someone to post online) is not confirmed until the email address is validated.

Forum structure

A forum consists of a tree like directory structure containing at the lowest end topics (commonly called threads) and inside them posts. Logically forums are organised into a finite set of generic topics (usually with one main topic) driven and updated by a group known as members, and governed by a group known as moderators.

Rules and policies on forums

Forums are governed by a set of individuals, commonly referred to as staff or administrators, which are responsible for the forums conception, technical maintenance and policies. Most forums contain a forum rules section detailing the wishes, aim and guidelines of the forums creators. There is usually also an FAQ section, which contains basic information for new members and people not yet familiar with the use and principles of a forum. The rules section is sometimes built into the FAQ section, but it's almost always available as a thread.
Common rules found on forums include:

• No swearing or otherwise vulgar language
• No insulting or harassing fellow members
• No advertising or spam
• No double posting
• No multiple accounts
• No unwanted links or information or copyright infringing material
• Do not resurrect dead threads

Forum rules are maintained and enforced by the moderation team, but users are allowed to help out via what's known as the report system. Generally, moderators encourage members to also use the private message system if they wish to report behaviour.

When rules are broken several steps are commonly taken. First a warning is usually given, this is commonly in the form of a private message but recent development has made it possible for it to be integrated into the software. Subsequently, if the act is ignored and warnings do not work, the member is – usually – fist exiled from the forum for 3 days. Denying someone access to the site is called a ban (as in "you have been banished"). Bans can mean you can no longer log in or you can't even view the site anymore. If the offender, after the warning sentence, repeats the offence, another warning is given, usually this time a longer one. Continuous harassment of the site eventually leads to a permanent ban. However, in most cases this simply means the account is locked.

Offending content is usually treated with deletion. Sometimes if the topic is considered the source of the problem it is locked. In a locked thread members can not post anymore. In cases where the topic is considered a breach of rules it – with all of its posts – may be deleted.

Other key terms

Member

Identified internally by their username (alias), members (also known as "posters" or "users") are the moving force behind the community. Unlike a guest, a member (also called user) has the ability to create threads, submit messages etc, thus, they talk about the topic or get involved in discussions with other members participating in the threads.

As a member you are allowed to edit or delete your own posts and threads. Some times these rights are reserved.

User groups

Internally, forums organise visitors and logged in members into user groups. Privileges and rights are given based on these groups. A person viewing a closed thread as a member will see a box saying he does not have the right to submit messages there, but a moderator will likely see the same box granting him access to more than just posting messages.

Moderator

The moderators (short singular form: "mod") are users of the forum which are granted access to posts, threads and all users, for the purpose of moderating discussion (similar to arbitration) and also keeping the forum clean from spams. Because they have access to all posts and threads, functions for handling multiple entries (such as merging) are available. Moderators can manage the forum in two ways. They can be assigned to a specific section and as such only have moderator privileges in that section. It is common for a knowledgeable and trustworthy member to be promoted to moderator for such a task. The alternative is usually referred to as a global moderator, instead of managing any one section they have moderator privileges for the entire forum, and are expected to help each other handle everything. Common privileges of moderators include: deleting, merging, removing, moving, splitting of posts and threads; closing, renaming, stickying threads (a sticky thread is an important thread); banning, unbanning, warning the members; adding, editing, removing the polls of threads etc.

Administrator

The administrators (short form: "admin") manage the technical details required for running the site, they also promote (and demote) members to moderators, manage the rules which are to be enforced and create sections, sub-section and set the forums' settings, as well as perform any database operations eg backups. Administrators often also act as moderators. Besides all moderator privileges, common administrator powers include: making forum wide announcement messages; changing forum settings; adding, removing, altering privileges etc.

Post

A post is a user submitted message enclosed into a block containing the users details (username) the date it was submitted as well as links to forum functions such as editing, reporting, deleting or quoting it. Members are usually allowed to edit or delete their own posts. Posts are contained in threads, where they appear as boxes one after another. If the post is not the first of the thread, it also referred to as reply.

Threads and stickies

A thread is a collection of posts, usually displayed from newest to oldest, often showing date and time of posts. A thread is defined by a title (as an opening post) which defines its topic or purpose. A thread can contain any number of posts including multiple posts from the same members, even if they are one after the other. When a member posts in a thread it will jump to the top since it is the latest updated thread. Similarly other threads will jump in front of it when they receive posts. When a member posts in a thread for no reason, but to have it go to the top, it is referred to as a bump or bumping. Threads which are important but rarely receive posts are stickyed. A sticky thread will always appear in front of normal threads.

A threads popularity is measured on forums in views (the number of times the forum has been viewed) and replies (total posts minus one – the opening post) count.

Discussion

Forums prefer a premise of open and free discussion. Most common topics on forums include questions, comparisons, polls of opinion as well as debates. The language used on forums is generally not limited by any set rules and standards. Personal opinion is commonly more dominant than informative opinion or documented one; often expressing your personal opinion over others is encouraged or implied.

Private message

This allows bulletin board users to contact each other 'off the board' in safety. Private messages are sent directly to the recipient's private message inbox, without disclosing any email addresses.

Guest/lurker

A guest is an unregistered user of the site, commonly a visitor. Guests are granted access to all functions that do not require database alterations or breach privacy. A guest can view the contents of the forum. A person who is a very frequent visitor of the forum, a section or even a thread is referred to as a lurker, and the habit is referred to as lurking. Registered members often will refer to themselves as lurking in a particular location, which is to say they have no intention of participating in that section but enjoy reading the contributions to it.

Troll

A troll is a user that repeatedly and intentionally breaches netiquette, often posting derogatory or inflammatory messages about sensitive topics in an established online community to bait users into responding, often starting flame wars. They may also link to or plant images on networks that others may find disturbing in order to cause confrontation.

Avatar or forum signature

Forum members are allowed to have what's called an avatar and forum signature. The avatar is generally a small image of limited size, displayed below a users' username. The forum signature consists of text – usually images are also allowed – defined by the user and appended at the end of each of his posts. Both fundamentally are just expressions of the users' creativity, rarely is their content limited. Some forums do forbid uploading of avatars and allow only avatars from their gallery.

Emoticon

An emoticon or smilie is a symbol or combination of symbols used to convey emotional content in written or message form. Forums implement a system though which some of the text representations of a emoticons (e.g. XD, ) are rendered as a small image. Depending on part the world the forum's topic originates (since most forums are international) smilies can be replaced by other forms of similar graphics.

Poll

Most forums implement an opinion poll system for threads. A user when creating the thread (and not after) is allowed to add a poll. Most implementations allow for single-choice or multi-choice (sometimes limited to a certain number) when selecting options as well as private or public display of voters. Polls can be set to expire after a certain date or in some cases after a number of days from its creation. Members vote in a poll and a statistic is displayed graphically.