i think the difficulty here is that the software itself has very little to do with the success of forums. software doesn’t create communities, it *supports* communities. a group of people with a shared interest (or obsession) will find a way to organize themselves and share with one another, and most tend to be tolerant of any tool that helps them do so, even if that tool isn’t particularly well designed or well implemented. in short, i don’t think it’s any characteristics of the software that’s responsible for the success of forums, it’s the people they’re serving.

- why do forums work? - branch

an excellent point from whitneymcn - ninakix [emphasis mine]