BuddyPress.org

Also, yes, I know ‘get back on your porch, grandpa — forums are so 1998.’

Fair enough — but that way of structuring conversation on the web is everywhere for a good reason. It works, and people intuitively understand it. You can’t force people into new interaction paradigms, you have to design interpenetrating ways of letting them interact, and let them choose for themselves the way they do it. As designers, I believe we must give users reasonable choices. We also have to respect the data — the kind of information a site presents informs the way it should be presented. Forum must follow function.