Are discussion "boards" on the way out?

Nope. I frequent a forum with lots of discussion topics that’s pretty buzzing. Don’t expect it to wane any time soon either.

What’s the difference between a “board” and fluther?

I participate in one, and it still is as active as it ever was. In fact, it’s recently had quite a growth spurt.

I’ve made some very good friends there, and we have “known” each other for about 5 years now. I think it really depends on the individual board, and the members.

Only cool people hang on Fluther.

I used to spend most of my time on the internet on message boards (comic book or sci fi boards in particular). When the blogging boom happened, I found myself slowly shifting toward the comments sections of blogs I frequented (aren’t blog posts really the same thing as an Opening Post on a message board?).

There really isn’t much of a difference between chat rooms, message boards, blogs, twitter and even fluther: someone opens a discussion with a question or subject and other people answers. They’re all different ways of doing virtually the same thing: getting together and talking about something interesting.

Thanks for your responses. As for differences, I think there is a substantial difference in the architecture of platforms. For example, I can communicate via e-mail, or I can send a text message. My son has probably sent less than 20 e-mails in his life, but probably sends more than 20 text messages per day. I think the structure of a thing, esp. a Web 2.0 thing, influences who uses it. I was just wondering if folks were gravitating more to the structure of a platform like twitter as apposed to a “full service” message board.

Perhaps the decrease action on some message boards is due to it being the summer, and the beginning semester for a lot of college students right now. A lot the blogs I read (mostly personal blogs) have updated less due to this.

New ones pop up all of the time. I don’t think they can ever be out

@perplexism I think you’re right. Thanks.