Today we’re happy to announce our new discussion forums, 2.0. We created the new forums because we want to encourage interesting, thoughtful and respectful discussions about radio. These often take place in the comments to our posts, but we also want a place for topics that aren’t only linked to a story.
We’ve created forums on topics like college radio news, community radio operations, LPFM policy and activism, and radio technology. Every story posted on Radio Survivor will have its own forum topic. You’ll find the link at the bottom of the story text.
You may remember the first iteration of our forums. While a nice try, the forums were hosted on a separate site–with different user accounts–rather than being integrated into our main site. This added extra steps to participate–probably too many for most folks. And, then, earlier this year a vulnerability in the forum software allowed the site to get hacked, forcing us to close it down.
This time around we have a new system that’s fully integrated into our main site and our comments. If you ever created an account so that you may comment easily, then that account also works for the new forums.
One of the reasons we added forums is because we want to support the radio community with an accessible and non-commercial space for thoughtful discussion about issues that affect this great medium, in all its forms. Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms have benefits, but they also have weaknesses. Anyone who has tried to have a long-form discussion on Twitter or tried to find a conversation thread more than a couple of months old on Facebook may have experienced these limits.
We respect you, and your privacy. We won’t track your activity on our forums, and we’ll allow you to use any screen name you like, as long as you provide a valid email address (we also won’t share your email address with anyone). All we ask is that when using the forums you treat other people with respect. We want our forums to be a safe space for all matters of discussion, from the technical to the managerial, from programming to listeners. We won’t tolerate racism, sexism, ad hominem attacks or any other abusive behavior, and will not hesitate to ban trolls and other people who refused to abide by these principles of mutual respect.
Please take a look, and register for an account if you haven’t already. Also, let us know if there are forum topics you’d like to see. We can also create private forums that are not publicly searchable or viewable, available only to registered members–are there conversations that belong there? Comment in the forums.
