UBB.Developers Forums Community Development Promoting Your Community Forum Showcase "free" area / chit chat, miscellaneous

huh! i think i spelled that right!

anyway, what are your thoughts on users that add a "general discussion" area to their boards?

like where every forum follows their theme (sports or movies, etc), except one, which permits topics that can have nothing to do with anything?

pros? cons?

A Chit Chat-sytle forum is often a good place for new users to get started. If you take a look at UBBDev, a lot of users will feel comfortable posting in Chit Chat, becoming known to other board regulars.

It is also a good forum, to move threads, which are off-topic to.

However, if you have a board that has forums for lots of different social categories...movies, music, games, computers, etc., then it may not be very effective because users will post in that forum, and there may not be many miscellaneous topics.

Since we are a techie kind of forum, Chit Chat is great for non-techie stuff, although even then we get a lot of hardware/software type threads.

my boards do feature one... but personally, i rarely, if ever, post there.

for the most part, its really just a free for all kinda board, where people will go in and, quite literally, post stuff that doesnt (have any right to) fit anywhere else. nonsensical stuff.

however... to each their own! some of my users love that -- they'll go in and have nonsensical conversations with one another. and, actually, they're pretty funny to read sometimes.

From the forums I've used, generally a good idea.

People do like to chat, and and area specifically for this means that the main forums can be kept more or less on topic

I have one on my forums. It's good for members to talk about anything just as long as it doesn't go out of hand.