UKNM: Fw: How do they do that ?

[Michael Reidy]

> I was wondering if anybody has been involved in attracting users to

> participate in discussion forums.

> How did you do it and did it create real added value from a Marketing

> point of view ?



Working from home today. Not enough juice to get round the M25. . . .


About five years ago, a company called The Internet Company (based in

Boston), and the original holders of the www.internet.com address, developed

some software that enabled moderated discussion forums. This meant that an

orderly discussion could take place in slightly less than 'real time'


It was developed by the net-wizard Robert Raisch (where is he now?), who

also developed the original Virtual Book.


This software was used by an on-line health site (www.hos.com) for German

doctors. It was set up by Burda and later sold to Bertelsmann. (It web-cast

the first live on-line operation (one frame per second in those days) and

attracted a record 60,000 visitors. The op was run on-demand on the site for

several years after that.) A discussion followed the op using the program.


Keeping order and an agenda in a discussion that people joining and leaving

was recognized as a problem from the start.


Unfortunately, The Internet Company was unable to put products in a box and

get them out the door - everything ended up being proprietary and not

cost-effective. The address is currently owned by Meckler Media.


Michael



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