[theshrike79]

You can set up a Discord server for free in under 3 minutes. 10 if you want to install all the fancy moderation bots and change the icons and add custom emojis.

There's nothing comparable for forums. FB tried but it's a cesspool of "user engagement", managing groups is a full time job and still doesn't work properly.

Oh, and Discord _has_ a forum-like feature inside it :D

[n_plus_1_acc]

You can setup a room on any Matrix server of your choice in the same 3 minutes.

[theshrike79]

The UX in Matrix is really crappy. I say this as someone who has been on IRC since the late 90's. I can deal with jank. I was in the IRC wars. I've seen server splits used to take over channels by Polish IRC warriors.

Matrix is its own brand of confusing because it's trying SO hard not to be a Discord clone. If you properly want to own your Matrix channels, you need to run your own server and that's not a 3 minute thing to do.

[cassianoleal]

> Discord _has_ a forum-like feature inside it

Pretty sure the last bit in the GP was the important one:

> What happened to product forums _that could be easily found in a web search_?

Without web searching capability, whatever "forum-like feature" exists is still subpar.

[theshrike79]

Yea, searchability on the internet went to crap ages ago.

Content is either in silos like FB or Discord or in videos on Youtube. None of which is properly searchable from an external search engine by content.