Why create a Discourse forum? Two main reasons
- Our Junto needs a way to communicate that works for all of us on a platform that we control.
- We have enjoyed our Junto for more than 12 years and would like to promote the creation of more Junto groups, i.e, a marketing tool.
What is wrong with the way we communicate today?
Our face-to-face discussions are awesome, the problem is with electronic communication. Public social networks are subject to censorship, exploitation, or manipulation. The disruption of an organization getting kicked off Facebook, Twitter, or Parler for example, is massive and a complete show stopper. There are many examples where public and semi-public sites discussion has been taken out of context and used as a tool against the organization and its members.
Group text and emails: You can’t control the when, you can’t control the who, and you can’t control the what, other than that it’s perfect! – Matt
The problems with group messing are well documented. Email and SMS text chains have a purpose but are difficult to manage, are not private, give the end-user little control over their participation. They are also insecure and subject to cancellation by tech-giants and governments. An email or text chain is like a party line. There is a single thread for all topics with no way to participate in some topics and not in others. You are either all in or all out. There is no way to show agreement or disagreement with a simple thumbs up or thumbs down without clogging the thread. The result is that users either ask to be removed from the thread or mute it, making it a useless communication tool
Why Discourse
Discourse is an open-source project that gives us full control. We can host it on any Linux, Windows or Mac computer on any domain. Clients include Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, App Safari with nice support on iPad, on iPhone, and Android. It can be put behind a firewall and used over a Virtual Private Network. We can set policies while not be subject to the whims of others. We can communicate privately in small Junto Groups or globally among many Junto Groups.
Discourse uses a trust system for the self-moderation of groups. Group members can respond, thumb-up-down content, label spam, i.e, group members moderate each other. New users can participate to a limited degree and are awarded higher-level privileges as they gain the trust of others in the group.
More Junto Groups For A Better World
We all enjoy The Junto. The knowledge and skills of the group help all of us to be smarter and better citizens of our community. Would the world be a better place with more Juntos?
The Junto Cafe can host multiple private Junto Groups at the same time. There will also be a global-group where members can post content from around the world. Not only can we help communities get stronger but we can facilitate education and collaborations around the globe.
