Sydney Forums

The Sydney Forum is probably mid-way between the briz forum and the adelaide forum - that is mostly focused on event related topics, but with other info like where sniffer dogs have been hanging out, what shoes are the comfiest for dancing, what is the best juice bar in the city, etc. this forum still lacks some of the 'personalised' aspects of the brisbane forum, which seems to represent a tight knit community. another thing ive noticed on the sydney forums is that there seems to be alot more VIP members - which are 'paying' subscribers to ITM. the benefits include cheap deals at a variety of clubs, and why this is focused in sydney could reflect either the number of deals available for people in sydney, or just the exorbatant prices for sydney clubbing in general.

Forums by city

The adelaide forum on ITM is very different to the brisbane forum. The adelaide forum is 99% event related topics. Posts concern event promotion, who's going, etc but it is in a very informative 'whats on' kind of function rather than 'lets meet up'. compared to the brisbane forum, this group is much more focused on events, and this could reflect the local community, or it could mean that they have a stricter moderator.. although in general the members seem to be less 'chatty', and the post that showed the most interaction was 'whos your favourite adelaide celebrity' - featuring prominent homeless people, buskers and the like. this is interesting and it would be good to see if there is any 'reason' linking the impersonality of the adelaide page vs the brisbane page.. more to come!

forum funcitons

ok ive been assessing the forums on ITM by city, heres the general breakdown:

Brisbane: two very interesting threads caught my eye.. the first is the Mayhem 2004 rollcall which is basically a list of people who are going to the event (the purpose of which isnt all that clear.. just to establish a little bit of subcultural capital? most users just add their nickname and a comment, and there isnt really that 'lets all meet up' situation happening)
the other thread is defining PLUR (where was this post when i wrote my last essay!?) that just has so much interesting stuff happening in it, but it is basically a discussion as to whether the old PLUR (Peace, Love, Unity, Respect) is still being used in clubbing in brisbane today, and the debate is raging..
and a nice one exposing some of the internal politics of the site i whore and i vote which is complaining about the ITM policy that 'off topic' threads are deleted from the 'city' forums.. its basically the ITM community fighting for their right to have a city specific 'thread about nothing'.. see the melbourne forums 'thread about nothing' that has been going since september 2003 and has over 24,000 posts!
but asides from that the brisbane forum seems to be mostly about past and future events, dj's, music, birthday announcements etc.