Message boards have become a popular medium on the Internet for people to visit and communicate with others about subjects ranging from the current war in Iraq, to what colour underpants a person wore on Tuesday. The detached feeling that the Internet gives is very much apparent on message boards, with people often willing to share much more about themselves than they normally would to people in the real world.
Bands commonly incorporate a message board (or forum) onto their websites to encourage their fans to congregate and talk about the band and their music. Popular band's message boards often stray from talk about the group, with users utilising it as more of a hang out while they are on the Internet, a place where like-minded individuals can go and chat about anything at all that interests them. A message board I frequently visit, and the subject of my analysis in this report, is the message board for a band called Sparta, from El Paso, Texas, USA. It is fairly obvious that I am a fair way from El Paso, and many people just like me from around the globe frequent the board on numerous occasions each day. .
Message boards create a very simple, but different form of communication amongst its users. The detached feel of the internet makes it easy for people to say what they think, post pictures of themselves and others and also get to know other individual users through the use of IM's (Instant Messages) and other such instant communication programs. .
Through my experience on message boards, I have come to know people from all around the world who have similar interests to me, and also people who are extremely different to me. I've conversed with both types of people, with enjoyable experiences coming from both angles. .
The most common form of expression on a message board is to simply start a topic about a subject, or a question, and wait for others to respond to it. In Figure 1 there is an example of a post I made on the Sparta message board, asking a question about people's thoughts on the phrase "Patriotism breeds Racism".
