Forum. This concept may be unfamiliar to today's young internet users. However, as an early zoomer, I still enjoy the forum environment. Personally, I don't like expressing various opinions, but I prefer to observe. And the forum is a good place to observe various viewpoints and information. Compared to places like YouTube or Twitter, expressing opinions in a forum does not require one to gain much fame (although this also depends on the speed and sorting of information flow), which is extremely attractive. More decentralization is always a good thing, isn't it?
Certainly, not everyone's opinions deserve respect, but everyone should indeed have the ability to express their own opinions and have the responsibility to be accountable for their own speech. That's what I believe. Next, I will talk about the forums I often visit.
Let's start with 4chan. 4chan is definitely an excellent embodiment of my viewpoint. Anyone can post on 4chan (IPs from China will be banned), there are very few rules, and posting is anonymous. Besides this, after a period of time, new posts will push old posts down, so there is no long-term "corpse-beating" behavior.
The lack of rules naturally brings about its side effects: chaos. 4chan is indeed a place where all sorts of people gather, and there have been many scandals and controversial events. Although freedom is reflected, the accountability for speech is not as serious, after all, anonymity + deletion is a perfect combination for a quick escape.
Initially, 4chan was a discussion board similar to 2ch for anime, but later it developed into an English community where anything can be discussed. When you first look at 4chan, you may find it very offensive because it is filled with either blatant discrimination or explicit content. However, if you continue to look, you will find that there is also valuable content. Take the many generals in the video game board (vg) as an example, they are great for beginners to get into the series. And in 4chan, no matter how obscure something is, there are always a few people who will respond, which is quite amazing. So it's definitely not as bad as it seems, although I wouldn't say it's great either...
The forums I often visit are:
/v/, /vrpg/, /vg/, /vmg/. These are game-related boards. Among them, /v/ has a fast pace but lower quality content, /vg/ has interesting board headers but generally not many good posts inside, /vrpg/ is slower but more likely to have interesting content.
/g/ has some interesting generals to look at, but it's mostly focused on tech news or arguments.
/jp/ is half a bunch of people going crazy over some fictional characters, and the rest is discussions about ACG or Japan-related content. The "djt" thread is a place to learn Japanese, but it may not be suitable for everyone.
/w/ and /wg/ have some interesting wallpaper threads and image editing requests, but the image size limit on 4chan can be annoying.
/d/, /e/, /h/ are three different flavors of adult content boards. /d/ is for various niche fetishes, /e/ is for simple "setu" (sexy) images, and /h/ is for games or other things as well.
/s4s/ and /b/ are quite similar, anything can be posted there, but the atmosphere is really warm and cozy. It may seem absurd, but I really think so.
Now that I've talked about 4chan, let's talk about the other -chan forums.
Uboachan, as the name suggests, is a community related to dream diaries. In addition to dream diaries, there are also discussions about ACG content related to dream diaries. For example, RPG Maker games, bizarre things, ghost stories, etc. There are also discussions among NEETs who live off their parents. The overall pace is slow.
Kissu is a split from the QA board. The pace there is slow, and it's difficult to explain in detail.
Then there's Reddit. I don't really browse Reddit much because there's too much content. I only occasionally look at the sections that interest me, as the larger sections can be boring. And the upvote system leads to centralization of content.
After talking about foreign forums, let's talk about domestic ones. Although Bangumi is not a forum, it does have a large community called "Teahouse". It's basically a forum where you can talk about anything. Bangumi is a "familiar society". Simply put, the people who frequently speak here are just a few, so it's similar to a group chat. This is also an interesting characteristic. The Teahouse often has changing trends, although it's mostly casual conversations, recently there has been a trend of people creating multiple accounts to provoke others, which is quite annoying. Although it may sound impolite to say this, the users on Bangumi are also highly educated. You might think there is a survivor bias, but based on a previous survey (although this behavior is not encouraged), the majority of users are excellent high school or university students from developed areas or even international students living abroad. It's not completely inexplicable, after all, liking anime is also a kind of luxury. Even though anime is not as niche as it used to be, discovering a small, old, and slightly core site like Bangumi still requires some dwelling experience, which means... well, I'm getting off-topic. I mentioned this because it leads to a unique atmosphere in Bangumi's discussions. Compared to Tieba, people here speak in a more civil manner. Even in trolling posts, this is still the case.
Speaking of Tieba, let me say a few words about it as well. I really dislike Tieba. Admittedly, there are a few small Tieba that are worth reading, but the overall atmosphere is really terrible. Plus, Baidu's various dark operations make me really dislike it. Reading Tieba makes me angrier than reading 4chan. I'm not sure why, but it's really hard to find any valuable content on Tieba. I used to occasionally browse Tieba, like the Sun Xiaochuan Tieba, but I got tired of it later.
However, Tieba does have a grassroots feeling to it. This is also a unique atmosphere. Compared to Bangumi, which has a more civil and formal tone, Tieba users are straightforward and direct. They don't beat around the bush and speak their minds. It can be said to have a more lively atmosphere of life.
I'm not very familiar with the remaining domestic forums because most of them have strict gatekeeping and require registration. Registering for S1 even requires payment, which is quite amusing to me. So, let me summarize briefly. As you can see, the larger the forum, the more noise there is, and the more time it takes to filter through. On the other hand, small forums can guarantee quality, but often require strict gatekeeping to maintain, and after that, they tend to form a community of familiar faces that exclude outsiders. Each has its pros and cons. What you want to see may be more important than the forum itself.