Many of our readers witnessed BusinessWeek’s introduction of a new interface for the MBA discussion forums yesterday. Needless to say, the redesign of the MBA applicant world’s most popular discussion boards has kicked up quite a stir. Before we analyze what’s taken place, it is worth offering a bit of background.
Background on BW Forums
The BW Forums rose to fame in the late 90′s as the place for MBA applicants, admissions officers, GMAT instructors, admissions consultants and students to meet, greet, debate and discuss. Although the Princeton Review’s discussion board had previously been the only serious game in town, BW quickly built a strong community for four main reasons:
1) Ease of use. Thanks to a new type of discussion software from Prospero, BW’s forum was really the first one that made it incredibly easy to post, respond, track and generally participate in a terrific community. Although the message-drafting interface was much like other offerings on the market, the key advantage to the BW forums was that the user could simultaneously view recent discussions in a narrow window on the left, while browsing actual postings in a larger window on the right. At the time, this interface mirrored MS Windows’ File Manager or MS Outlook and would have been familiar/comfortable to anyone used to searching for files or reading emails on their PC. Interestingly enough, this sort of interface can still be seen in the popular iTunes software from Apple. Simply put, people seemed to like the idea of clicking on a list of discussion topics at the left and seeing actual discussion posts display in the large frame on the right.
2) Relevant Content. Given the ties between BusinessWeek’s editorial content, rankings and great online resources, the site was a natural place for students and applicants to chat. In other words, the online magazine already had a faithful audience reading their articles with a great deal of frequency. Adding discussion forums merely allowed this group to create two-way dialogue in the same location.
3) Great Moderators. In addition to providing visitors with the means to debate, BusinessWeek’s editorial staff kept a close eye on the forums. Journalists like Mica Schneider stayed active in the forums, ensuring that discussion was productive and that questions were answered. This prevented excessive off-topic discussion or inappropriate content and made the forums a valid resource. The caliber of the forums was also aided by informal moderating from admissions officers, current students, admissions consultants and alumni who had been readers of BW content and found the forums of interest.
4) Reinforcement. As BW’s forums rose in popularity, leading schools took notice. The Wharton school switched their ‘e-talk’ system over to the same interface/software as BusinessWeek and unveiled the incredibly popular student-2-student forums. Anyone with a BW account could instantly use the Wharton forums without any need to get up to speed. This phenomenon worked in both directions, sending many Wharton forum members into BW’s discussion as well. Most recently, the University of Chicago has adopted the same software for their discussion forums.
The New Look
The new version of the BW Forums has abandoned the frames/windows style format of old. Users can no longer view discussion threads at the same time as they read actual posts. This has caused tremendous outcry on the part of the forum’s most faithful users. Oddly, it seems that much of the new space gained from the elimination of the frames/windows is largely being used for banner advertising on the right hand side of the screen.
Another element worth noting is that the new look is also more graphically intense, with all sorts of icons to indicate popularity of discussions, etc. These icons take more time to load, making things a bit less speedy than before. One of the prior advantages of the BW Forums, beyond the intuitive interface was how sparse the forums looked. A great metaphor here is Google vs. Alta Vista. In the mid-90′s Alta Vista was the leading search engine with all kinds of graphics, bells and whistles. Then along came Google, which had an almost amateurish look and feel – with classic hyperlinks and not much else. It just so happened that along with the bare-bones look came unmatched speed and accuracy. We all know how that battle turned out (ironically, Alta Vista’s current look is now much like Google’s). This was in part the same appeal that the BW Forums brought to the table in the late 90′s (and until yesterday).
We’ll keep our readers posted as this story continues to develop…
