The World Forum was created due to a perceived need for such a site in the world. There are numerous right-wing and left-wing radio shows, television shows, and web forums, targeting specific nations, which mainly preach to the converted and often suppress opposing opinions. But there seemed to be few (if any) forums that encouraged the participation of people of all political and religious ideologies from the entire world. I felt we needed a forum with no political axe to grind whatsoever, where everyone from all walks of life across the world can discuss world events, sharing their different opinions and viewpoints, and in so doing, help everyone to expand their horizons and understand each other better.

I do not pretend that I do not have a political axe to grind--I am rather left-wing and my stories will no doubt reflect this. But this site was not built so that I might have a place to freely post my political rantings. It's a community site, and I sincerely hope that it will eventually attract people from all political spectrums to participate in intelligent debates.

I did not want this forum to be purely political, however. Most web forums cover fairly niche topics, such as science or technology, so that when stories or discussions do inevitably stray into other topics, those that know a lot about it are probably not there to lend their thoughts and opinions. Instead, I wanted The World Forum to be like a daily newspaper for the world, covering every topic--politics, human rights, war, crime, science, environment, business, finance, sports, entertainment, everything.

The World Forum empowers the users to be the content producers of this site and create a community open to everyone. Story submissions are usually summaries of (and links to) news sources elsewhere on the web. A lot happens in the world every day, so I hope that eventually, as many as a dozen stories might be posted to the front page every day, and more posted to the sections and blogs. Original content is also welcome, including essays, editorials/commentary, and book and film reviews. I will also work hard to arrange guest interviews (politicians, scientists, authors, business leaders, etc.), where the questions come from our users--you write the questions and you rate the questions. You can also rate each other's story comments, thereby providing a collaborative filtering tool.

Unlike many other forums, there is no confusion regarding the similarities/overlap between sections and topics. In The World Forum, the sections (other than Blogs and Site News) represent geographical locations. The top-level section is International, with continent subsections beneath it, and country subsections beneath them. All use reverse inheritance, so while you can post directly, say, to the North America section, you could also post to Canada and have all of its stories visible in the North America section. Another feature of our site is that every user is required, upon registration, to specify their country of citizen ship/residence (you can choose Undisclosed, if you really don't want people to know). The country is displayed next to the poster's name for stories and comments, which allows you to know at a glance where someone is from and hopefully will encourage more global participation.

The ultimate goal for The World Forum is to become a principal forum for the discussion of world events with people from all over the planet. And, hopefully, by helping each other to become more aware of world issues and more understanding of different viewpoints, we can actually make the world a better place. It's a lofty goal. But it's a good one.

I promise to always work hard to keep this site fresh and exciting. I will never allow it to stagnate, nor will it ever just disappear one day. And I will run the site in a fair, mature manner--never forgeting that it is a community site, and is thus not mine with which to make rash, impulsive decisions that affect everyone. Important decisions will be made by the community, and if I ever feel I need help in its day-to-day operations, I'll ask for that help rather than letting the site get out of control.

So sign up for your free account now! Having a username helps you to establish a reputation in this community by posting unanonymously, it allows you to read and vote on the stories submitted to the moderation queue, and it also allows you to write your own blog entries about anying and everything, which do not go through a voting process at all.

I hope you are as excited about this site as I am. I will work hard to market it and improve it as time goes by. I want this endeavour to succeed, so please do not hesitate to tell me any ideas you have to make it better!

Drog