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    <title>Forem: Patrick Woods</title>
    <description>The latest articles on Forem by Patrick Woods (@patrickjwoods).</description>
    <link>https://forem.com/patrickjwoods</link>
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      <title>Forem: Patrick Woods</title>
      <link>https://forem.com/patrickjwoods</link>
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    <item>
      <title>APIGTM: a bunch of lightning talks about APIs + AI</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Fri, 19 Sep 2025 17:32:46 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/patrickjwoods/apigtm-a-bunch-of-lightning-talks-about-apis-ai-5apg</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/patrickjwoods/apigtm-a-bunch-of-lightning-talks-about-apis-ai-5apg</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://media2.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Farticles%2Fa4i21jszppmwb9hgnv3j.png" class="article-body-image-wrapper"&gt;&lt;img src="https://media2.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Farticles%2Fa4i21jszppmwb9hgnv3j.png" alt="APIGTM is on October 7"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  We're live-streaming 14 talks about API growth in the age of AI
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;If you care about driving adoption of your public APIs, I'd love to see you there.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://partiful.com/e/qdFeSYSXmeVfui2PGVdv" class="crayons-btn crayons-btn--primary" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Sign up&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;APIs. MCP. Agents. We'll cover it all, along with: &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Battle-tested API playbooks from leaders at Canva, Mintlify, Block, WorkOS, Merge, Continue, and more &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Techniques on positioning, pricing, and onboarding&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Making your endpoints irresistible to developers and AI Agents today, and into the future&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Proven tactics for converting word-of-mouth into revenue, and turning casual users into evangelists&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;The evolving role of MCP and Agents in API GTM strategies&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  📅 The details
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;October 7&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Noon till 4pm PT &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;Streaming live from Postman's SF HQ &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;In-person happy hour to follow &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;✨ It's free ✨&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://partiful.com/e/qdFeSYSXmeVfui2PGVdv" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Signup&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🎤 Hear from leading experts on API Growth
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;strong&gt;Keynote&lt;/strong&gt;: &lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/ankit-sobti/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Ankit Sobti&lt;/a&gt;, Co-founder and CTO, Postman&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/ernananguiano/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Ernan Anguiano&lt;/a&gt;, Product Manager, Firebase&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://x.com/DynamicWebPaige" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Paige Bailey&lt;/a&gt;, Developer Relations Engineering Lead, Google DeepMind&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/briandaviddavidson/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Brian Davidson&lt;/a&gt;, Sr Customer Eng, Google Maps&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://x.com/bdougieYO" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Brian Douglas&lt;/a&gt;, Head of Developer Experience, Continue&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/noureldifrawy/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Nour Eldifrawy&lt;/a&gt;, Product Manager, Merge&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://x.com/mlhassett" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Meredith Hassett&lt;/a&gt;, Sr. Developer Advocate, Canva&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebecca-hauck/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Rebecca Hauck&lt;/a&gt;, Postman Leader, Lead Technical Product Manager, PayPal &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://x.com/Prathkum" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Pratham Kumar&lt;/a&gt;, Dev Rel Manager, APILayer&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardmoot/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Richard Moot&lt;/a&gt;, Tech Lead, Developer Relations at Block&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/devrel/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Chris Riley&lt;/a&gt;, Sr. Manager, Developer Relations, Hubspot&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulomi-shroff-63237a/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Paulomi Shroff&lt;/a&gt;, Head of AWS Marketplace International Expansion, Amazon&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://x.com/TobinSouth" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Tobin South&lt;/a&gt;, VP of AI Agents, WorkOS&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://x.com/BrandonWaselnuk/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Brandon Waselneck&lt;/a&gt;, Head of Product, Mintlify&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://partiful.com/e/qdFeSYSXmeVfui2PGVdv" class="crayons-btn crayons-btn--primary" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Register now&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1968748838111392240-827" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1968748838111392240"&gt;
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&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🚀 Brought to you by the &lt;a href="https://explore.postman.com" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Postman API Network&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You're not maximizing your API's potential if developers can't find or successfully use it. Ship your API to millions of developers, onboard them quickly with fewer errors, and drive sustained adoption with actionable usage insights.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Learn more about growing your API usage with the Postman API Network: &lt;a href="https://www.postman.com/publish/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;https://www.postman.com/publish/&lt;/a&gt; &lt;/p&gt;

</description>
      <category>api</category>
      <category>ai</category>
      <category>news</category>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Developer Love #1: Unintentional Gatekeeping with Brian Douglas of GitHub</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Thu, 23 Jul 2020 19:20:32 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/orbit/developer-love-1-unintentional-gatekeeping-with-brian-douglas-of-github-244</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/orbit/developer-love-1-unintentional-gatekeeping-with-brian-douglas-of-github-244</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;In this inaugural episode of Developer Love, host &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/patrickjwoods" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Patrick Woods&lt;/a&gt; speaks with &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/bdougieyo" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Brian Douglas&lt;/a&gt; of GitHub. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;They discuss the developer advocate role, leveraging open source knowledge, and improving inclusivity within communities.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🎧 Listen now
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe width="100%" height="166" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://soundcloud.com/heavybit/developer-love-ep-1-unintentional-gatekeeping-with-brian-douglas-of-github&amp;amp;auto_play=false&amp;amp;color=%23000000&amp;amp;hide_related=false&amp;amp;show_comments=true&amp;amp;show_user=true&amp;amp;show_reposts=false&amp;amp;show_teaser=true"&gt;
&lt;/iframe&gt;
&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.heavybit.com/library/podcasts/developer-love/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Check out the show notes and transcript&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/developer-love/id1524102185" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Subscribe in Apple Podcasts&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  In this episode
&lt;/h3&gt;


&lt;div class="ltag__user ltag__user__id__19970"&gt;
    &lt;a href="/bdougieyo" class="ltag__user__link profile-image-link"&gt;
      &lt;div class="ltag__user__pic"&gt;
        &lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fuser%2Fprofile_image%2F19970%2F6dc0f11e-a4da-4762-aed8-11f70143d31b.jpeg" alt="bdougieyo image"&gt;
      &lt;/div&gt;
    &lt;/a&gt;
  &lt;div class="ltag__user__content"&gt;
    &lt;h2&gt;
&lt;a class="ltag__user__link" href="/bdougieyo"&gt;Brian Douglas&lt;/a&gt;Follow
&lt;/h2&gt;
    &lt;div class="ltag__user__summary"&gt;
      &lt;a class="ltag__user__link" href="/bdougieyo"&gt;Brian founded OpenSauced, a platform for turning open source into opportunity. Try it out and let me know what you think.&lt;/a&gt;
    &lt;/div&gt;
  &lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;


</description>
      <category>devrel</category>
      <category>podcast</category>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Slack vs Discord vs Discourse: The best tool for your community</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Tue, 26 May 2020 15:40:11 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/orbit/slack-vs-discord-vs-discourse-the-best-tool-for-your-community-lgn</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/orbit/slack-vs-discord-vs-discourse-the-best-tool-for-your-community-lgn</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;“What platform should I use for my startup’s community? Should I move from Slack to Discourse? Wait...there’s a Discourse &lt;em&gt;and&lt;/em&gt; a Discord?”&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Now is a great time to build a community online, and there’s no shortage of really great tools to help. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;But despite the many options, there’s no single tool to rule them all. There are just too many variables, including community size, engagement model, the size and capabilities of the team building the community, and more. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;While there’s no silver bullet for building and growing a community online, there &lt;em&gt;are&lt;/em&gt; a few key questions to consider that will help guide your tooling decisions and your &lt;a href="https://orbit.love/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Developer Relations &lt;/a&gt;strategy. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In this article, we’ll discuss the key factors to consider when choosing a community platform, compare the three most popular options, and make recommendations based on a few different community scenarios. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Jump to these sections:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  The TL;DR recommendations
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  The 3 key factors to consider when choosing
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  In-depth feature comparison grid
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Detailed recommendations
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  The TL;DR Recommendations
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ll discuss plenty of details, but here are the high-level recommendations.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Use &lt;a href="http://slack.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Slack&lt;/a&gt; if…
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You want to take advantage of Slack’s large library of integrations, bots (limited to 10 on free plans), or use their no-code workflow builder (only paid plans).&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You want threaded conversations in your realtime chat. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You don’t care that only the last 10,000 messages are retained (on free plans).&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You and your community members already use Slack for work.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;But keep in mind:&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  On the free plan, Slack only retains the most recent 10,000 messages, which means they automatically archive messages above that threshold. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Slack paid plans start at $8 &lt;em&gt;per user&lt;/em&gt; per month. Every community we’re aware of uses the free plan. &lt;a href="https://slack.com/pricing" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Compare Slack pricing plans here&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Slack offers no real tooling for moderation. It’s specifically designed for workplaces, and they &lt;a href="https://qz.com/1641708/slack-doesnt-care-that-you-cant-block-a-workplace-harasser/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;don’t appear interested&lt;/a&gt; in building features for moderation. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Use &lt;a href="https://discord.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Discord&lt;/a&gt; if…
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You need realtime chat with advanced permissions and moderation. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You need unlimited message history.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Making users sign up for yet-another-Slack group is a concern.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Integrations and bots are less important. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Your community won’t mind the casual gamer-centric aesthetic.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;But keep in mind…&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  With Discord, community members use a single account to login to multiple communities. This user model means you can join new communities with a single click (versus creating a new user account for every community). But it means it’s impossible to use different avatars for different communities, which could be a concern for folks who have used Discord primarily for gaming in the past. It’s possible that some might not want to use their stormtrooper headshot in a professional setting. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Discord’s design and copy is playful and gamer-centric, which could be confusing for community members who aren't familiar with Discord’s gaming roots. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Use &lt;a href="https://www.discourse.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Discourse&lt;/a&gt; if…
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Many community members will likely have similar questions or issues, and you’d like to point them to a library of common answers&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You’d like community-generated content to be indexed (and thus findable in search engine results). This helps new members discover the community while reducing the core team’s support burden. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Moderation and fine-grained permissions are important.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You have enough community members for chat to be counterproductive.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Synchronous communication isn’t important, for example, if your community is distributed across many time zones. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You don’t mind paying to host the forum software, or are capable of hosting it yourself&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You want to use an open source platform. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;But keep in mind…&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  There are many technical options for starting a community on Discourse, including deploying the open source code on your own servers, paying a third party for hosting, or paying Discourse.org for a fully hosted solution. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  For new members, starting a new thread in a forum can be perceived as a higher barrier of entry, versus simply saying “hello” in a chat channel. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Use &lt;strong&gt;both&lt;/strong&gt; chat (Discord or Slack) + Discourse if…
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  You want indexed content (Discourse) along with realtime vibes (chat).&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Have the bandwidth to manage multiple platforms. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Want separate spaces for distinct groups, for example a chat for your champions and a forum for everyone else. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;  Note: Discourse offers a &lt;a href="https://meta.discourse.org/t/chatroom-integration-plugin-discourse-chat-integration/66522" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;plugin for integrating with chat platforms&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Three key factors to consider when choosing a community platform
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;When picking a platform, you’ll likely weigh some factors more heavily than others based on your situation. The factors here will provide you with a framework for assessing the options. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fieog37jhjc0w00mdn73v.png" class="article-body-image-wrapper"&gt;&lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fieog37jhjc0w00mdn73v.png" alt="3 factors for choosing a community platform" width="800" height="257"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  The size of your community
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Starting from scratch (or close to it)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In the early stages of a community’s life, it’s important for the organizers to build strong connections with the first handful of members, since early adopters are more likely to join discussions, answer questions, and contribute in ways that make the community seem active and vibrant. Chat is good for this. Scalability and governance are less of a concern at this stage. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Hundreds of community members&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;At this point, chat platforms can start to feel unmanageable for a few reasons. First, moderation becomes an issue, since it’s hard for a small group of community managers to keep up with the volume of conversations happening (Discord beats Slack on this point). &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Second, most community members complain that, on chat platforms, they often answer the same question or address the same concern many times over. The conversations just disappear too quickly for others to easily find, and since they’re not indexed or perma-linked, it’s difficult to reference previously answered questions. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Many thousands of community members&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;For large, well-established communities, forums are often the right choice, since live chat is difficult to manage and large scales. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Discourse provides fine-grained permissions and moderation that large communities will appreciate. Additionally, since large communities create lots of content, they especially benefit from indexed and shareable content.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;One caveat for large communities: big communities are often staffed by large teams, which means they may have the bandwidth to manage more than one platform, such as a forum _and _a chat tool. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  The size of your team
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Your choice of community platform should take into account your team’s ability to manage multiple channels, their timezone availability, and the number of folks available to interact on your chosen platform—all of which are a function of the team’s size. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Small teams&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Small teams tend to start with a single platform, since that’s what they can manage given their bandwidth. In general, teams of three or smaller should commit to a single platform to focus their time and keep overhead low. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Medium teams&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;These teams are more self-sufficient compared to small teams and won’t need to depend as much on other teams for support. They &lt;em&gt;may&lt;/em&gt; be able to handle multiple platforms, but often choose to go deeper with a single platform, such as more clearly defining roles and responsibilities within the team, and designating team members to focus on specific parts of the platform. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Large teams&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Larger teams can handle multiple platforms and different sub-communities, such as a Slack for your MVPs and a Discourse forum for everyone else—but doing so introduces substantial overhead in terms of process management, identity resolution, and governance. That said, larger teams inside bigger companies tend to be better equipped to plan for and manage these situations. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Your community’s engagement model
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;What are the behaviors and norms you want your community members to model? Are you hoping for a casual vibe where members can congregate, discuss, and debate? Or are you more interested in cultivating deep knowledge sharing and collaboration? Once you decide, you should factor your engagement model into your tool choice. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In &lt;em&gt;&lt;a href="https://www.amazon.com/People-Powered-Communities-Supercharge-Business/dp/1400214882" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;People Powered&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/em&gt;, &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/jonobacon" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Jono Bacon&lt;/a&gt; outlines three engagement models that we think are useful to consider when choosing a platform: &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Consumers&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;These communities revolve around ephemeral and emergent discussions about common interests, and emphasize connection based on those topics. Examples include communities about art, gaming, or general technology trends.&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Champions&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In this engagement model, community members share knowledge and insights about a common tool or technology, with an emphasis on leveling-up one’s expertise and experience. Members often teach each other through demos and examples, driving further participation from other community members. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Examples include company-specific communities, like the &lt;a href="https://roamresearch.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Roam Research&lt;/a&gt; Slack group, where members share custom CSS and browser extensions as well as how-to videos to share their knowledge and help others excel. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Collaborators&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In communities of collaborators, members work together on shared projects. The primary example is open source software, where diverse people from around the world work together to build and improve a common codebase. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Comparing Slack, Discord, and Discourse
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In addition to the key factors above, it’s important to understand the actual feature set each platform offers. The grid below assumes features for the baseline plans for each platform, and includes call-outs when features are offered only on paid tiers. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;›› &lt;a href="https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/i/vid8m17th6c16nnysld0.png" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;View the full image&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br&gt;
›› &lt;a href="https://res.cloudinary.com/dzello/image/upload/v1590438891/orbit/Slack-Discourse-Discord-Comparison-Primary-Orbit.pdf" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Download the PDF&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fvid8m17th6c16nnysld0.png" class="article-body-image-wrapper"&gt;&lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fvid8m17th6c16nnysld0.png" alt="Alt Text" width="800" height="1996"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Detailed Recommendations
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We’ll now look at detailed recommendations based on the key factors and the pros and cons of each platform. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Of all the factors to consider, we think a community’s engagement model should have the most influence over which platform is used, so we’ve organized this section along those lines with caveats for size of community and team. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Consumer communities
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Suggestion:&lt;/strong&gt; Discord&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Rationale&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Casual communities should lower the barrier to involvement and focus on building close connections between users. For those reasons, we suggest using Discord. With Discord, new members can join with the click of a button (versus creating new accounts, as with Slack and Discord), which means they can get started quickly. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;For servers managed by an official brand account, Discord also offers a &lt;a href="https://discord.com/verification" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;verification program&lt;/a&gt;, which unlocks additional features, like custom branding and short URLs, a verification check mark, and higher quality voice service. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Tradeoffs&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Discord is strong out-of-the-box, but doesn’t offer the depth of integrations and bots that you get with Slack. Additionally, content isn’t public and indexed, as with Discourse, though public content isn’t always as important for casual communities compared to the other engagement models. Finally, the gamer aesthetic can be polarizing, depending on the culture of the community members. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Champion communities
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Suggestion:&lt;/strong&gt; Slack&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Rationale&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Champion communities need to strike a balance between causal connection between members and deeper sharing of information, learning, and projects. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;For those reasons, we suggest Slack. It’s widely adopted and understood, and enables the real-time communication crucial to building loyalty among community members. Threaded chats enable community members to follow interesting digressions without distracting the whole channel, and link unfurling makes shared content standout in the flow. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Finally, Slack offers tons of integrations that are useful for sharing work, like the GitHub and Trello integrations. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Tradeoffs&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Slack will let you go fast early in the life of your community, but expect to hit a wall around 1,000 active users. At that point, you’ll likely want better moderation and permissions, and you’ll start to bump up against Slack’s 10,000 message retention limit. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;From a community member standpoint, it’s annoying to create a new account for every Slack community you join, and for Slack to force you through the same onboarding, even if you’re already a member of dozens of other groups. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;So why start with Slack? It takes most communities years to grow to thousands of members, if they make it there at all. That said, given Slack’s ease of startup and widespread adoption, it makes sense to take advantage of it for the speed early on, then consider a transition plan in the future once the pain points become prohibitive. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Collaboration communities
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Suggestion:&lt;/strong&gt; Discourse&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Rationale&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Communities focused on collaboration usually want to foster deeper participation from existing community members, lower the bar for new folks to get involved, solve problems as a group, and publicly share the solutions. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Discourse stands out in each of these areas. Since all content is public and indexed by search engines, members can reference previously answered questions and discussions, which means the core team can avoid answering the same questions repeatedly. New members can quickly learn the basics and overcome common challenges, and existing members can pose more complex questions and receive help from the broader community. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Discourse is especially powerful for large communities, which face plenty of challenges related to moderation, permissions, and governance, as well as the difficulty of delivering a great experience for all community members. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;To address these challenges, Discourse provides granular permissions and moderation, which enables members of the community to progress to higher levels of access and trust. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;For communities backed by medium or large teams, we also recommend implementing a live chat platform in addition to Discourse to foster a closer relationship with core team members, or as we call them, members of their &lt;a href="https://github.com/orbit-love/orbit-model#orbit-1-ambassadors" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Orbit One&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Tradeoffs&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Self-hosted, large Discourse instances require ongoing maintenance and performance tuning, and hosted instances cost money. Managing multiple tools can become burdensome, but as long as the team has the bandwidth, these issues should be solvable. &lt;/p&gt;
&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Conclusion
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;More communities are moving exclusively online, and more tools for managing online communities emerge each day. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;While the landscape of community platforms continues to evolve, Slack, Discord, and Discourse can reliably meet the needs of most communities. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;But as much as we love debating the nuances of our tools, we can’t forget that “community" really just means “people.” David Spinks reminds us:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1258879281557454848-732" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1258879281557454848"&gt;
&lt;/iframe&gt;

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&lt;/p&gt;




&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;If you’d like help tracking your community’s growth and measuring its ROI—no matter which platform you choose—signup for early access to &lt;a href="https://orbit.love/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Orbit&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;




&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Have opinions? Share them in the comments 👇
&lt;/h3&gt;

</description>
      <category>devrel</category>
      <category>community</category>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>The Observatory #3: Hot takes and cool tools for building community remotely</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Tue, 24 Mar 2020 22:54:21 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/orbit/the-observatory-3-hot-takes-and-cool-tools-for-building-community-remotely-2917</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/orbit/the-observatory-3-hot-takes-and-cool-tools-for-building-community-remotely-2917</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;As community leaders grapple with the fallout from cancelled events worldwide, tons of folks have shared in-depth guides and tutorials for ways to move events online. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Below, we've pulled together a few shorter reads—call them hot takes and cool tools—that bring a unique perspective to the conversation and hopefully inspire some creativity and energy for your own communities. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🏎️ On the move
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;But first, our regular round-up of comings and goings in the DevRel and Community space. Have a tip for us? Drop a note to &lt;a href="mailto:observatory@orbit.love"&gt;observatory@orbit.love&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/stefanjudis" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt; Stefan Judis&lt;/a&gt; joins &lt;strong&gt;Contentful&lt;/strong&gt; as head of DevRel from Twilio &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/stefanjudis/status/1242409366088749059" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;(more)&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/VishwaMehta30" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Vishwa Mehta&lt;/a&gt; joins &lt;strong&gt;Hasura&lt;/strong&gt; as as Community Associate &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/VishwaMehta30/status/1241940479534497793" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;(more)&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/domitriusclark" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Domitrius Clark&lt;/a&gt; joins &lt;strong&gt;Cloudinary&lt;/strong&gt; as Advocate Engineer &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/domitriusclark/status/1242149259916476418" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;(more)&lt;/a&gt;. &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  The 🔥 takes and ❄️ tools
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Have you tried &lt;a href="https://auxparty.com/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;AuxParty&lt;/a&gt;? It's a super fun social listening room where you can enjoy music live-curated by others, or step up to the DJ booth yourself. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;👌 Try spinning-up a room and asking community members to take turns DJing throughout the workday. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fyjy2bui81fyjqeie69wi.png" class="article-body-image-wrapper"&gt;&lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fyjy2bui81fyjqeie69wi.png" alt="Alt Text" width="800" height="534"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Speaking of jams, TIL how to add a little ambiance to status meetings: &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1241120485397549056-201" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1241120485397549056"&gt;
&lt;/iframe&gt;

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&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I for one am looking forward to surprising, even delighting, our community members with unexpected background music on future calls. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;The biggest question now will be how to pair Zoom background &lt;em&gt;music&lt;/em&gt; with the perfect Zoom background &lt;em&gt;image.&lt;/em&gt; To spruce up your space, &lt;a href="https://unsplash.com/collections/1887152/zoom-backgrounds" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;check out this Zoom background gallery from Unsplash&lt;/a&gt; 🖼️&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;While we're at it, I'd like to give &lt;a href="https://twitter.com/dzello" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Josh&lt;/a&gt; a shoutout for always staying way ahead of the curve, and using Zoom backgrounds well before they were cool: &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1204438096214818816-15" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1204438096214818816"&gt;
&lt;/iframe&gt;

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&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;On a more serious note, as more events move online, though, organizers need to stay vigilant against bad actors. As we've seen, lots of folks are hosting large Zoom events without realizing these potential risks, so here's a 🧵 about how to configure Zoom for community safety: &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1240073789586714626-513" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1240073789586714626"&gt;
&lt;/iframe&gt;

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&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Finally, everyone's trying to figure out how online events can create the impact of their offline counterparts. For many, the answer seems to be something like, "The same great content, &lt;em&gt;now online!&lt;/em&gt;" &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;But David Spinks challenges community leaders to reimagine events for our new online reality:&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1238207050410319872-621" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1238207050410319872"&gt;
&lt;/iframe&gt;

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&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;I hope you've enjoyed these tips and takes. If you've come across something interesting or useful we should share, please post in the comments. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  📐 Measure your community with this Orbit Model Airtable template
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fn8h7zw1qsqa83xi736xq.png" class="article-body-image-wrapper"&gt;&lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2Fn8h7zw1qsqa83xi736xq.png" alt="Orbit Model Template" width="800" height="399"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Measuring community ROI has always been a crucial topic among DevRel and community practitioners, but with the specter of tightening budgets on the horizon, the best teams will find ways to clearly demonstrate their impact. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;That's why we made this detailed Airtable template to help communities measure their impact, communicate their value, and focus on what's working for their communities. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://orbit.love/blog/introducing-the-orbit-model-airtable-template" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Read the blog post and download the template&lt;/a&gt; 🚀&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  What tips or resources have we left out?
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Share your own advice for building remote community in the comments below, and &lt;strong&gt;please reach out to us at &lt;a href="mailto:observatory@orbit.love"&gt;observatory@orbit.love&lt;/a&gt; if we can be helpful in any way&lt;/strong&gt; 💜&lt;/p&gt;




&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🗞️ Previous editions
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://dev.to/orbit/the-observatory-2-what-s-in-it-forum-me-pd2"&gt;The Observatory #2: What's in it forum me?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://dev.to/orbit/the-observatory-1-high-gravity-4kp2"&gt;The Observatory #1: High Gravity&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Don't miss the next edition of The Observatory 🔭&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://orbit.love/subscribe" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Subscribe here&lt;/a&gt; to get an email for each new edition.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://dev.to/orbit"&gt;Follow Orbit&lt;/a&gt; on DEV to see all of our posts.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

</description>
      <category>devrel</category>
      <category>community</category>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>The Observatory #2: What's in it forum me?</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Fri, 06 Mar 2020 02:34:59 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/orbit/the-observatory-2-what-s-in-it-forum-me-pd2</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/orbit/the-observatory-2-what-s-in-it-forum-me-pd2</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;In this issue, we shout-out DevRel leaders on the move, hear from Orbit CTO about Orbit and Funnel on a podcast, and take a look at some perspectives on forums for community building + some bonus Slack emoji 🥳&lt;/p&gt;




&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🏎️ On the move
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;In each issue, we'll highlight key moves in the DevRel and Community space. Have a tip for us? Drop a note to &lt;a href="mailto:observatory@orbit.love"&gt;observatory@orbit.love&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/KimMaida" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Kim Maida&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; joins &lt;strong&gt;Gatsby&lt;/strong&gt; as Head of Developer Relations from Auth0 (&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/KimMaida/status/1225043010515279872" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;announcement&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;strong&gt;&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/IAmJerdog" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Jeremy Meiss&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/strong&gt; joins &lt;strong&gt;CircleCI&lt;/strong&gt; as Head of DevRel &amp;amp; Community from Solace (&lt;a href="https://twitter.com/IAmJerdog/status/1231941979166121984" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;announcement&lt;/a&gt;)&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;




&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🎧 Orbit on the airwaves
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Tune in to this podcast for favorite Orbit Model hits, including:&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;software is not sold, it's adopted&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;funnel is a model for &lt;em&gt;capturing&lt;/em&gt; value for the company; &lt;strong&gt;Orbit is a model for &lt;em&gt;creating&lt;/em&gt; value for the &lt;em&gt;community&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;
&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;the Orbit Model gives us a language for describing the complex experience of community&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;


&lt;div class="ltag__link"&gt;
  &lt;a href="/slashdatahq" class="ltag__link__link"&gt;
    &lt;div class="ltag__link__pic"&gt;
      &lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fuploads%2Fuser%2Fprofile_image%2F266264%2F75eb74bc-a420-4df9-b92e-744a4772f739.jpg" alt="slashdatahq"&gt;
    &lt;/div&gt;
  &lt;/a&gt;
  &lt;a href="/slashdatahq/devrel-metrics-orbit-vs-funnel-571h" class="ltag__link__link"&gt;
    &lt;div class="ltag__link__content"&gt;
      &lt;h2&gt;DevRel Metrics: Orbit and Funnel&lt;/h2&gt;
      &lt;h3&gt;SlashData Team ・ Feb 27 '20&lt;/h3&gt;
      &lt;div class="ltag__link__taglist"&gt;
        &lt;span class="ltag__link__tag"&gt;#devrel&lt;/span&gt;
        &lt;span class="ltag__link__tag"&gt;#podcast&lt;/span&gt;
      &lt;/div&gt;
    &lt;/div&gt;
  &lt;/a&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;





&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🙊 What's in it forum me?
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;In our recent chats with leaders of dev communities, &lt;strong&gt;we've noticed more discussion around transitioning online conversation from realtime tools like Slack to persistent forums like Discourse&lt;/strong&gt;. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Forums offer communities lots of benefits, like nuanced permissions and moderation, badges and progress tracking, and the added benefit of content that's both referencable and SEO-able. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;We'd love to hear from you about your perspective on forums for building high gravity communities.&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;To start the conversation, here's a comprehensive overview to get everyone on the same page: &lt;a href="https://blog.vanillaforums.com/community/community-management-101-everything-you-wanted-to-know-about-building-your-community-from-scratch" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Everything You Need To Know About Building Your Online Community Forum&lt;/a&gt; (warning: it's a little Vanilla Forums-heavy, but the principles are still instructive). &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;But &lt;strong&gt;does forum = community?&lt;/strong&gt; Catch up on the discussion in the CMX Facebook group with this question: &lt;a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/cmxhub/permalink/2842875992402618/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Can you share the difference between an online community and online forum?&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;a href="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2F78bjwmhybgpbawtha61y.png" class="article-body-image-wrapper"&gt;&lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/cdn-cgi/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fi%2F78bjwmhybgpbawtha61y.png" alt="Screenshot of the discussion" width="800" height="183"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;👇 &lt;strong&gt;Discuss below&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;What are some examples of effective developer community building through forums? &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;What are some common forum pitfalls? &lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;




&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  Bonus round: Grab these 🔥 custom Orbit icons for your Slack
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;iframe class="tweet-embed" id="tweet-1232698780509704193-833" src="https://platform.twitter.com/embed/Tweet.html?id=1232698780509704193"&gt;
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&lt;/p&gt;




&lt;h3&gt;
  
  
  🗞️ Previous editions
&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;&lt;a href="https://dev.to/orbit/the-observatory-1-high-gravity-4kp2"&gt;The Observatory #1: High Gravity&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Don't miss the next edition of The Observatory 🔭&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://orbit.love/subscribe" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Subscribe here&lt;/a&gt; to get an email for each new edition.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://dev.to/orbit"&gt;Follow Orbit&lt;/a&gt; on DEV to see all of our posts.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;

</description>
      <category>devrel</category>
      <category>community</category>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>5 Writing Books Every Technical Leader Should Read</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Wed, 17 Apr 2019 16:55:34 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/orbit/5-writing-books-every-technical-leader-should-read-5ekn</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/orbit/5-writing-books-every-technical-leader-should-read-5ekn</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;Clear and persuasive writing is essential for effective leadership, but most of us have never had any training aside from maybe an English Lit class in college. And yet, writing is a big part of the job. Emails, presentations, articles, and talks are all opportunities to inspire and inform—and they all begin with writing. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You write every day, so maybe you &lt;em&gt;should&lt;/em&gt; see yourself as a writer. That may sound scary, but you don’t need an MFA to improve your writing skills. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;I’ve read more than a dozen writing books in the past six months, and want to share the five that rise to the top as particularly useful for anyone that uses writing to encourage and educate.&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;by Roy Peter Clark &lt;br&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.amazon.com/Writing-Tools-Essential-Strategies-Writer-ebook-dp-B000SEIW9E/dp/B000SEIW9E/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;📚get it&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;“Think of writing as carpentry, and consider this book your toolbox. You can borrow a writing tool at any time, and here’s another secret: Unlike hammers, chisels, and rakes, writing tools never have to be returned. They can be cleaned, sharpened, and passed along.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Clark’s 50-tool list is immensely useful and applicable, and provides an excellent foundation for anyone reading about writing for the first time. Every chapter plainly states a rule, unpacks it over several pages with explanation and example, then concludes with in-depth “workshop” exercises for immediately applying the tool. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;And since &lt;strong&gt;most rules can be read in less than five minutes&lt;/strong&gt;, this book is ideal for the busy leader. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Start here, and equip yourself with a powerful framework for deeper exploration. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person's Guide to Writing in the 21st Century
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;by Steven Pinker&lt;br&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.amazon.com/Sense-Style-Thinking-Persons-Writing-ebook/dp/B00INIYG74/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;📚get it&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;“Good writing starts strong. Not with a cliché (“Since the dawn of time”), not with a banality (“Recently, scholars have been increasingly concerned with the question of...”), but with a contentful observation that provokes curiosity.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;You might be familiar with Pinker’s popular works, like &lt;em&gt;Enlightenment Now&lt;/em&gt; and &lt;em&gt;Better Angels of our Nature&lt;/em&gt;, but the Harvard linguist and cognitive scientist has also written a practical guide for the nonfiction writer. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Pinker describes the aspects of what he calls &lt;strong&gt;classic style, which emphasizes clear, direct, and powerful language, making it perfect for business writing&lt;/strong&gt;. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Pinker says, “The guiding metaphor of classic style is seeing the world. The writer can see something that the reader has not yet noticed, and he orients the reader’s gaze so that she can see it for herself.” &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;What if you could say the same about your writing? &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Along the way, he provides and updated grammar, with an emphasis on the functional roles of different parts of speech. Trust me: it’s interesting and useful!&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;By William Zinsser&lt;br&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.amazon.com/Writing-Well-30th-Anniversary-Nonfiction-ebook/dp/B0090RVGW0/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;📚get it&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;“The secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;First published in 1976, &lt;em&gt;On Writing Well&lt;/em&gt; continues to dispense practical advice for writers. Its author began his career as a journalist for the New York Herald Tribune, and has enjoyed decades of success as a writer, editor, and educator. This book pulls from that vast experience. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;On Writing Well&lt;/em&gt; covers useful advice on tone and style, and digs into various nonfiction forms, such as literary nonfiction and sports writing. While many of those sections may not seem applicable to, say, a CEO, the principles are timeless, and provide a unique perspective not found in the typical business book. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Everybody Writes: Your Go-To Guide to Creating Ridiculously Good Content
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;by Ann Handley&lt;br&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.amazon.com/Everybody-Writes-Go-Creating-Ridiculously-ebook/dp/B00LMB5P0G/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;📚get it&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;“Good writing serves the reader, not the writer. It isn't self-indulgent. Good writing anticipates the questions that readers might have as they're reading a piece, and it answers them.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Ann Handley provides several chapters on structure and style, but the key difference from other books listed here is her chapters covering brand journalism and channel-specific tips about blogs, tweets, and other social platforms. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;This detailed exploration of the nuances of each channel provides leaders with a thorough understanding of how readers experience their messages in various contexts. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;by John McPhee&lt;br&gt;
&lt;a href="https://www.amazon.com/Draft-No-4-Writing-Process-ebook/dp/B06X18NHC1/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;📚get it&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;“Writing is selection. When you are making notes you are forever selecting. I left out more than I put down.”&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Nonfiction master John McPhee has written for Time, The New Yorker, and has authored many best-selling narrative nonfiction books. True to form, &lt;em&gt;Draft No. 4&lt;/em&gt; contains essays on topics including story progression, the structure of your story, frames of reference, and more. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;While the other books on this list read like handbooks, &lt;em&gt;Draft No. 4&lt;/em&gt; feels like a slow walk through the park with a guru. As a result, you’ll absorb his principles through his stories as the main points sneak up on you chapter after chapter. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;While most people don’t write essays for The New Yorker, McPhee’s masterclass on narrative provides a compelling perspective on storytelling that promises to add both style and substance to any leader’s writing. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;h2&gt;
  
  
  Smart Reading is Essential to Better Writing
&lt;/h2&gt;

&lt;p&gt;Stephen King says that, “If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.” If that’s true, then reading about writing is like a double bonus for those looking to improve their writing skills. Reading these books will guide your learning and motivate you to explore new ways to influence and inspire with your writing. &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;What else would you add to the list?&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;Cover photo: &lt;a href="https://unsplash.com/photos/2JIvboGLeho?utm_source=unsplash&amp;amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;amp;utm_content=creditCopyText" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;Susan Yin&lt;/a&gt; on Unsplash&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

</description>
      <category>writing</category>
      <category>leadership</category>
    </item>
    <item>
      <title>Help build a list of awesome .dev sites</title>
      <dc:creator>Patrick Woods</dc:creator>
      <pubDate>Wed, 20 Feb 2019 19:56:28 +0000</pubDate>
      <link>https://forem.com/orbit/help-build-a-list-of-awesome-dev-sites-5ejg</link>
      <guid>https://forem.com/orbit/help-build-a-list-of-awesome-dev-sites-5ejg</guid>
      <description>&lt;p&gt;The &lt;a href="https://domains.google/tld/dev/" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;.dev TLD&lt;/a&gt; has created lots of conversation in the community (&lt;a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19199892" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt; and &lt;a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19178757" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt; for example), and some of the most interesting developer-focused companies are using .dev to share dev-focused resources and tools 🛠.  &lt;/p&gt;

&lt;p&gt;We thought it would be fun to build a list of interesting developer resources on the TLD as they emerge. &lt;/p&gt;


&lt;div class="ltag-github-readme-tag"&gt;
  &lt;div class="readme-overview"&gt;
    &lt;h2&gt;
      &lt;img src="https://media.dev.to/dynamic/image/width=800%2Cheight=%2Cfit=scale-down%2Cgravity=auto%2Cformat=auto/https%3A%2F%2Fdev.to%2Fassets%2Fgithub-logo-5a155e1f9a670af7944dd5e12375bc76ed542ea80224905ecaf878b9157cdefc.svg" alt="GitHub logo"&gt;
      &lt;a href="https://github.com/orbit-love" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;
        orbit-love
      &lt;/a&gt; / &lt;a href="https://github.com/orbit-love/awesome-dot-dev" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;
        awesome-dot-dev
      &lt;/a&gt;
    &lt;/h2&gt;
    &lt;h3&gt;
      A list of awesome developer resources on the .dev TLD
    &lt;/h3&gt;
  &lt;/div&gt;
  &lt;div class="ltag-github-body"&gt;
    
&lt;div id="readme" class="md"&gt;
&lt;div class="markdown-heading"&gt;
&lt;h1 class="heading-element"&gt;awesome .dev sites &lt;a href="https://github.com/sindresorhus/awesome" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;&lt;img src="https://camo.githubusercontent.com/8693bde04030b1670d5097703441005eba34240c32d1df1eb82a5f0d6716518e/68747470733a2f2f63646e2e7261776769742e636f6d2f73696e647265736f726875732f617765736f6d652f643733303566333864323966656437386661383536353265336136336531353464643865383832392f6d656469612f62616467652e737667" alt="Awesome"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;/h1&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;blockquote&gt;
&lt;p&gt;A curated list of developer resources on the .dev TLD, inspired by &lt;a href="http://awesome.re" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;awesome.re&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/blockquote&gt;
&lt;div class="markdown-heading"&gt;
&lt;h2 class="heading-element"&gt;Sites&lt;/h2&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;div class="markdown-heading"&gt;
&lt;h3 class="heading-element"&gt;Resources&lt;/h3&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://crm.dev" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;crm.dev&lt;/a&gt; - homepage for the Salesforce developer program&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://glitch.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;glitch.dev&lt;/a&gt; - the Glitch guide to developer relations&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://nodejs.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;nodejs.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Node.js guide content&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://opensource.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;opensource.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Google’s guide to open source&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://stripe.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;stripe.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Stripe demos, guides, and developer tools&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://slack.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;slack.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Slack tools, libraries, and SDKs&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://web.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;web.dev&lt;/a&gt; - educational resources about web development from Google&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://ycombinator.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;ycombinator.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Y Combinator Resources for Developers&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://kapitan.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;kapitan.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Generic templated configuration management for Kubernetes, Terraform and other things&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://tfhub.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;tfhub.dev&lt;/a&gt; - TensorFlow hub&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://pptr.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;pptr.dev&lt;/a&gt; - a Node library which provides a high-level API to control Chrome or Chromium over the DevTools Protocol&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://awesomestacks.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;awesomestacks.dev&lt;/a&gt; - an open source tool for discovering tech stacks for building different applications and features&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;div class="markdown-heading"&gt;
&lt;h3 class="heading-element"&gt;Blogs&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://jess.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;jess.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Jess Frazelle's blog&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://hashnode.dev" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;hashnode.dev&lt;/a&gt; - Hassle-free Blogging Software for Developers!.&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;div class="markdown-heading"&gt;
&lt;h3 class="heading-element"&gt;Communities&lt;/h3&gt;

&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;ul&gt;
&lt;li&gt;
&lt;a href="https://women.dev/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"&gt;women.dev&lt;/a&gt; - women Who Code is the…&lt;/li&gt;
&lt;/ul&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;
  &lt;/div&gt;
  &lt;div class="gh-btn-container"&gt;&lt;a class="gh-btn" href="https://github.com/orbit-love/awesome-dot-dev" rel="noopener noreferrer"&gt;View on GitHub&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;


&lt;p&gt;The list is thin for now, but with the community's help, we hope to see the resource grow. Check out the contribution guidelines and add to the list!&lt;/p&gt;

</description>
      <category>showdev</category>
      <category>opensource</category>
      <category>discuss</category>
    </item>
  </channel>
</rss>
