Unizr: The Second Incarnation Of The Online Discussion Board

I get a good amount of email from startups, established companies and so forth asking for some face time on Profy. They’ve got news, updates to let the world know about, so naturally they give us a shout to get some placement on our pages.

And I’ll be honest. I rarely do as they ask. Not out of negligence or spite or anything of that kind, but because most of the time I simply don’t want to. More of then than not, their announcements don’t interest me all that much, and I proceed with a story, review, rant or rave about, well, other things occurring around the Web.

Yesterday evening, however, I received a message that had me take a second look. The message was written by a fellow named Gianni, and he wished for me to know that a beta he and a few other folk have been working on had launched. The write-up was short and to the point, and he tacked on a link to his creation. I clicked on it. Then I began to write up a review. Here it is.

The site’s called Unizr. (I’m not fond of it. I think folks tasked with naming items in the Web 2.0 space need to spend a hell of a lot more time with their dictionaries and thesauruses. Of course, Unizr doesn’t appear to be any worse than most other titles, so let’s just carry on, shall we?) It presents itself immediately as colorful and bubbly, two standard-issue characteristics for the current generation of Web applications. But it also appears more utilitarian and “sophisticated” than many other things coming out of the startup world today. Dare I say it looks quite appealing? Sure, why not.

Unfortunately, the appeal stops there. Why? Because it’s stuck. It’s stuck between two genres of social structures already well established on the Net: the online discussion board, and what we all know to be the online social network. Yes, it’s very pretty and operates very well. I can imagine it’s very easy to work with, and quite a nice venue at which to stay atop various talks and whatnot. But there’s nothing inventive about it. It’s a new take on an old methodology, thus I can’t see it “taking off” in any significant way.

That doesn’t mean it should be tossed aside, however.

I know of many sites – forums, boards, whatever you wish to call them – on the Web, still very much active, that could benefit greatly from the incorporation of the Unizr structure.

Some people don’t like to keep in touch through Twitter, Pownce, MySpace, or Facebook. Some like a little more complexity, a little more variety. Unizr allows variety.

I won’t write Unizr off yet. The fact that it appears to be a well-built update to the discussion board of the Web 1.0 era in my view makes it worthwhile to keep around.

But the folks behind Unizr need to recognize that fact, and work to get the structure they’ve established into the hands of webmasters of forums across the Net. That’s the only way they’ll get their product in to the number of hands they’re looking to reach. Or at least the number of hands I presume they’re looking to reach.