What happened to the tree-like structure of forums?

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A couple of decades ago it was common to see forums with tree-like structure. Not any more. But I like that format so much better: it makes it possible to go off tangent and "at the same time" stay on the topic as well: the tangent would simply be one of the branches of the tree. But if I go off tangents now in the current format (by using quotes or whatever) people would lose focus and that's it. Doesn't anyone else feel that tree is better?

If you mean like it is on Reddit or YouTube.... On Reddit in particular it actually makes me ose track of where I was if I follow a tangent, so I guess that structure can make it easier to stick to what I want, but I can't say that I'm a fan.

If that's not it, then I have no idea what you're talking about.

Online Asperger Syndrome Information And Support (OASIS) forum had that structure back in 1999-ish or so. I don't know if that forum is around any more. I just looked up OASIS and found it, but it doesn't look anything like I used to see it.

In any case, it wasn't just that forum in particular. The treelike forum structures were quite common in the 90-s but then they were replaced by the kinds of things we see right now in the 2000-s.

I cant even imagine what you're talking about: what a "tree like structure" would look like when applied to an internet forum.

And you say that this was "two decades ago" which would place it in the early days of the modern internet ( the Net had been around for decades but existed only for big institutions, after 1994 or some year like that it switched to being available for the public) when it was still transitioning out of its infancy, and when it was still geek dominated.

Maybe "waving threads" forum would be easier term for you to understand? Anyway, you will see the titles that you would be able to click on, something like this (NOTE: there are no dots, but there ARE spaces, but the computer refused to put those spaces thats why I just editted it and inserted the dots):

What did you do last week?
...Last Friday
.......I had a date last Friday
.......Why did that date not work out?
..............I went grocery shopping
....................Kroger is cheaper than Walgreens
....................I like carrot juice!
......Last Tuesday
...........I really enjoyed that class we had
...........I slept in
.................How to manage time better and wake up early?



Me personally, I started using internet in 1997, although others used it earlier, and I discovered this type of structure in 1999, so yes it was only two years after I started using internet.

I found that confusing & hard to follow but I haven't used that much & it's been ages since I have. maybe it's because I have a hard time keeping my place on it