The ABC of building a successful forum is a terific new post on WMW about the Do's and Don't – the ABC of Forum Community Building.

Some nice quotes from the post

A is for… Authority

Your forum has to build a name for itself as the best place to go to for discussions about the particular niche.

B is for… Ballast Removal

The design and layout of your forums is very important. It can make all the difference whether a visitor leaves immediately, signs up – then leaves, signs up, says hello, then leaves, or sins up and makes ten posts every day, becoming an established member and recommending your forum wherever he goes. The rule of thumb here is Keep It Simple

C is for… Community

What brings people back to a forum isn't just the level of banter or the desire to learn more about the topic of discussion. The major factor that will keep a member coming back every day for a year or two is the feeling that he/she belongs to the community here. You therefore have to get members to feel as integrated into the community as possible.

Check it out today!

Some other nice posts I found on forum/community building:

Moderator Guidelines and Community-Building Tips – this is a netiquete guidelines built already 15 yrs ago

Building Online Communities – Best practices for running and managing online communities.

Building Online Communities:Transforming Assumptions Into Success cites Amy Jo Kim from the book below and has a nice quote that brings it to the point

In any successful community, the goals of the site owner and the needs of members must intersect. Your members need a reason to come back to your community time and time again. Why should they bother?

Virtual Communities Research Papers – a group of 3 reasearchers from sweden and some great research papers (work in progress or published)

Master Thesis on Virutal Communities

Making Online Forums Work for Community Networks – part of the Web Conferencing publications at thinkofit

Design Principles for Online Communities – Peter Kollock of the University of California, Los Angeles – with a nice checklist in the appendix called List of Design Principles for Communities

• Axelrod's (1984) requirements for the possibility of cooperation:
  
  
  • Arrange that individuals will meet each other again
  
  
  • They must be able to recognize each other
  
  
  • They must have information about how the other has behaved until now
  
  
  
  

• Ostrom's (1990) design principles of successful communities:
  
  
  • Group boundaries are clearly defined
  
  
  • Rules governing the use of collective goods are well matched to local needs and
    conditions
  
  
  • Most individuals affected by these rules can participate in modifying the rules
  
  
  • The right of community members to devise their own rules is respected by external
    authorities
  
  
  • A system for monitoring members' behavior exists; this monitoring is undertaken by the
    community members themselves
  
  
  • A graduated system of sanctions is used
  
  
  • Community members have access to low-cost conflict resolution mechanisms
  
  
  
  

• Godwin's (1994) principles for making virtual communities work:
  
  
  • Use software that promotes good discussion
  
  
  • Don't impose a length limitation on postings
  
  
  • Front-load your system with talkative, diverse people
  
  
  • Let the users resolve their own disputes
  
  
  • Provide institutional memory
  
  
  • Promote continuity
  
  
  • Be host to a particular interest group
  
  
  • Provide places for children
  
  
  • Confront the users with a crisis
  
  
  
  

This seems to be quite an authority book, as it's cited in 78 research papers according to Google.

Designing for Virtual Communities in the Service of Learninglinkingpublicationresults,1:100659,1 is another research paper, by the Center for Social Informatics, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA, that they offer for $23.

cited in over 300 and having a great review at Amazon and a ton of interesting citations…

I think with this post I created a nice kick-off for your own in-depth research on this topic even into social science.

Some nice Google queries for you:

• Scholar search
• Google search