Indeed, it could be well placed but I worry about the possible headache of moderation as well.

Does anyone else have any thought?

I don't think it's worth it. The message boards tend to be full of hate, negativity and gross comments. :/

Edit: The message boards are a GO and already filled with a few hundreds of new topics : https://www.themoviedb.org/discuss

First time user here. Never heard of you guys before but hate the comment crackdown on IMDB. The only reason I signed up is to see if you allowed comments here. Oh well. Bye.

I'm sure it would be a headache but I would love for you to take it on. I've learned SO much about old movies on IMDB.. I feel like it's a catastrophic loss in need of a new venue.

I wonder why people care or see so impossible a message board because "it will be full of hate and negativity", it's not the whole Internet full of hate and negativity? But it is also full of people who loves to share thoughts and opinions in a respectful way, why only take the negative side on the situation? It's so annoying that people or websites are opposed to message boards because of they only think and worry about the typical trolls and completely disregard normal, regulars users' opinions.

^ yes. ! I'm thinking IMDB may be kowtowing to some big studio pressure (?) Most of the trash threads seem to occur on new releases where an obvious P.R. firm has padded the reviews.. and users come in and cut it down. IMDB has some of the most thoughtful, knowledgeable reviewers, commentors .. compared to the trashy, glib (& phony) reviews on Rotten Tomatoes - IMDB is true film lover's haven. BTW there are 2 petitions so far if anyone is interested in signing: https://www.change.org/p/imdb-stop-imdb-from-disabling-the-message-boards and https://www.ipetitions.com/petition/petition-to-keep-the-imdb-messageboards-going

same here, just sign up expecting you are going to roll out forums for individual movies/tv shows so people can discuss them, which is the only reason why i used IMDb. not sure why is anyone paying so much attention to trolls, just ignore them and it is fine, I havent really see any big problem on specific movie/tv show forums with trolls, nothing special compared to rest of the internet, though I havent frequented the general forums, I guess it was worse there. But why not take advantage of this? You have already database nof movies/tv shows, just add board/forum functionality for each of them, I dont believe it would be that big burden financially but it would raise your traffic and significance vastly, since I am done with IMDb after this forumn fiasco.

edit: one more thing, if you dont have resources for modration why not use external forum like Disqus for each movie/tv show, then it should not be your responsibility since content is loaded from Disqus servers + as benefit many people already have Disqus account and there is even moderation and upvotes/downvotes

You need Moderators for the forums and I think you need one who will only moderate this forums here 24 hours a day because you have to monitor the comments not only because of hate speech or trolls but for be sure that there will be no postings for illegal content and other things which could be against the law and the moderator must have the knowledge to decide ( I was the owner of a forum for years so I know this can be a hard job)

what about Disqus comments? they are not really hosted on your servers, just shown through frame, so it should not be legally your responsibility to moderate them

I think that unless such discussions are strongly moderated (to an extent I have never seen on an Internet forum), you will learn the same hard lesson as IMDB . There are good and informative people out there, but there is also a population that derives amusement from tearing down others, and as long as there are no repercussions they will continue.

A.

i had no problem with imdb discussions, they are not wise than reddit for instance, seem to me the biggest experts on them are people who haven't used them actually, i have been using them frequently in last 14 years and dunno what's so big fuss about

Why unnecessarily open Pandora's box? Stay focused on what this site is already great at and let people bicker everywhere else on the internet.

because people like discussing movies and nobody will use this site without discussions same as it was until now, i am sure moving anywhere people will be to discuss movies

I have just signed up here in the hope somewhere else will cater for after-movie and after-show chit-chat.

** Without IMDB forums millions of people would never be able to understand Inception!! **

I agree with @Samara and @Alrescha . The only way I could see this working is with:

1. A whole new set of mods. We already have more than enough on our plate...
2. Super strict rules and moderation. Basically, we only allow instructive and constructive discussions. No gossips, no games, no commenting on people's physical appearance/relationships/sexual orientation/acting ability and no personal opinions (that's what reviews are for). Plus, things like a minimum&maximum characters limit and a well-thought spoiler policy.

@travisbell One argument in favor of having a IMDb-like message board is that it could be useful for mods. We could have a private topic per entry to leave notes to each other and stuff.

ps: I'm sorry IMDb folks, I know it's a terrible loss for all of you.