Moderating discussions on the web

Many of us already use the world-wide web in the course of our work ‐ both to communicate with colleagues and to share and access information. A relatively new development is to use the web as an interactive forum for structured, moderated discussions, in which participants exchange views about a specific topic. We recently moderated a web-site discussion on ‘methods and models: cost-effectiveness analysis for HIV prevention’ for the International Aids Economics Network (IAEN), sponsored by UNAIDS. 1 The discussion lasted for 2 months, ending in April 1999, and can be viewed at (http:// www.iaen.org). From the outset we recognized that it was an exciting opportunity to discuss our area of speciality with colleagues from a diverse range of backgrounds, but did not fully appreciate the challenges involved. As such discussions are increasingly likely to be used by a range of health professionals, we thought that it would be useful for others to share our experience. There are several modes of communication on the internet, including e-mail, participation in subject-specific conference groups, 2 and posting of resource materials on web-sites for others to access. The web-site discussion is an amalgam of these ‐ incorporating both the ease of communication of conference groups, but also having a focused, structured and time-restricted element to the discussion, as is found in faceto-face meetings or conferences. The discussion is based at a particular web-site. Anyone can read the comments from different participants and download materials from the site. Generally, anyone wanting to actively participate registers for the discussion, and then can ‘post’ responses directly on the web-site, or send them in by e-mail.

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