Over these networks run communications services, which let people communicate with other people. When continually communicating with the same people, they form virtual communities, which they imagine meet in cyberspace. If many people spend a lot of time online, we may be entering an Information Society . It has conferences for many technical and social issues, which can be started by anyone. The atmosphere of many of the conferences tends to be like a British pub.
Discussions start on one subject and then veer off into others.
It was the CIX barbecue that appeared on Visions of Heaven and Hell. Compuserve is an American, now international, conferencing service, with more members and higher charges. The non-threaded interface leads to shorter discussions. A lot of them are of the technical problem, clarification, solution type. The answers come from both their own specialists, and other users who have had the same problem.