A discussion group is a group of individuals with similar interest who gather either formally or informally to bring up ideas, solve problems or give comments. The major approaches are in person, via conference call or website. People respond comments and post forum in established mailing list, news group or IRC. Other group members could choose to respond by posting text or image.

Brief History of discussion group

Discussion group was evolved from USENET which is traced back to early 80's. Two computer scientists Jim Ellis and Tom Truscott founded the idea of setting a system of rules to produce "articles", and then send back to their parallel news group. Fundamentally, the form of discussion group was generated on the concept of USENET, which emphasised ways of communication via email and web forums. Gradually, USENET had developed to be a system of channels which provide notifications and "articles" to meet general public's needs. Nowadays, World Wide Web gradually takes on the major role of supporting and extending platforms for discussion group on the Internet by setting up various web servers.