On Oct 2, 12:10 am, "Brenda Ann" wrote:

Sure there were. I was using web based forums at least as far back as 1983,
with my Commodore 64 and a 300 baud acoustic modem [....]

No, you're wrong. There was no Web in 1983. Usenet existed in 1983,
but the Web was not invented until 1990, and it was not practical
until Mosaic in 1992. I called attention specifically to the Web
because the growth of Web-based forums is the reason Usenet has fallen
into disuse.