It’s difficult to believe, but I expect there are now many users on the Internet who have never participated in one of the oldest forms of ‘online community’ – Usenet Newsgroups. In large part I expect because of the influx of spam, but also with the rush to other forms of communication and community, Usenet groups don’t get the recognition, nor I expect the trafffic, they did in their heyday…
But I come to praise Usenet groups, not to bury them. At their best, one of the immense values they produced for new users (both to the community and to the subject matter at hand) were the (in)famous FAQs, ‘frequently asked questions’ docs. They likely represent some of the best byproducts of informal learning one could point to. The Internet FAQ Archives provide one windows on this legacy.
Oddly though, the FAQ that prompted me to remember this archive isn’t actually found there, the one from comp.theory.self-org-sys on Self-Organizing Systems.