Forums
Forums are an integral part of any website looking to build a community. They allow visitors to give very detailed criticism or commentary of the site and also allow users to have a area where they can start conversation.
Team Liquid Forum
Link to team liquid forums: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/starcraft2
Team liquid are in many ways the backbone of the eSports community for PC gaming, they have extremely extensive forums with up to a thousand of pages per topic. These are policed extremely actively with the Mods as to keep order on the site. This is a form of inbuilt forum with no attachment to any sort of social media. This would usually be a disadvantage for may websites hosting forums, as it can stand to isolate the site. This isn't however, a big problem for team liquid as they have essentially grown with eSports and they are a very active American site for it with strong links to the pro scene in Korea and the rest of the world.
Desports Forum
Link to Desports Forums: http://www.d-esports.com/ (forums held within member's area)
Desports have their forum based on a CMS called Wordpress. This allows for seamless integration with social networking sites. and is breathlessly easy to set up, they are an ideal solution for Organisations that have very minimal funding or manpower. Many content management systems provide their users with the ability to connect with social networking sights well but Wordpress is by far the easiest to use and manipulate as a moderator.
