Exploring the adoption of online discussion forums for knowledge sharing and social relations among virtual communities

This paper investigates the adoption and use of online discussion forums by Sudanese virtual communities located in different places in the world. For this purpose, an extended Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is proposed to analyze the users' adoption of online discussion forums for sharing knowledge and social relations. A survey questionnaire is administered to the users of Sudanese-Online.com: one popular online Sudanese discussion forum. Results from preliminary analysis show that social influence and online social skills influence users' acceptance of online discussion forums for social relations and knowledge sharing.