Forum/bulletin board participants have been connecting and sharing
information since before I connected to them with my 300 baud modem.
Your efforts would be better spent looking for similarities and
lessons that can be applied to making MOOCs successful. Think of a
thread as a course (however brief) and see where that takes you.
Think of multiple threads and forums as delineating a learning
organization and consider the implications. I see the Gardenweb and
Tomatoville forums and a cluster of MOOCs around a theme. Isn't that
where MOOCs are going?