SKForum design goals
insight (delete really means hide, and the person who did the deleting is logged, and anyone can see who deleted what)
streamlined user interface (links to most used things up front)
location independent (no data is stored client side)
high availability (all browsers)
immediate feedback (color code, eg mark everything new since last read)
fine grained access control (from totally locked down system to a totally open system)
The overall design philosophy is to create a good social interface.