On the subject of forum software, I've heard good things about Discourse: http://www.discourse.org/
For the record, I prefer the user-driven moderation we have now, mainly because it doesn't create extra work and responsibility for volunteers, but also because it doesn't create the perception of a privileged inner circle, and speculation about what agendas they could be using their super-user powers to push.
I was a newswire volunteer for Indymedia.org.nz for a few years, and balancing free speech and mood minding is always a tightrope act. In theory, it's easy to look at any kind of moderation (whether driven by all users or super-user mods) as risking a step onto a slippery slope towards censorship. In practice though, we now have an internet where every moron can have a blog, a FarceBook page, and Tweet endlessly, and finding quality information and friendly discussion is a much harder problem than avoiding censorship. Ultimately, the question always becomes this; do we want a thriving community where people enjoy reading and posting discussions, or do we want a Pure Free Speech Zone filled with trolls, tumbleweeds, and spam?
BTW I also tend to start posts about general free software questions in 'Trisquel Users', because this is a place where a knowledgeable community of software freedom enthusiasts has gathered. I'm not a troll, and I'm not going to post in a forum called 'Troll Hole'. If we could start another forum for these topics, or if someone could direct me to an active forum elsewhere where I could ask these questions, that would be awesome.
