Vanilla (Open Source Forums) Funding Announcement

Vanilla is one of the companies that drove Brad Feld to push for a startup visa. They're Canadians, would love to set up in the US, have investors, but are blocked from doing so by the immigration system. There's a WSJ piece that talks to Mark O'Sullivan about his situation if you want more:<p><a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126282269345218789.html?mod=WSJ_Deals_LEFTTopNews" rel="nofollow">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB126282269345218789.html?mod=...</a>

I'm happy for them. I've thoroughly enjoyed using Vanilla for community based sites I've run. They get usability more than the mainstream PHP forums.

Why don't they have a link on their homepage to their own forum?<p>Any HN'er want to link to their Vanilla Forum here?

I wonder if Automattic would ever buy them. When you think about it, all of those people with blogs need forums.

Why does it seem all forums are PHP based? Is "making a forum" the Hello World of PHP?<p>Are there even any good non-PHP forums?