Forums allow for the posting of opinions and personal experiences with a group discussion format. Google and search engines allow for the checking of or learning facts. If you want to know the Gross Tonnage of a ship it is faster searching the web for that answer than posting in a forum. But if you want to know things like is the early dinning, late dinning, or MTD the best option when you consider other factors like shows, port calls, etc, then posting in a group like this allows for much more complete answers.
Research vs. investigation two very important things with sometimes different goals but many times the same results.
