In reply to Brin Wilson.

Yes it can if the right person is energetic, outgoing, and works hard everyday to bring people into the discussion. They have to spend at least a year of working double-time to craft the community and lead by example. This is based on experience. I wish I had more energy and time to devote to WPChat, but I don't. Also, the platform used for the discussions and community is pretty important as well. Discourse is pretty rad on this front with the ability to send an invite to someone where they get access for just that thread. And similar to Facebook, you can at mention someone and bring people in the discussion that way as well. There's a lot to like with Discourse.