Seasoned Alcoholic puts forward some good arguments as to why it's easier for the mod team itself to have it's own forum on a site for promotional purposes, rather than a single thread.

The site's concern would be - whilst their own forum would be convenient for a mod team - given the failure rates amongst mods, even mods that seem quite promising in the early stages, it will be left with a large number of little-used forms.

Equally, however, I would understand mod teams who would argue that - without a forum to call their own, it means they don't have the prestige to interest others - that in not being granted a forum it actually increases their likelihood of failure.

To be honest, I feel the choice of forum/no forum for marketing purposes (and I'd like to separate this consideration from those mods who actually want to develop here, who would most definitely need forums) is very limiting. A whole forum, in many cases, would see too much; no forum, a single thread as Seasoned Alcoholic is relatively unwieldy and less attractive and so perhaps is too little.