Just to answer the question about wjehjer it's private... I'm not sure how best to explain this but I'll try and if someone else has a better or additional answer please add/correct me.

So, it's not strictly private but in a way its more private than here.

Here, you don't need to log in so everything can be viewed by 100% lurkers. On the discord server, you do actually need to be part of the server to view any of it. It's sort of comparable to having a forum that you have to log in to be able to read any of it.

As you can probably tell from the link being posted here, it's not secret/private to join. Anyone with the link can join and the link is available in public places online. However it's not highly publicised and we can see when someone registers and joins us.

Within the server there are areas ("channels") that are more private, where you can't get access unless specifically granted access by a moderator. So someone we don't know who just clicked the link and joined won't be able to see posts in those channels until we get to know them better.

Also nothing posted on the server is "searchable" online in the same way forum based message boards are. So posts can't appear in Google, for example. You have to actually be on the server, logged in, and a member of that server to be able to view the posts there.

So the short answer is... It's somewhat private compared to this style of messageboard but not fully private and not secret