Following a post to the D&C perl mongers asking about Perl forums/BBSs I googled for mwforum remembering it was one of the less awful forums around when I left uni.
Imagine my surprise when not only is it still actively developed but the changelog shows that it's been improved heavily over time with plugins, avatars and everything people seem to want from a forum these days.
Very cool, I'll be giving it a go over the weekend I think. http://www.mwforum.org/