Wordpress & other CMS' have 'Post Types', because they deal with various Content Types.
Forums are about discussions. Discussions take different forms. So why not have a system which has 'Discussion Types', and handles them all well enough to unify them? In fact, you already have that, because most forums have Threads and Private Messages.
So just extending that to cover some other types ought to be well in scope for a system which is about discussion and community, for me, and didn't ought to be beyond mankind, or even forum developers ?
