If he is your friend, you can still see if he'll run an RSS feed for the forum. FYI -- An RSS feed on the forum would be helpful for everyone who visits the forum and would like a quick method to see new information. It would be useful for him to add it, even if it wasn't to help you out.
If not, then you'll have to check the forum using sockets and watch for a change in the date, or a text that says there are new topics/posts.
