I don't post in the main subforums all too often. With the exception of the Wild Wasteland RP.
Usergroups though? That's my bread & butter! Buuuut, life and responsibilities has gotten in the way of that as well. The EUNOPF [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/chat/The-Escapist-United-Nations-of-Pure-Fun] in particular --- the very usergroup that kept me from leaving the Escapist a long time ago --- seems have been shot with a crossbow since my most recent departure. It was once a group of chaos/jubilation and confetti. :'(
I adore the Escapist, there's a lot of personal history here and interesting opinions from a variety of perspectives all around. Sure, things tend to lean heavily towards the critical, and while that can become exhausting to read, it does have its place.
~Sigh~
Gamergate happened.
That repugnant cesspool of stupidity brought out the worst in a lot of users. Drove many regulars away. Attracted a litany of shitheads and created a dividing line of pro & anti stances. Those that were neutral/didn't give a fuck had a hard time having their subforum of choice being flooded with a slightly-reworded-thread-with-a-new-axe-to-grind. The Gaming Industry Forum served as a decent enough dumping ground.
All in all, I'm extremely bitter about how "the debate" fractured the userbase. There was a long period of time where it was just unpleasant to look at the forums. Still, to this day, I have no idea what either side's clearly defined goals even were. (And no, I don't want to know.)
I just hate what that did to the climate of the forums.
The Escapist was also poorly handled on a staff level, yet I still strongly believe that the moderation pulled their weight and went the extra mile, especially with the history of absentee community managers. Content creators left for other avenues, don't blame 'em, still sad to see them go. There's no way to compete with something like Youtube or Social Media with regards to video content, but I feel that written columns could have been given a greater focus to fill those holes, perhaps the site could have served as a platform for even more webcomics? I dunno.
...
This, uhh, seems more like a terrible history lesson and I apologise. But there's a lot of factors behind why forum traffic has slowed to a crawl.
Anyway, I'm pretty much here because of two usergroups, two members and the lurking material.