eh, I’m ambivalent. i think it’s like @miasm said, if you care, you can find them, and really easily, too. they get bumped off the main listing due to the main site topics generating more traffic, but all you have to do is click one of the topic buttons that are found several places and everything else is in front of you. My bookmark is for the /new page, so I see everything. I only go to bbs.boingboing.net after I’ve done my daily browsing to see what the hot threads are and who’s in 'em.
you can’t force a community. if you do, it ruins it (we’ve talked about this before.) those of us that want to participate are doing it. we all pretty well know each other by now. to me, it’s really all good, is what it is, etc.
I guess I’m not opposed if the algorithm got changed to favor community-member BBS posts but this forum is so easily searchable it’s ridiculous (and now there’s even keyboard shortcuts–yippee!) I think the hard fact is that, even to community members that have an avatar and are frequent posters, most Happy Mutants come here to read and comment on stuff from the main page. I mean, that’s how the whole thing was set up for over ten years. If the forums blossom at all beyond what they are currently, it’s gonna be gradual as hell. but I don’t think that’s really a bad thing.
