People here hardly know me or my motives, but like someone else said, there's a forum tendency to be negative toward outsiders and expect the worst.

I thought about the Journal section again and now wonder whether it gets people to join via writings that show up in search engines. I then keyword searched the New Members section about that, without finding relevant recent results. I wish moderators would seriously investigate why the rate of new member contributions has been dropping - making things friendlier is worthwhile in itself and could only help, but what if that plus more music threads don't help enough?

@Sopsych

i don't think is that easy..
just making more threads won't help it's about the attitude you bring to this place and how you behave around here

In the last month you have had about 10 posts in the music forums and over 50 in this thread complaining. you didn't participate in the mixtapes/album reviews/journals or really anything else in that time. Not to mention your biggest problem seems to be how we treat new users here. Well everyone else in this thread who is kindly trying to help you out is seen welcoming newbies in all the intro threads...where are you???

A Fraction of the Noobs Not Helped By You
http://www.musicbanter.com/introduct...317-hello.html
http://www.musicbanter.com/introduct...e-bigmala.html
http://www.musicbanter.com/introduct...uron-here.html
http://www.musicbanter.com/introduct...2-im-back.html
http://www.musicbanter.com/introduct...-new-town.html
http://www.musicbanter.com/introduct...124-hello.html

My point you ask? You have no room to make suggestions or complain if you are not even doing your part.

Don't forget though Rez - The forum will be amazing once he starts contributing - he just refuses to do so until the forum is changed according to "his vision".

Welcoming new members over there hardly seems to help, and it should be done by friendly people who relate to them.

I said I'm not interested in journals. I'm also not interested in mixtapes. What I want is non-technical, non-esoteric, meaningful music discussion. If there were lots of that, my music post count would be higher. It probably also would make more new members stick around.

I have been thinking about topics to post, but I'm not ready to do that. I have to be happier with things first (and have more free time). Meanwhile, to anyone who is already trying to start more conversation, I can (arrogantly) give a few tips for how to get discussion going. The forum needs a bunch of members who are good at that:
An interesting title, probably in question form or as a strongly worded (but not absurd) claim
A subject that hasn't often been asked before
A subject to which a wide variety of readers could respond (not Dio vs. Tony Martin, though that was well-written)
A subject that makes people think and keep thinking (but can be tentatively answered, not like asking what's the best song ever)

One of the lamer thread ideas I have (and mostly abides by that list) is hereby presented, for anyone who wants to steal or improve it:
What's the best solo album by someone usually thought of as a band member?

I started one here: http://www.musicbanter.com/classical...ant-today.html

Vote and comment if you'd like to.

Without re-opening old arguments, I´d like to make a couple of comments after reading through this intensely-debated thread:-

First, I´d like to voice my support for the mods, who continue to do a difficult, largely thankless job. On this occasion I think Freebase, Urban, Janzsoon and Burning Down have done a great job in coping with, refuting and considering some of sopsych´s allegations. All proponents of free speech, they have to make judgement calls about the difficult-to-define line where some kind of control is necessary for the good of the community. When they do so, I don´t think it´s fair that they should be subjected to a kind of grilling more appropriate for a war criminal at the International Court of Human Rights. This place is, after all, just a music forum.

Next, I´d like to thank GuitarBizarre who had the patience and courage to spell out, with uncanny accuracy, my own dis-satisfactions with Hermione and sopsych as forum members. Credit also goes to Trollheart for rightly defending his patch of turf: the journals.

I have great respect for tore and count him as one of my friends on MB, although some of his ethical points in this thread were a bit over my head. BTW, anyone who thinks tore defended sopsych because sopsych thinks tore is God is doing tore a great injustice, imo. On a happier note, or perhaps a reminder of happier times, I´d like to mention again just one of tore´s many popular contributions to MB :- http://www.musicbanter.com/announcem...-calendar.html

I always thought this was a fun way to focus attention on our various music forums, and it drew in newcomers and old-timers alike; isn´t there any one who´d care to pick it up again?

Finally, I don´t think, as a community we need to agonize overmuch if not many new members stick around. In fact MB does many good things and it does them well - if those things don´t appeal to everyone who logs in, it may be due to external/personal factors outside the control of MB members.

People mentioning me needlessly in order to insult me - when is the atmosphere going to be against that?

Burning Down, I appreciate that you're following my formula. However, I probably won't post in that thread, because that genre has never been relevant to me or something I care to think about, and the poll question is a bit too broad (I personally would have included a "Don't know" option). Edit: I'd already thought of a topic similar to that, and maybe someday I'll post it and beat yours in replies :)

Your criticisms of the community and complete lack of constructive effort draw negative energy from people who are comfortable in their niches and willing to contribute.