WOW! It's been a little while since I've been here, but this used to be a very lively community with lively Forum/Forums (and for the pedants, Fora).

I thought I'd check in last weekend and answered some posts in a few of the previously, more active threads. I checked today and my contributions in the Jokes forum are still the last ones in those threads. I also made a comment in a Sports thread and the only posts after that are the moderator's posts.

This isn't a criticism of the mods (I've always loved mods since the The Who era :-) ). What can we do to liven things up a bit (or am I outdated [or should I substitute that for backdated?] and looking in the wrong places)?

I guess that you need to go back into the history of the site. The forums, as they are today, were started in 1999, this was the main site. Then Terry introduced Quizzyland (as it was then called) where people could create and take quizzes. This took off and soon became the main site. Shortly after the quizzes Terry introduced the Chat Rooms which were intended for chatting about the quizzes, the forums were for everyting else. Soon people kept using the Chat Rooms to talk about thing other than actual quizzes and the moderators there were fighting a losing battle in trying to keep it purely about quizzes.

We cannot force people to use the Chat Rooms for what they were intended, and the forums for the rest of it, I would think that the majority of members don't even know that the forums exist.

What would be great is if more people would actually start threads, a fresh thread for each topic, not just adding onto an existing thread.

Forums like the photography and Chains do well.

Message received and understood! I miss the days when the forums were really busy, including for some years after the chat boards started. I can't avoid mentioning the religion and politics were some of the most active areas so stopping them had to contribute as well, but we can still liven things up regardless.

I stayed off the Forums for years because I had heard from Team Mates(at the time) that the criticism was brutal and that it was very cliquish.

I am sorry to hear that. One would have thought that the more people who post then the less cliquish it would become. As for the criticism, I am not sure what that would have been, provided people stick to the general rules then there ought not be a problem. We work hard to keep the forums spam free, also not permitting self advertising for things like quizzes nor links to most external sites. We don't permit personal attacks and avoid contentious subjects to keep the disagreements to a minimum.

Years ago we had a controversial issues forum and it became so unpleasant with members having strong opinions and attacking others with differing opinions that we had to close it.

Edited to correct a typo - sorry Aunty Ren!

I know I don't post in the forums as often as I used to do, but I check back regularly. I have made some wonderful friends through the forums

That's just what I was going to say, Jane! If making several really wonderful caring, funny and loyal friends is Cliquey then, "guilty"
Edited to say that if working hard to keep a firm hand on making this site clean and acceptable to all has resulted in any brutality, I would love to know when , who and where?