*uses defibrillator*

Yeah, it's eerily quiet around here. Something is stirring in the East!

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Is the cup half-full or half-empty? Neither, the cup is the rightful domain of air,
and water are the imperialistic invader that must be fought by all means neccesary.
Drink it.

*lights a candle*
*watches the dancing flame*

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i think crystal's pirates are scaring people away

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Isn't it pretty to think so?

or perhaps we're all just ninjas.

ARRRR! We be the dread cookie pirates!



Ninjas during fall and winter; pirates the rest of the year.

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I thought everybody was hunting wabbits.

Too many cats got our tongues.

Honestly, I think it was because it was the anniversary of 9/11. Dunno about you, but I spent the weekend just watching 9/11 shows.

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The weekends usually seem to be "dead" in general, I've noticed.

Another thing I've noticed is that there tends to be flurries of new members who join and start of making several posts, and everything seems promising, but then within a week they all but dissappear. Usually they tend to get good responses to their posts too...but things do tend to move slow around here.

I did watch one show on 9/11 for a bit on Sunday evening. Ten years...

I agree with both of the above observations

IMO the issue is (if indeed it is an issue... do we think it is an issue?) the retention of interest of new members after their initial burst of enthusiasm wanes, as Bailiwick observes. Is there anything we can realistically do about this?

I'll give them a little rainbow poo at a time instead of all at once.

This is a good question. I used to try responding to new people's posts and engaging them, but that didn't seem to work. Recently I've been ignoring them, and that doesn't appear work either...

Why do people join the forum in the first place? Do they want more type talk? For a forum on personality type there really isn't much talk on the subject. I'm not complaining about this as my current interest in personality typing is pretty low at the moment.

Do people join because they want the company and comraderie of fellow type members?

Maybe we come off as too cliquey to new people? Maybe we are intimidating?

i think when people go looking for a type forum they expect a bunch of people talking about their type and how it effects them. since this is a splinter board from GC i think that most of the members here are over that kind of discussion (for the most part). so people join and then see its just a bunch of people hanging out and not posting much about anything they are interested in. i like that though. the reason i still come here is because its NOT personality cafe or anything like it. not sure how to translate that into member traffic though.

also, i think most people who join most forums never become regular members. so when forums grow its because they have a large influx of members consistently. then even though most of them don't stick, some small percentage of them do... i think we dont have enough new people joining to maintain that growth.

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Isn't it pretty to think so?

I think that about covers it actually.

It's possible that the only way we'll get new members who actually stick around is in the form of people from other personality forums who decide that large amounts of type talk isn't really for them any more (it can get a bit repetitive after all). So perhaps there is still work that can be done to get the word out that this place actually exists, and particularly that it offers something different - something more for the 'type-weary' out there?

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What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet. - Gerard Manley Hopkins

I like these thoughts.

I'm wondering if it would help to reshuffle the forum's topic order, so it's more a place for general discussion of world and domestic events, and putting the typology topics more towards the bottom? I think it would help to at least give the News and Current Events a more prominent space, so people can link to news articles or editorials for discussion.

FWIW, I don't mind the quietness here, though sometimes I am afraid you guys will all find it too dull and leave. I like the peacefulness and general tone of respect that goes around here... and that didn't really happen on INFPgc.

I agree. If I come back to a thread and there are a dozen new posts, it's 50-50 on whether or not I'll read all of them. Most likely I'll skim the short ones.

Need some bait threads. Stuff like "Are you SURE you're an INFP?" "Need advice, suicidal." "I've been acting extroverted lately, am I still INFP?"

I prefer the slower pace too though. Signal to noise ratio much better.

LOL. Do it!!

I was also thinking we either need to up the angst (up the angste?) or else increase the Ne-ness of this forum to get more action. Perhaps both at once?