Interesting thread read.
Turn off your tl;dr filters.... 
I do see traffic down on the site, some of it due to Summer time, some due to the fact that a lot of the users who were once teenaged/young adults are now done with school, in the real world, have kids, etc. There are definitely many factors, even along with the "taking a break for a while" thing. There have been forums I have lived on that I take long breaks from, then come back and repeat. It's natural.
Now, that all said, I'd love to get your alls feedback on some things I'm working on. I'd prefer your trust in not repeating it outside of this thread if possible (not that it is all that super duper secret but the less that know the less headaches I deal with).
I haven't given up on the forum concept at all. Still love it and see it has a "main stay". However, it does need to "get smarter" (more functional/modern?).
1) I'll soon be moving UM over to new software. Vbulletin was bought out a couple years ago by a bunch of lame ass money grubbers who care more about money/stockholders than quality of software writing/performance/employees. All the original guys are gone. That's why I have not upgraded in forever. But, some of the original guys formed another forum company called xenForo and it's finally maturing to the point I am ready to move UM over to it. You can get a feel for it at
http://xenforo.com/community/ (mind you that's the default theme). I know there will be a few growing pains on getting used to slight differences but all in all it's much nicer, runs smooth, modern, better functionality, etc. I think it will be a good move (thoughts?).
2) I am working on a bunch of other forums, and the bonus if all goes as planned, is you will be able to use a single sign-on across all the sites without having to go through the full registration process over and over. Some of the other sites I'll be building cover topics such as: movies in general, a horror specific site (love my horror!), other genres of music (some metal specific such a doom, death, djent), tv shows, sports - you get the idea. One can argue "we can talk about all that stuff here already" - but, with new standalone sites comes new people, new topics, more porting, more to participate in in general. Some will love the idea of new sites to visit, some won't, and that's cool. All will mostly use the Ultimate_____.com brand.
3) If you have a desire to contribute content about any of these subjects - each site (including UM) will have full on proper front end content sites to go with them. I know there are some dudes/dudettes here who love to write about stuff they're passionate about so there's an opportunity to do that. Some of you already write for others sites but if you are not exclusive to those places you are more than welcome to contribute on some of my sites as well. Just hit me up in private if anyone is interested.
4) Feedback! I seem to struggle getting good feedback from people. Complaints are never a problem (hah!) but I'd love to hear features, idea, things you'd like to see, things you do indeed hate about this site or other forums. I don't build/run all this stuff just for myself - I love building/maintaining places (sorry mono, no Ultimate porn/erotic sites in the works) where people can come and hang out with like-minded folks.
There's a ton of work to be done, but I am going full steam ahead on it all before I get too old to give a shit any more!
Thoughts, hate mail, feedback?
