A lot of it is the fact most of the conversations have been done. When forums first started it was an age of discovery. Folks werent here just to shoot the bull, they were posting to figure stuff out or find answers for stuff they had spent decades scouring sources of information for out of magazines, snail mail groups, penpals etc.
The internet started and it was like someone turned the lights on. The next 10 years or so was very heady stuff, thousands of experts and hobbyists came together, every thread was enlightening.
The frontier got settled so to speak, then the average guy started turning up in his droves around the late 2000's, what I call 'townies'', fellas who just want to shoot the bull.
The next generation of kids or townies logging on don't need to ask all the questions we did- they just run a search...
This is very insightful. I hadn't thought of this before, but I think you really are on to something here. Forums allowed very experienced shooters/hunters to share knowledge and some out-of-the-box thinking (light rifles, light for caliber bullets, 243 for elk, Leuoplds suck, etc.) We all benefitted initially for a decade and now things are mostly settled for current technologies. I read much more archived posts than current for info. Lots of the good guys are gone or don't bother posting anymore about '30'06 vs 270 for elk'.
