I agree with most of what Chuck said. I have been on here for almost 4 full years now, and the general quality of new members has gone down substantially. There has undoubtedly been a proliferation of people coming on here, asking the question that's been asked a million times before, and everyone (myself included) gets impatient and tells them to search for their answer. Maybe that's a function of the search being somewhat difficult to use or maybe general laziness, but that is one trend I'm noticing. Additionally, Chuck was spot on in the increasing "I know better than you" attitude of many new members, but I guess there's nothing we as a community can do about that. Some of those members have since left the site (StarmanDXE comes to mind). Member relations don't seem as divided to me either, I tend to agree with what Tony said a couple of posts earlier. I only see the bickering come out when people start the lightning-rod moral dilemma thread (teen pregnancy, abortion, politics, whatever). And quite frankly, it's just dumb to do that and then get offended when other members say things you don't want to hear or that come off as callous. Otherwise most people seem friendly and willing to help. On the automotive side of things, I too would like to see a more prolific aftermarket for Volvo, especially in this country. I think the kind of community we'd all like to see is like the turbo performance club over in Sweden, but I guess it's pretty obvious why they have so much more going for them over there. It's pretty hard to be original on here these days, and when you suggest anything out of the "R Bumper, Pegs, and Tint" world you're usually trounced on pretty hard. That really does need to stop. Yes, 98% of us think that cheap chrome wheels will look dreadful on a Volvo, but we really need to adopt a more "your car, your mods" kind of attitude. In any case, I'm glad that VS exists in its current form. I like being able to plan meets with locals and using the forum is a super-efficient way of doing it. The traffic here way outpaces some "other" sites and in general, I think I have more in common with members here than on those other sites. Thank you to the mods and Chuck for keeping this site as high quality as it has been, and here's to another 4 years of membership!
