The state of this community is really a just shadow of what it used to be.

True, but this is a normal and completely predictable state of affairs as core members of the bbs "age out" of the system one by one.

There are no new empegs to replenish the membership, and bit by bit people move on to different interests in their lives and leave the community.

Besides that, really, how much discussion of our beloved empegs can we do after five or six years of incessant chatter? We've pretty much said all the obvious stuff, and the remaining stuff is so esoteric as to not be of that much interest to the non-technical user.

I have long ago lost interest in the empeg-related discussions, not because they are uninformative or uninteresting, but because my player with v2.0 final software is rock solid and stable, and it does everything I am even remotely interested in having it do! I use my player to play music, and the occasional audiobook. That's it. I don't need nor want more memory or more hard drive space or a GPS application or a way to display the lyrics or games or who knows what else. I have no quarrel with those who do, indeed, I have a lot of respect for people with the knowledge and determination to make such things work. But reading about such things holds little interest for me, and I suspect that my viewpoint may be that of the majority of current and former bbs members.

My interest in the bbs is now almost entirely the Off Topic forum. I love the disccusions of religion, and politics, and whatever else comes up there, and despite what some people are saying, I cannot recall ever seeing anything that could truly be called flaming. The people on this bbs are certainly the most intelligent, knowledgable, and articulate people with whom it has ever been my privilege to associate, and as long as people like bonzi, pca, altman, schofiel, tfabris, wfaulk, jeffs, mlord, mlwest, peter, rob, robricc, se_sport_driver, kayakjazz, julf, and a host of others (I know I've left out a lot of people, and I apologize for the omission) contribute to this board, I can guarantee that I will be here too, and hopefully even make a few contributions of my own.

In the long run, though, everything must come to an end. When this community finally goes away, I will mourn its passing. But... life goes on.

tanstaafl.