One way to find out if and how bad the decline is would be to look at the statistics, for example at the daily/monthly number of visits/posts. It should all be in the database.
There may be also seasonal variations...
To improve things, apart from posting more in the forums we should also look at ways to attract and keep new users. The 2-years old front page has been mentioned several times. While most of us know that the real action is on the forums and don't mind (much) the front page, new uses will definitely be turned off by it and may go elsewhere.
How about replacing it with a static image that possibly links to the imaging forum. Not the best but better than the current alternative, considering the difficulty to keep it updated regularly (as per Mike's explanation in another thread). We could also have a vote about which image to use.
And our 2-year old news section is best removed. It was a great idea but in its current state it is not helping.
Also a comment regarding the decline of the interest in visual astronomy. The sub-forum "Observational reports" is our one and only sub-thread. It would make sense to "elevate it up" to the level of other threads instead of keeping it buried. It may help to make it more prominent. I only noticed it today after all the years
