The reasons for the lack of activity on TJR has been well-stated by Pat and Sy. It is an organic result. As I see it, TJR came about when a lot of like-minded people were racing together on a regular basis. I came to the site in late 2005, towards the last couple of years of that wave, and got to experience a bit of what made Juicy "juicy." (It will always be "Juicy" to me-- I was not one of the early members but I did not feel excluded or an outsider, in fact you guys made me feel right at home and welcome. I think the Juicy name has individuality and personality, which is what gives the site its individual character, and should remain prominent. It contains the back story of the site, and sets us apart from every other racing site.)
IMO the activity of the site has decreased due to the organic reason that people who have moved on to other racing only post occasionally, because they are not racing each other. "Trash talking" and rehashing the wheel-to-wheel moments on the track was a big driver of activity. When that went away, so did the posting. And as Pat says, they have not been replaced by an adequate number of passionate grown-ups (Strelzoff and Paul Fisk being the big exceptions of course). Just as the economic world is showing us the limited ability of governmental policy to fundamentally change an organic cycle in our economy, I think similar "artificial" attempts to try to drive activity based on artificial polls ("Who's your favorite pit girl?"-- sorry Sy, but that was too close to jumping the shark for my liking
) or photo quizzes, etc, will only create blips in activity. People have to post about the races, and other news about racing. Since I am not racing this season, I am dying for any news about the race events. I was really disappointed in how few posts there have been about Lime Rock, Grattan, and Road America. Road America, especially, the gang got back together, but there has been total silence. How is a site going to survive like that? If people are posting on Facebook about it, then we are not going to have substantial new activity here until an economic upturn brings in new drivers. Although I have a FB profile, I just find it too big and unwieldy, and harder to discuss and interact. I like the focus and intimacy of Juicy.
I think Gerardo has the best suggestion so far to create real new content. Until either the economy or SBRS turn around, we are going to have to figure out what content will allow us to compete successfully with the plethora of other social networking options drivers have. I wish the old guard would also post more-- everyone still racing should be posting stories about their racing experiences on Juicy-- Dom in Star Mazda, the Greists in FC, Pew, Patterson, Kasey Kuhlman in Porsches, Tom Brown in Spec Miata, etc-- we want to share in these experiences. Some people are good about it (thank you Ron Yarab for the stories about the Rolex and your dirt cars), but I know you other guys are doing some serious racing, and would love to hear about it.