George and Athelene,

  I've been posting in this forum from the start - 11 years ago.
   I've seen a number of changes. The last time there was such a rapid decrease in the number of comments was three or four years ago when the G & M began their paywall.
   Before these current changes, the G & M had the best Comments forum of any news website. If you posted a comment, you often received an email notifying you that someone replied to your comment. At a glance you saw your score for each comment measured in thumbs up and  thumbs down. If you were interested in a particular commenter, you could click on his name and read all his comments going back months. What could be better than that?
  If one of my posts every once in a while was censored, that was a minor problem.
  What some people call "trolls" never bothered me.  What some call "trolls" are usually posters with the most passionate beliefs about a particular topic. I believe we learn more from them than conventional ones.