I have talked to him and he says that he stopped AF cold turkey and he can’t say that he misses it. He has off-board contact with most of the people he cares about maintaining contact with, and that’s enough for his taste.
When I talked to him and asked him what motivated his decision, he said that AF had lost a lot of the high quality posters and it was frustrating to have to moderate what had essentially devolved into discussions about whether and how often to fap, and other discussions that had a tendency to tilt from “politically incorrect” into outright racisim, as well as sexism that was truly insulting to many of the female members of AF and likely alienating them.
I can’t remember if he actually said this or if it was simply the impression he left me with but I definitely got the sense he felt embarrased to be implicated in this through association by being a moderator/board memeber and so stepped down and away.
He definitely did say that he made some attempts to be more assertive and to try to raise the bar on quality and that these 1) didn’t seem to work, and 2) generated a lot of animosity toward him, and so he decided it wasn’t really worth the effort anymore and that if the forum wanted to go down the toilet and talk about fapping and bishes and how “The Bell Curve” was the pinnacle of scientific reasoning, that’s fine but he didn’t want to be a part of it.
[PS: although I didn’t ask him specifically, I’m pretty sure he would not have a problem with my saying these things here, particularly if it resulted in things improving.]
I have to say, I can’t disagree with his analysis very much. I suppose I am holding out for the hope that things might get better, but right now the signal (good financial discussion) versus noise (fapping, racial slurs, random outbursts of anger and profanities for the fun of saying them) ratio is really low and I myself am finding it harder and harder to care these days.
There is some comedic value in watching these conversations, which I guess is why I’m still here, but AF used to deepen my thinking and understanding of things financial, and it’s been a while since I’ve felt that way.
To some extent, it may have to do with the fact that the industry is still contracting and that there are a few winners and many losers, and the winners are increasingly keeping quiet and things close to their chest. The fact that there seems to be only one macro play for the past few years (long the S&P / short everything else) also may be constricting the diversity of viewpoints and things that we can learn.