He's not saying you have to accept that GW is dead because of RPGMaker. All he said was that from the fact that GW was built and established to provide gamemaking resources centered around RPGMaker, you can't find it suprising when a prime source of new members is tied to that factor. It's a prime example of stagnation, and you really can't be shocked at the results or treat it as a casual matter.

All I can think of now is to center it on something else. We got a vibrant enough community of programmer game-dev folk. I say we make GamingW an XNA site (That might give us a year or two).

I for one joined GW because of the RPG maker resources/tutorials, so I can definitely agree with that statement; we're not going to attract new members without being centered around a new program. Lately I've been thinking about developing again so if anyone can recommend something good, I'm game. Looking through this thread alone, I've got

1. Game Maker
2. XNA
3. ...there was another one somewhere here. Grr.

EDIT:
Think of it this way, peeps. Alot of us haven't even finished making a single game. Do you really want to live your life UNFULFILLED?

As for people getting older + having lives etc., shit thousands of people participate in stuff like NaNoWriMo in november, when everyone has  finals and everything else. Not that I'm saying that making a fully-fledged game is the same making a 50k word novel but it shows that people are willing to go out of their daily lives and do something cool like that.

Absolutely, so long as the lack of a template is mitigated by a focus on an easier game genre. That isn't to say that people can't make rpgs anymore, but that GW should provide the tools and resources necessary for genres that are easier to finish. A good push in the right direction would be to ask the developing forums to start making resources for these types of games (obviously with a specific game-making program in mind).

I really don't think we can create a "new image" centered around something fresh to attract more people. We're deep rooted in RPGs and RPG Maker and always have been. I agree that more people would be interested if we were more diverse rather than being a group of enormous nerds and geeks who enjoy telling epic tales of heroic deeds and slaying dragons and kissing fairy princesses whilst questing to recover the King's missing crown and scepter.

It just doesn't seem likely that GW will come out of its slump. Honestly, those in charge of the front page and the coding are being pretty lazy in my opinion. I mean jesus, we went over a year without a proper main site. I think that more motivated, talented web designers should be allowed to step up and give GW the rehaul it's always deserved. Someone who has the time and loves designing web sites. Not someone who will just throw a  blog on the main site and say "lol new shit cumin soon! maybe".

If we had a pretty, functioning main site with tons of content to offer, like we used to have, people are going to go to it and then say "Hey look at that, they got forums too!

Which is why GW will never thrive like it used to again.

Sailing is just the key we need to get GW active again! Make the article!