Hey Kirk,
Not sure how ESRI feels but I can tell you that my reasons for not participating that much on the new forums is merely a function of my developement needs changing drastically. I spent quite a lot of time on the old forums, which mostly consisted of ArcObjects-specific/related questions --- and I'm greatful to have built a solid base of programming knowledge. Including code from you!
But I can tell you that over the past 2yrs, the bulk of my programming as migrated away from spatial data-specific customizations and into a hybrid of spatial and non-spatial database integration. I still consider it GIS-centric programming because all of my applications do run in ESRI products, but the major functionality of those apps is largely regular 'ole client-server, N-Tier application architectures!
I'd guess that the needs have changed for my specific client base. I think it's a natural progression from creating spatial data and ArcObjects customizations to manage that spatial data, into ancillary database integration services. So, it's more about... well, the spatial data is all there. How do we integrate our legacy MS Access billing databases and spreadsheets (non-spatial databases) with our huge and awesome ArcSDE???!!!!
This means that my time is now spent over at MSDN! lol...:D
But I still lurk around.