I don’t think that people don’t answer questions because they are busy with private projects.
3 years ago, there were no answers. We all shared our experiences, then we organized, made threads after threads of explanations, collections of posts, FAQs, all a search away.
Many people here have answered the same questions over and over and over, it feels like writing for nothing. Like there is no memory in-built in the community.
You’ve made 38 post. I don’t think you’ve been “helping” that much and before someone thinks it, no, it’s not an attack. Not really. Some of the people who answer the most now are also the ones who answered at the beginning. What happened to all those who’ve read and learned ?
It’s not always new users asking the same questions that have been answered in 10 threads, some time it’s the same exact users who already had answers multiple times.
After a while it does feel pointless, it does.
You log in, same question, you reply. Log back later, someone else ask it, you reply. Then you see it again, you copy paste their questions in the search bar and see a list of answers for that question.
Imagine if you spent hours writing stories with metaphors, detailing the processes and giving informations, over and over. On weekends, late nights, noon. Best case scenario, the enthusiasm fades. It’s human.
I noticed that original problems tend to receive more answers and engagement, 90% of the time (being generous here), it’s been answered for years, one old timer at a time.
There are even old memes about the repetitiveness of the questions on the forum.
Then, now that we know each other, many of us don’t necessarily have projects, but chit chat in private groups. Often 1 on 1, these are friendships with more intimate conversation. Some people only log in to chat with their friends.
Lastly, as the forum expands and older users leave, the initial brotherhood fades a bit and the individual impact becomes less important. It’s also harder to keep track of what goes on.