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The sociology questions fascinate you like they fascinate me, Harlan.
There's no need to police a strong community - the people set their own agenda and police it themselves through mores. We've had approximately one non-spam-related banning per year. The community has mixed feelings even when a necessary banning takes place.
If it was harshly policed it wouldn't survive, either. We want to be free to talk about anything that occurs to us. Would you go to a tavern that had a sign on the wall "No Talking About Cats"?
There remain precious few online communities that will talk about *anything* - most have a specific purpose and a community may develop as a result, if there is critical mass. This one has been relentlessly about nothing since the beginning.
It doesn't really care about its growth either. There is no business plan. Whatever happens, happens. As long as it has grown it has been able to support itself, roughly, so let's allow it to drift and see what paths it cuts for itself. I could never see how any community would put up with a business plan. People don't want to think that their local forum could suffer or go away because somebody got fired or a business had a bad year.
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