If you can't see what would engross a player to spend over 4k hours in its galaxy I'd be lost trying to explain it to you, we have other regular posters with in excess of 10k hours played - should we ask them what has made them put so much time into it too?
...don't worry about lack of substance, all I'm currently doing is mirroring your own contribution, which, unsurprisingly, you dislike...
To explore all the systems (some 400 billion of them) might take a little over 4k hours...
But I am in 2 squadrons too, so have folk to interact with and enjoy everything the game offers...
Oh, and I have probably 40+ G5 engineered ships on 2 Fleet Carriers on top of my mountain too