I disagree with adding the fluff back in. I still remember trying to start conversations in here about them - and the overwhelming response was that they were uninteresting - because they were fluff. And then there are the other cases like Gan Romero where people spent weeks looking for something not in-game.
I think the issue with Galnet is that it reflects the game - nothing much is happening, so nothing is reported*.
The patch next week seems like it will be another missed opportunity - the Interstellar Initiative 'The Scourge' was used to introduce Blight as a state (let's gloss over the fact it vanished again afterwards) - it would be pretty simple to put in some manual Infrastructure Failures etc, put them in Galnet and let people play with them - but at the moment it looks like they'll just start popping up randomly - missed opportunity.
And why not run CGs this year? They must be low maintenance by now - just clear the backlog so factions can get them active in a reasonable time (rather than the usual 'I asked for it 18 months ago, so now don't care'). I'm not a big fan of them, but others like them - and the main complaint is when they stop & start randomly.
As with many aspects of the game - fdev continue to refuse to leverage their community. By centralising everything within fdev and then realising they don't have the resources to do anything they don't do the game any favours. They could have added Squadron CGs, PG Galnet submissions, lots of stuff that would also have the effect of showing that people do actually play the game, but instead we are bemoaning the demise of a winking cat that never even existed
* Well, there is some stuff to report - as ever Galnet continues to under-report the Thargoid storyline.
