Glad all the animosity seems to be over...
But, @MadMole - one thing that came out of that: You really should play some of the mods, especially the overhauls.
Not just for your own enjoyment (though, that too) but because some of them have some pretty good ideas, and/or because it can give you a feel for what many players want (even if they're in the minority).
Ideally, I think it would be a good idea to assign someone on permanent mod duty. Kind of like what Roland is for the forum, except for technical issues involving modding. A dev, or perhaps an experienced QA, someone who knows at least a little about the codebase.
Their job would not just be playing a bunch of mods, but doing stuff like:
- Coming to TFP with things like "modders used to do this, but now it's broken"
- Finding out what's difficult to mod, and researching whether code changes could make it easier
- Coming to you with a neat idea they ran across in the mod, in time for TFP to "steal" it and polish it
- Writing modding tutorials
Kin was pretty good at this before, maybe he could get roped into doing it. (Though I haven't seen him here in a long while - to the extent that I hope he's still with TFP.)
Just some advice, obviously, take it or leave it.
EDIT: On a different subject, Caitlin Glass is a good choice. Hope I get to hear her in game soon.