Losing the local channels might promote guilds as the means of inter-realm communication. Guilds are nicely IG and IC plus they moderate themselves. The local boards made communication too easy.
It used to be so that realms would actually force their rulers to give e.g. weekly updates of what was going on on the continent, so everyone stayed involved. That way you could easily distinguish the good realms from the lesser ones (or the good rulers from the apathetic ones). I don't think people should get their information from the boards on the forum. It is a OOG medium and will, deny it as much as you will, influence the way your character behaves. Simply put; perhaps it is better you cannot know what is going on everywhere all the time. Your character don't, why should you?
People didn't stop doing these things when the forum was created. People stopped doing these things (or never did them in the first place) because they are a lot of work and effort, usually for very little return (or in the case of newspapers, no return at all). Closing the Local board is not going to inspire people to do more in the game and on the wiki than they're already doing. It's just going to cut off a source of passion for and interest in the game.
The idea that the forum is somehow responsible for what ails the game (as suggested by the title of this thread) is ridiculous, unprovable, and thoroughly hyperbolic. What ails the game is a lack of interest, passion and inspiration among players of the game, as reflected by a shrinking player base, quieter and quieter realms, and falling activity levels.
Battlemaster is getting more boring, not less, and closing off one of the few channels of communication that still inspires passion and lets us still feel like a vibrant community will only exacerbate this trend.
