I think all of my most used websites attract me mostly for the content (informative, humorous, supportive, and/or personal assistance) and ease of use. When forums are available, I am usually very reluctant to join online communities but I usually do so after about a year or so of lurking anonymously lol I observe how the members interact with one another as well as with newbies, what content is specific to the forums that is not available elsewhere on the site, and how much privacy members maintain as anonymity is very important to me (which is why I use an alias with everything lol). I look at the higher ups as well to see how they interact with one another as well as monitoring and interacting with members. I have left sites that were otherwise practically perfect because of poor feedback/user interactions and I am part of sites that are not quite popular, but fit the bill for me in every other aspect. Popularity is a factor for me only for promotional use, but is not a necessity for me.