Time spent with fiction when it's about some coherent body, be it a video game, book, tv series etc. Usually, the more time you spend with that coherent fictional body, the more immersed you become which means you can enjoy it more.

The last hour I spent with my best friend was more fun than the first hour.

Railroads in Monopoly.

Railroads in an actual railroad monopoly.

Time spent with individuals - I'd rather spend time with friends than strangers.

Let your aim be to come at truth, not to conquer your opponent. So you never shall be at a loss in losing the argument, and gaining a new discovery.

Arthur Martine, quoted by Daniel Dennett

The well-kept garden thing obviously hasn't succeeded as planned, so should we be aspiring for some kind of 4chan for rationalists?

I disagree; LW has succeeded far better than, say, SL4, and better than OB. Despite having just a tiny fraction of the population and activity and a heavily restricted set of topics, SL4 was a much less pleasant forum to use.

Here is an MWI perspective from an actual physicist: http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/02/12/the-many-worlds-of-quantum-mechanics/

A very thorough explanation of QM by Sean, much better quality than the QM sequence: http://preposterousuniverse.com/eternitytohere/quantum/

Relevant video debate: http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2014/05/29/quantum-mechanics-smackdown/

Read/watch those first.

You can access the mockery videos by Robert Gross once again.

Okay, honestly. I think they're pretty bad and lame.

But this recap of maybe the most funniest thing I've read on LessWrong is quite good. But the ending kinda ruins it, I don't think lukeprog is woman-objectifying misogyny rationalizing whatever, I just thought it was adorable.

See also http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/06/04/open-thread/#comment-95554

I think a big issue is that any of the big contributors of the past, lukeprog, EY, Yvain, gwern, Kaj_Sotala etc. aren't writing articles here anymore and there is no other similarly good and popular writer that would do the same today. There is no purpose coming here, except for the Open Threads. Posting and making comments itself is not very fun because you always have to watch out what you say.

Anything that requires many people to change their habits probably won't going to happen. Changing norms is difficult for the same reason, so idea D is possible, but a bit hard.

I think a combination of

a more co-operative and cheerful style of discussion

and

allowing and encouraging submissions of rationalism, artificial intelligence, transhumanism etc related articles from elsewhere, possibly as a separate category.

and generally allowing a more free discussion about related "fun" issues

could work, but I don't know how would you go about implementing the first one. Like I said, changing norms and habits is a bit difficult and making announcement to the effect of "Be more co-operative and cheerful" is probably going to work as well as announcing "Be nice and don't bully!" in schools. Just relaxing moderation wouldn't be enough. Because honestly, I haven't even noticed any moderation here, there's just the feeling of it.

There's the possibility of starting from scratch and making the subreddit /r/lesswrong more active. Then changing habits and community norms wouldn't be such a big problem. LW related subreddits like /r/rational and /r/HPMOR are already pretty active so expanding this "LW cluster" on reddit would only be natural progression. But I feel like even if that happened, it wouldn't be a satisfying solution for many.

Normally the first rule of responding to a suicidal poster on a web forum would be advising you to get professional help, call an emergency line, join a support group, all that stuff. And it's still what I will recommend you do in the first place, but we must admit that some of them may be ill-equipped to deal with the struggles of a highly rational person. On the other hand, they may try a supportive approach you haven't thought of yet. As per the posted LW guidelines, we must point you to these resources:

http://wiki.lesswrong.com/wiki/Suicide,_Self-Harm,_or_Violent_Content_on_LessWrong#Suicide_and_Self-Harm

As your medical history is yours to choose to share or not, you don't need to apologize for keeping it private. But you wouldn't need to apologize, either, if you chose to discuss it with us. You're protected behind your username. Most of us don't know you in meatspace. And even if someone dared make fun of you or say something insensitive, he/she would be downvoted to cyber-hell. One of the main priorities I've noticed in the LW forum is that its members take human survival very seriously, and we're talking your survival here.

In your post I saw several signs that suggest you don't really want to die. You postponed it out of consideration for your relative (i.e. you still care about things in this world). Every day you wake up less sure of doing it than you were the previous night. You still find the idea repulsive on a gut level. By what I'm about to say I mean absolutely no disrespect, and I don't intend in any way to minimize what you're feeling, but as someone who has been terribly depressed before, I can assure you that people who are resolved to suicide find the idea comforting, not unnerving. From your words it's clear you want the pain to end, but not to end it all.

For most of us, keeping on with life is just the default state, something that happens on its own if we don't do anything to change it. In your case, you'll find that, when staying alive becomes a conscious decision, it gives you an added strength that most people aren't familiar with. Instead of just living because it's what's supposed to happen, you will feel that you decided to stop inertia from pushing you (as it does to all of us) and instead stepped up to own your life. Choosing to stay alive will gradually change your mindset toward more self-mastery. It also comes with a number of responsibilities. You have medical issues to attend to. Eventually you'll need to face the consequences of what you did with your money, and work towards restoring your livelihood. Other LW members are a hundred times more money-savvy than I am, and will be able to give you much better advice on that matter. What I can say to you is something that both LW rationalists and suicide counselors say: question what your mind is telling you. Especially if it's telling you that you need to harm yourself; in that case you should not believe it at all.