From the point of view of a long-term player that's stayed active, I don't think the community is stagnating. I see new players join and make new groups and mini-communities every day. CraftyMyne's community isn't dying, but going through a change. One filled with new, younger players. This isn't a new phenomenon either, and not just on this server. I've watched the active player base change a few times. Players grow older and taste change. The same applies to younger generations.

I think we need to switch away from a commodity currency to a fiat currency!

people only trade in diamonds because they can use the diamonds themselves

where as if we switched to emeralds. players an only use emeralds if they trade with other players or computers!

so if we switched to using emeralds for all trades it would encourage player participation!

a switch from a commodity currency to a fiat currency would cause the server to appear more active!

Moving to a emerald based economy wont work cause players like me have huge farms to get emeralds where new players do not. I have been concerned about the server myself and a map reset could really help when the new Aqautic update finally arrives. I have covered this multiple times in other threads and wont go into it again. Also the Return of Red Army would give team eye a true challenge. Harvestar put on a Pink Flamingo Scavenger Hunt and the server came to life for over a week to 2 weeks. Other events like this could help. A new Spawn area with the old school bridges would be nice, and I would love to see a stadium style PVP area where we can watch like in 1.8. I miss those days of being able to see people wander into PVP arena.

Really haven't noticed any decrease in the community for the 11ish months I've been here. I'd say there are times when the server is more active due to various ongoings in-game, but I really haven't seen a drop in the playerbase. Gotta agree with Vene and Dawn here.

This thread has already derailed into reset discussions, which is another topic in itself, but no, I wouldn't say there has been any sort of massive decline in playerbase that hasn't echoed the popularity of Minecraft as a whole.