Because most of the subforums are barely used, I'm thinking about getting rid of some of them, leaving just announcements, general and bugs in the English section. Any opinions about this?
Well since the forum became a multinational hub, I'm for getting rid of the Dutch side and changing the name of the English side into something more international friendly.
I don't speak Dutch so I can't say much about its usefulness, although I suggest archiving and leaving it visible rather than completely erasing or hiding it.
Does it cost money or extra effort to keep it the way it is now? If not, then just leave it as it is now.
Personally, I stopped making my announcements on the Dutch side of the forum as the English side resulted in more reactions and discussions. And after al; nearly everyone from the Netherlands speaks English too. But if people appreciate it, I am very happy to make my announcements (at least the most relevant ones) on the Dutch side again too. It could help keeping the interest of younger Dutch users of the simulator; keep it more accesible.
English/Dutch is not my concern here, I mainly want to get rid of the sub-forums that are more than one level deep in the hierarchy. Often people post bugs in the main forum because the 'bug reports' subforum is not visible on the main page but only shows as a sub-forum after you go to the 'beta testing' forum. I would like for all subforums to fit in the main page, having separate English/Dutch forums should not hinder that as long as there aren't too many subforums in each group.
Then get rid of the sub-forums. Keep the main page, with the English section and the Dutch section.
I see 3 subforums under "Beta testing"...
A "Downloads" subforum is not needed I think... Just put a link somewhere to a wiki-page with all the download links on there.
"Beta testing -> General"... Not much different from the normal "General", but hardly used (just two topics in the past year). Perhaps just merge those together.
That leaves "bug reports". So move those topics one level up, and under "Beta testing" (or just rename it "Bug reports") you just have those bug reports topics.
Same for the Dutch side.
That leaves just the main forum pages you see when you log in, with the topics in them, without further sub-forums.