Facebook groups have impacted traffic but they will not replace forums. We are more structured, better managed, easily searched, and can adapt to changes in the industry.
Many of these posts have hit the nail on the head, the fact FB can shut a group down in a second is one problem, the other is the anti-gun attitude. It has been noted why give your business to a company that hates what you do, in other words, why support the anti-gun nature of FB. They will instantly turn on your if the mood strikes them. No sales, if you even mention it, they will close the group. Like Youtube is doing censorship is super heavy, and anyone can turn you in. It would be like a poster from another forum contacting me to have you banned and me banning you for that reason. A single issue anywhere on FB can get your suspended or removed.
The problem is, it's free and easy, guys are all too happy creating a silly small pond to fit their mood. It costs nothing to start up a group and populate it with people you feel are like minded. I get added to groups daily, all without me knowing about it. A forum you have to sign up for, an FB groups you do not. You can be added and counted and never know it.
They are 10x worse in terms of actual knowledge, every dickhead adds their two cents, wrong or not. And some are dead wrong or giving out terrible advice and there is no way to fix that amount of stupid. I may have to bring back the, "Dumbest thing I FB I read this week" ...
They have affected to the bottom line, but there are ways around that. They do work for advertising the forum and the content, but still, it's bad. Guys from these groups are reaching out to sponsors claiming, "5000" are members of the group" most of that they added themselves. Plus FB only puts your information out to 10%, they want you to pay or promote it so they limit the reach on purpose so you will pay to get more reach.
Those supporting FB groups are cutting their own throats. On the other hand, I am working on the site, creating more content, and generally pushing forward this year. The idea is to fix the issues here from the changes and get everything moving in a friendly direction. With phones being the highlight. That takes time but we are already working on it. I contracted a web company in November and they are working behind the scenes now to fix the site up. Huge Trump level changes coming to fix the issues.