Hi! As someone who frequents the Yaoi & Yuri forum mostly, I noticed a recent uptick in posts wanting to discuss specific manga or asking for recommendations. As a long-time user of Manga Updates, I found that a little odd because the database pages actually have sections for both of those features. In addition, it has more than one recommendation section. So, I went to go have a look at a page (Renchin! for reference) to figure out what was driving newer users to the forums rather than using the features on the page. Below are a few observations and suggestions:

Recommendations
I like that I can vote on tags for a story, and the strength of these tags are then used to automatically generate the "Category Recommendations." However, looking at the how different the suggested titles can be, it's clear that the original genres of a story don't receive a great deal of weight; and, these suggestions might not actually reflect a story's main premise. For example, category recommendations for Renchin!—a story about a cuddly gay couple united through cooking—range from Sugar Dog Life (which is on point with a similar premise) to shoujo cooking titles with icy male leads to a gay drama title with rape and no cooking 😐 So, for the most part, as a user, I wouldn't use Category Recommendations unless I had exhausted all titles I knew were similar to the original premise; basically, Category Recommendations seems best for when a reader is ready to branch out and explore NEW genres.

Below Category Recommendations is the "Recommendations" section; but, on both the Renchin! page and the page for its prequel, Sofure Buka!, all that's listed there is "N/A." I originally thought that only site members could post in this section, but that doesn't appear to be the case. Can you only post in this section if you've reviewed a story? If "Recommendations" is a feature that's still being worked on, I think it would be neat if it could only be populated by suggestions with the [ m ] tag and site members could vote on those like they do for category tags. The list could then be limited to the five titles with the highest votes. I think this would produce a list of recommendations that are more similar to the story premise (like Recipe no Oujisama or Itsumo no Jikan, Itsumo no Basho de. in this case).

Page Layout
It's absolutely AMAZING that Manga Updates has a unique forum for every title, but it's definitely one of the easiest features to miss on database pages. I think a number of features, like tags, recommendations, and the dedicated forums get lost on the page because of the layout. While there's nothing wrong with the basic layout, there are some sections placed nearer the top that are less important than sections closer to the bottom. As a user, I'd suggest:

[img]https://i.ibb.co/4MXk5ft/mu-layout.png[/img]
(click for larger size; scale has been altered to show layout, but zoom in to get a more realistic impression)

Basically, the first column has become a place for hard data—all the information a reader would need if they were interested in buying the story or its series. The second column is more fan-oriented, listing recommendations, the forum, scanlation progress and availability, and tags. The other sections not presented here can be squeezed below on either of these columns as one sees fit since they have less impact on the reader. However, I will admit that I've no clue what the "User Reviews" section is meant to do since the "User Rating" and "User Comments" sections already provide reviews; so... not sure what to do with that one 🤨

Finally, these columns have been ordered in such a way that they allow a reader to quickly decide whether they want to commit to reading or buying the story they're viewing. For example, at a glance, I know that, if I were to purchase Renchin!, it would be 2 volumes and I might be looking for a third if I want its prequel. I also know the author/artist's name so that I can find it on a store shelf (if I'm that lucky); and, the year lets me know it's an older work, so it might not match current art styles (which can be jarring for newer fans) or it just might be hard to find in general. The second column shares similar information, but for the digital fan scanlation.

TL;DR
So, I think just a little shifting of info on the database pages might make them even friendlier for new users and possibly encourage more forum activity.

Thank you for providing an awesome site and continuing to build a lovely community! 😀