1000 is a nice milestone to look upon and I think it is fair to use it as a 'valid' number of appreciation when there was no real advertisement or any other means to increase the number of members as such. When you near that 1000, the least you can say is that 1000 people took the time and the effort to enroll, and wanted to be part of this forum.
Zero posters isn't a new phenomenon either : each forum is a mixture of expertise and newbies, and most newbies will be overwelmed by the expertise and want to 'sit out' some time just following the threads. Some newbies have troubles getting their seeds up of their common 'supermarket green hot pepper variety', let alone debate on the dna of the 'real naga'...
Newbies with a low treshold will try to say as little as possible in the 'open' subjects (welcome, general, whatever) and hope to say few (what they call stupidities).
So, for my part, celebrate the 1000th, and praise the forum for it, among many pepper related sites it is a good one...