What exactly are you trying to say with this thread? What "policies" are you alluding to in (what appears to be) a rhetorical question?
Also,
I LOVE FAMILIARITY!!!. You guys were tired of fixing your broke ass network anyway, weren't you?
From day one (yes I have been part of the DG community since day one) the DEVS have worked very hard actually at (and were certainly measurably successful at) solving many connectivity-related issues. Much more so in fact than most other DEVS kicking around mostly MP-only titles at the moment.
Many connectivity issues with DG were unfortunately outside of DEV control due to the nature of individual networking configs BUT with a little bit of problem-solving interest on the part of the individual these issues could be and were (for many) resolved.
My personal belief with regard to the decline of population and rise in lobby-waiting in DG goes as follows:
1. Individual network configuration causing connectivity issues:
Which unfortunately couldn't be resolved by the user in every case, so the DEVS stepped things up with their own proxy system which helped many but seemed to come too late for others who had given up by then.
2. Individual network hardware causing latency issues often resulting in game-desyncs: (I took a "guess" at a potential cause in this quote from an old thread)
If I had to hazard a "guess", I'd say "latency spikes" (when in relation to P2P-gaming) often have something to do with certain hardware not being able to handle multiple concurrent connections properly. Some hardware doesn't initiate and/or track them correctly and some hardware isn't able to close and reopen them fast enough.
The above can be due to an actual hardware limitation (shitty consumer-model routers, home-hubs etc.), or being limited by an ISP's particular firmware on said hardware (ISP supplied modems and/or home-hubs).
The best thing those of you with issues can do, is to provide Stardock with the make/model of each piece of hardware in your network map (ie. modem >> router >> etc.) including firmware versions so that some sort of "pattern" might be possible to detect.
thanks,
the Monk
The DEV proxies helped some latency issues but desyncs were much more difficult to diagnose and address since it became obvious that some community members found ways to intentionally produce them in order to avoid game loss-counts or to simply be asshats!
3. The community as is unfortunately the case with *almost* all MP-only (mostly) gaming communities became increasingly hostile towards newcomers.
4. The final reason is that due to the nature of the attention-span of the *average* MP-gamer these days, game-population will just naturaly drop off starting as early as several weeks after release. Of course the above 3 points helped hasten the drop-off, but don't discount the "natural" (by this generation's standards) progression.
Now, how any of the above fit into some "scrub policies" definition I don't know........but I guess to each their own! 
the Monk
