I'm not sure "seriousness" is the correct word but I think its fair to say that too few people put care and effort into their RP these days. It seems like no one can create an interesting character, everyone is too focused on tech and ships to realise what makes it good is how that person handles the "why" of that character.
Take your standard trader or pirate, one wants money, the other wants kills yet neither of them can RP why they'd need credits or kills. All that matters is what the ID's allow and that rules remain unbroken.
The bar has been set too low. Now the effort of maintaining factions or interesting characters has been made redundent, after all why be held to the high standards of a faction or solid RP if you can get everything right off the bat?
