What about making an official Bots-united IRC channel on some network?
Dunno what the exact benefits would be, cause i couldn't imagine a newbie just randomly joining #bots-united to ask a question, if the person hadn't heard of that name before, and honestly, this is community is a bit hidden... took me some time of searching before i found this page
but anyway, it would give people an oppertunity to small-talk without using the fora...