Disclaimer: I used to work for mahalo. You mentioned these sites having no unique or original content but after a few quick searches on questions on the star

Disclaimer: I used to work for mahalo. You mentioned these sites having no unique or original content but after a few quick searches on questions on the star wars answers sites it was pretty clear that all the ugc is original. True there is not much of it, but thats because the sites are only a few months old at the most. You've proven that the category structure across the sites is similar and that new sites often don't have much content but Google already knows not to grant page rank power to new undeveloped sites. The backlinks from these domains will only carry weight if users engage it and significant content is built...and if that happens then your entire argument goes away. If there are actual users building niche content, I don't really see the problem here. If you don't agree with that then you're making the case against all niche forums and communities just because you don't like the guy.