Hi! So, I am very afraid of pitchforks - please be gentle.
I just wanted to briefly address groups maths. It's true that the groups of Basic accounts are being lowered by 7, and the groups of Premium accounts are being raised by 10 - and if you look at that math alone, it might not seem to add up. However, most residents have at least one alt. Technically, you can have up to 5 alts, and many residents are not entirely limited by that technicality. But let's you had one Premium Membership and 4 Basic alts - the number of groups you could have on your main account would go up by 10, but the total number of groups you could be a member of would go down by 18. This is important because all members of groups contribute to lag, even inactive group members. This is especially true for group chat. There are residents who have a lot of alts that they have not used in years that are still part of groups, and they are slowing those groups down. Lowering the number of groups for Basic accounts will not be a quick fix for this issue, but reducing the number of groups Basic members can join could help keep it from building further as we go forward.