In reply to Kip Klingman.

Hi Kip,

Wordpress.org has taken a lot of steps recently to make the plugin repository more relevant. Number of active installs is now easily available. Plugins more than two years without an update become almost invisible.

At this point, I'd say Wordpress.org are doing a good job with the plugins, though it is certainly true Wordpress could improve search, including for their own plugin directory.