Well.... To be honest, I didn't chose ALIVE, ALIVE choose me :-D When they're tipping bot went down last year, I stepped in and helped them (after learning Hive Botness by fixing the BBH bot, and creating our own bots).
What I do appreciate about the ALIVE community is that the community (albeit being around the "thriving" part) is a lot about that community feeling.
But there are many and many interesting communities on Hive, all with their own merits. The Visualshots community is also one with a tipping bot (also down at the moment I believe) and their own token, yet the communities goal and focus is photography. I love it like that!
!WEIRD
!DOOK
!MMB
!INEEDSLEEP
!BBH
!LOLZ