Cheers for the years

I'm not dead either. I pretty much just post on the Youtube thread. But...yeah as everyone else has said, this place has somewhat shaped me into who I am today. Kinda sorta. Finding the T9k Classic server with Zennai in the middle of high-school game design class way back when was the best thing that could've happened to us.

This was my first internet community, and it introduced me to so many things, be it memes, Mumble, and even Steam itself. I do wish I was more active around here again. I hope to get on Mumble more often. That would be nice.

Another thing...I've been here for four and a half years now and I still haven't meet Woot in person! Yeah I missed him at PAX South but he lives in Austin and I live in Buda. These cities are literally right next to each other! It'd be nice to at least personally meet you at one point, Wooty.
 
I'm over here
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Wooty said:
I don't know why anyone would be waiting for something to happen. If you want to read up on anything that's been posted, then feel free to stop by time time to time, otherwise don't. There's no obligation for any of us to be here, and I have no obligation to try and "turn this community around."

This site has always been my playground for new projects, and I don't really feel obliged to make it anything more than that.
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The topic of this community dieing and withering into no more than an exoskeleton of its past is a really bitter, bittersweet thing for me.

I understand that starting the community was your plaything, or a laboratory of sorts for new projects, and there is no obligation on your end to continue nurturing this place or upkeep. Up to this point I've respected the calls (or lack thereof) you've made. However, when outside variables such as members are added, who are separate entities with their own free will and desires come around and want to give their time, their ideas, and their resources toward such a thing, and there is no desire on the other end or consideration, some affirmation that these are workable potentials, maybe actual goals... It royally pisses me off. Here we have a leader whose greatest ideas here were only enacted part-way, and left as whimsy after the next new project obsession comes around.

There are members here who want to continue growing this place, evolving it to fit the current trends and times, make it better despite its creator's attention span and desires waning. We have lives, hell a lot of us made this community a good, memorable chunk of our lives despite our busy adult obligations. And this is the result. Wooty, I've fucking cried multiple times over this bullshit, and I'm not forgiving you for letting this happen. But at least have some dignity in handing the reigns to someone else if your attention span for this place has fizzled to nothing. Someone who wants to keep this place going, and have it grow back to life...
...
Essentially, the complexity of such an endeavor of building a community, then neglecting it is like having a child, then waiting until its five years old and conscious and speaking its own desires to toss it in a dumpster, left to die. Its disgusting. If you had no desire for longevity in such a project, you should have tossed the child when it was a baby and not cognizant of itself.
 
MotorKat said:
The topic of this community dieing and withering into no more than an exoskeleton of its past is a really bitter, bittersweet thing for me.

I understand that starting the community was your plaything, or a laboratory of sorts for new projects, and there is no obligation on your end to continue nurturing this place or upkeep. Up to this point I've respected the calls (or lack thereof) you've made. However, when outside variables such as members are added, who are separate entities with their own free will and desires come around and want to give their time, their ideas, and their resources toward such a thing, and there is no desire on the other end or consideration, some affirmation that these are workable potentials, maybe actual goals... It royally pisses me off. Here we have a leader whose greatest ideas here were only enacted part-way, and left as whimsy after the next new project obsession comes around.

There are members here who want to continue growing this place, evolving it to fit the current trends and times, make it better despite its creator's attention span and desires waning. We have lives, hell a lot of us made this community a good, memorable chunk of our lives despite our busy adult obligations. And this is the result. Wooty, I've fucking cried multiple times over this bullshit, and I'm not forgiving you for letting this happen. But at least have some dignity in handing the reigns to someone else if your attention span for this place has fizzled to nothing. Someone who wants to keep this place going, and have it grow back to life...
...
Essentially, the complexity of such an endeavor of building a community, then neglecting it is like having a child, then waiting until its five years old and conscious and speaking its own desires to toss it in a dumpster, left to die. Its disgusting. If you had no desire for longevity in such a project, you should have tossed the child when it was a baby and not cognizant of itself.
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I dunno, I still feel like anything we bring the community to be may not be superior than a place to reminisce about the old days of classic and survival. While many of us are or have been emotionally attached to this place, can we really replace the people who have already left? Am I a worthy replacement for those who were around in Eagle Pass? Can someone replace the friends I made in 2011 and 2012? Those with whom I bantered with griefers, held spleef tournaments, built grand structures and begged for Engineer rank?

Now, don't get me wrong. I would love for this place to be roaring with activity again, regardless of whose name sits beside the posts made. I just fear branching out and bringing more new people won't have the desired effect of returning the community to its former state. Actually, I'll go ahead and say it probably won't. If anything it may even push some older members away from the site entirely. I will check this site from now until it goes down or the eventual heat death of the universe (Whichever comes first). If this is the last message ever written on the site, I'll still check it from here on hoping someone else will stop by. If everyone attempted to start a game, I'd attempt to start it with them. The main problem is we do not have a minecraft classic. We do not have a game that both gives old members a place to chat and coexist. We don't have a game that brings in new players and new members in such huge numbers. Even if we manage to pick up new people in small numbers here and there, the new people we bring in could very well be subject to some unintentional elitism, especially in such a tight-knit community like this has become.

Let's say I'm a new T9ker that someone brought in from Rocket League. Sure, this is a cool site and all, but wouldn't it be easier if I just added the T9ker that invited me, as well as the few other T9kers that play Rocket League on steam? The thing that truly made the site blossom were the things that could only be handled via the site.

Ultimately, the trouble I see with bringing something to the community is that while old T9kers had the shared experience of Minecraft, these hypothetical new members would have few shared experiences with each other, as well as few experiences shared with the older members. Why would they bother to stay? We need another large root in a game large enough to bring players in, and interesting enough for old players to get into. We need to re-specialize if we want to grow.

That being said, I would honestly hate to see this place go down without a fight. Please delegate someone Wooty. Some of us have invested too much to see this just die. :/ I feel like we can at least get it to stagnation or maybe more if we put our heads together, and have some power to make a change.
 
Honestly, I feel one of the main issues here, or at least for me, is dealing with the ramifications of nostalgia and change. As we all know, nostalgia tends to blind our view of the past and in turn drives us in a desire for the return to better times in the face of a changing community. Personally, the best days for me were late 2010/early 2011 hanging with people like Aramat, Briggs, and Prof on the first public survival server, that Halo 3 gamenight with people including RSMV and Jazzgasm, or when T7, a few others, and I made a shitty underground city on classic and were promoted as a result. However, after I returned a few months later after my desktop imploded on itself I was faced with a changed community; old faces gone and in their place strangers.

I've felt these past few years that I've never been able to achieve the same level of integration, that feeling of belonging and community since those early days. I was never able to never achieve a connection with the seemingly disintegrated mumble crowd, which to be fair probably stemmed from my fear of alienation and how much of an immature cunt I've been. Regardless, I imagine others gone and remaining have felt or feel the same or similar to how I do. Case in point, the loss of members during periods of drastic change such as the Brony Wars, the transition between survival worlds, and the closure of both survival and classic. People who once felt they belonged to the community suddenly departed, explanation or not.

I didn't really know where I was going to go when I startes to type this ramble on my phone, but I feel my point is ultimately this. I don't know whether Team9000 will spring back from its decadent state as a launch service for GMod servers through some revamp of the community or discovery of some entity that brings the community together then. I can't even imagine how T9k will be in a few months time. But I don't think, for many of us at least, that we'll ever be able to recapture that spark of magic that compelled so many of us to remain here throughout the years. Whether or not that's somehow the fault of Woot or the community is ultimately inconsequential. After all, everything fades with the passage of time and change. Team9000 was never exempt from this law of the universe, right from the start.

I'm done ranting now so I'll leave you with this final tidbit from the 11th doctor that'a given me some perspective on my time here.

"We all change, when you think about it, we're all different people; all through our lives, and that's okay, that's good, you've gotta keep moving, so long as you remember all the people that you used to be. I will not forget one line of this, not one day."
 
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This website has been the one and only tab that I have never once closed out of for the entirety of my 4 years and 4 months here. I have seen it at it's grandest, and I have seen it at it's worst; I have not seen it from the beginning, but I will see it through to the end. Every day from here on forth will pass, and I will always remain. However, even though it will be sad to see the eventual day that this community ceases to exist, it needs to happen. I don't want it to happen, but you can't freeze time, and can't hold on to the relics of the past forever.

You can always look back and nobody can take the memories that have been made here, but those memories only apply to those who were involved with them. New members to the community will not know what we have been through. They won't understand the inside jokes, or the bonds we all share. Nostalgia is eternal, and that's fine, but you can't expect everything to remain as time moves forward.

I know this post will be read by some who will understand the message I'm attempting to portray, and read by others who do not share my views, and there are members who will never see this post because the thread doesn't interest them. But that's why this community thrived in the first place. Diversity. Everyone was able to start discussions and enjoy others' company even if it was only through a keyboard, mouse, and monitor. There were friendly rivalries and even some real relationships formed here that last even into the real world. We were all given this wonderful community by one man who did it out of curiosity, generosity, time, effort, and respect for others. Even though he may have lost interest, as everyone does eventually, he still deserves the respect and generosity he showed us.

If he wants to move on, we should respect that. We shouldn't argue and try to hold him back, as he's already given so much for countless people he never got to know, and some that he did get to meet. If he one day decides to revive the community or even create a new one, I will tip my hat to him and I will be there. Same goes for anyone reading this.., If you decide to do something this grand, I will eventually show up and you will have my respect.

This post has gotten longer than I thought it would, but to end it, I will leave two quotes that come from an Anime I recently watched. They aren't exactly about this type of topic, but I believe they convey the same message I'm trying to get across.

Haruyuki Arita (Accel World) said:
It’s natural to want to stay in the game world and hope the game will never end. However, I’ve learned one thing from playing all those online games. There’s nothing lonelier or sadder than the end of a game with no ending. More and more players get bored and move on to other games… And one day, even NPCs like your favorite blacksmith or landlady disappear forever as they smile. I’ve experienced that moment and cried many, many times. That isn’t how games should end. It definitely isn’t! If Brain Burst really does have an ending, then we should be aiming for it!
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Haruyuki Arita (Accel World) said:
We all live in the space between one moment and eternity. We meet and part. Everyone lives their lives to the fullest in a world where things change with the passage of time. But I’m sure some things won’t ever change. There are also things that change and can never be gotten back. But we already know. Even if things change, they’ll begin anew. And as long as we have the will, humans will always move on forward.
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I feel like I've wasted enough of your time with this long post, so I'll continue to linger in the corner like one of Kagato's farts.
 
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