Professor Nub
Platinum
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2012
- Messages
- 1,186
- Reaction score
- 725
Hello all, I'm Professor_Nub and I was quite an active player on the Australian servers from around midway through 2012 until late 2014. In 2015 I was at boarding school at a place near Mt Buller in Victoria and I was beginning to lose interest in the game so I didn't play much- maybe 1 or 2 games on the holidays for nostalgia's sake with my brother. In this post, I'd hopefully try to impart my opinion on the current situation in Australia and general observations of the community (specifically mod censorship).
So about 1 week ago, my brother and I started to play the game again. There's a few glaring issues which I will address later on in the post, but for the most part we had a lot of fun. There was the odd lag, but we usually attributed it to our parents streaming something on the internet. We even met a few people who recognized us from the old days.
However, as all of you are aware, two days ago the Australian servers were taken off of the MCGamer Network, with no prior warning apart from a few rumours. The reasons stated we that the server host was playing up and that data communication to the US database to the Australian servers was an issue. We were told that lately it had been becoming worse and worse, so they cancelled the renewal for the host until a better quality of service became available. However, their search had apparently limited them to very little results.
So this was very inconsiderate towards the Australian community, which I believe had been making a sort of recovery judging by the amount of clans and events set to go ahead in the region. It was like rubbing salt in the wound when Chad later said that "we can't continue a location where it has bad connectivity to our DB servers" and that "Most AU players actually play on US so we are not loosing much".
Now obviously this issue was not dealt with the best it possibly could have been. I'll make a list of things it did wrong and things it can improve on, so hopefully we can work out a solution together.
1. The lack of communication between the senior staff and the playerbase.
If something as drastic as this is to happen to an entire community, we need to know before it happens. Simple as that. Especially if it is a negative change like this. From a business point of view it has shut off an entire portion of its customers. Also, how does this change make the rest of MCSG feel? This could be interpreted as the "beginning of the end", at risk of being cliche. It is clear as day that the userbase on MCSG is growing smaller by the day, and this does situation doesn't fill anyone with hope for the future.
2. What was actually said in the post
I understand that Chad is trying to be diplomatic. I understand that it was a hard decision to make and purely a business decision- I don't believe that the developers/Chad removed the AU network because they couldn't be bothered fixing the bugs. I believe it was something to do with sustainability. However, in saying that the actual posts by Chad are part of what sparked a lot of controversy. Particularly the lines about how they "can't continue a location where it has bad connectivity to our DB servers" and that "Most AU player actually play on US so we are not loosing much". These parts clearly were not thought about for very long and sparked a lot of discussion on whether Chad has any intention of really bringing back the Australian servers, because this clearly shows otherwise. This did not need to be said like this- not only was it demoralizing, but it is simply not true. Another large Australian server (which I'll mention later on) has no problems communicating to it's US database, and no matter what demographics you look at, Australians and New Zealanders (and probably Asians too) will play on AU servers because we get too much lag on the US and EU servers. Australia already has extremely slow internet speeds. American servers are simply unplayably bad for most of us.
3. When players started to speak up, mods started to delete.
I believe that for a community to thrive, there needs to be transparency. That's why Reddit does so well. Coming from being mainly using reddit for over a year now, back to the MCSG forums, I'm shocked when I see moderators going around deleting and editing posts at their whim. There is one mod specifically who I am talking about, who went wild on the deleting on Chad's post announcing the discontinuing of the AU network. This needs to stop. The main reason for this is that Chad and the developers need to see the Australian response to something that concerns us so heavily. If all of our most passionate people's posts are deleted from sight from mods hiding behind the wall which is their rank, when ordinary players can't see through it it creates tension between the staff and the ordinary users. That's why the moderator who messaged me after deleting my posts is to be commended- I need to know who and why deleted my posts, or I might begin to think that someone is out to get me. I think that it should be mod policy, or at least common courtesy, to let a person know that you deleted their post and why you did so.
4. The other Australian server.
Most of us know what it is. Unfortunately for MCSG, yesterday this server released an Australian survival games server. This means that anyone who still wants to play survival games can go over there and play. This is very bad for MCSG. There is an anti-MCSG stigma on that network that I've experienced myself. Players who become invested there may never come back. This is a massive problem for our network and could lead to the disintegration of the AU MCSG community.
So how do we fix this?
5. The Australian response.
To all the Australians out there who are upset by the change. We need to speak out for Chad to hear, loud and clear that we are upset. People who want us to lay off of the developers and leave them alone because they'll figure something out are deluded, because from what Chad says it seems easy to believe that the AU servers may never come back. Chad needs to know how much he is losing by treating our entire community like this. I'm definitely not as involved in this community as I once was, but I have faith that we have enough voices to be heard. To our moderators- LilBub , Cameron and other moderators whom I don't know simply because I've only been back for one week: your voices are stronger than ours. Let senior staff know that this situation is not right. We haven't been treated as we deserve to be. If we speak up loud enough, I believe something can be changed.
6. A timely response from the senior staff.
I believe that Chad's post was really not sufficient. We need a better explained, more detailed post from somebody, and we need it fast. The AU community has already lost the little faith that it had in the senior staff. A timely response would do so much for our confidence in you. If you are to add Australian servers back, it needs to be announced quickly because as I mentioned earlier, the other server has added survival games and this could mean the end of Australian MCSG, which I'm sure nobody wants.
7. Mod transparency.
This one probably seems off topic. But I believe that just a quick message to somebody who's post has been deleted could go a long way in staff to player relationships. Also, senior staff need to be transparent in their decision making processes. This idea of removing an entire community could be seen as being done on a whim, when I'm sure it was not. I know what I said probably doesn't make a lot of sense, but believe me, a bit of mod transparency will go a long way in making this a much tighter-knit community.
At the end of this, it could already be too late for Australia. The other network is very popular in Australia, and if people get as invested in their network as they were here it could be game over.
Thanks for reading. I'd really like to hear your opinions on this, as I want to play on these servers again- I've only been back 1 week!
TL;DR: Read the bolded headings above
EDIT: After reading this again I realized I failed to properly address one of the problems with censorship. If we say something that might break a forum rule but actually contributes to discussion, I believe that just the offending part should be omitted and the rest should stay up.
So about 1 week ago, my brother and I started to play the game again. There's a few glaring issues which I will address later on in the post, but for the most part we had a lot of fun. There was the odd lag, but we usually attributed it to our parents streaming something on the internet. We even met a few people who recognized us from the old days.
However, as all of you are aware, two days ago the Australian servers were taken off of the MCGamer Network, with no prior warning apart from a few rumours. The reasons stated we that the server host was playing up and that data communication to the US database to the Australian servers was an issue. We were told that lately it had been becoming worse and worse, so they cancelled the renewal for the host until a better quality of service became available. However, their search had apparently limited them to very little results.
So this was very inconsiderate towards the Australian community, which I believe had been making a sort of recovery judging by the amount of clans and events set to go ahead in the region. It was like rubbing salt in the wound when Chad later said that "we can't continue a location where it has bad connectivity to our DB servers" and that "Most AU players actually play on US so we are not loosing much".
Now obviously this issue was not dealt with the best it possibly could have been. I'll make a list of things it did wrong and things it can improve on, so hopefully we can work out a solution together.
1. The lack of communication between the senior staff and the playerbase.
If something as drastic as this is to happen to an entire community, we need to know before it happens. Simple as that. Especially if it is a negative change like this. From a business point of view it has shut off an entire portion of its customers. Also, how does this change make the rest of MCSG feel? This could be interpreted as the "beginning of the end", at risk of being cliche. It is clear as day that the userbase on MCSG is growing smaller by the day, and this does situation doesn't fill anyone with hope for the future.
2. What was actually said in the post
I understand that Chad is trying to be diplomatic. I understand that it was a hard decision to make and purely a business decision- I don't believe that the developers/Chad removed the AU network because they couldn't be bothered fixing the bugs. I believe it was something to do with sustainability. However, in saying that the actual posts by Chad are part of what sparked a lot of controversy. Particularly the lines about how they "can't continue a location where it has bad connectivity to our DB servers" and that "Most AU player actually play on US so we are not loosing much". These parts clearly were not thought about for very long and sparked a lot of discussion on whether Chad has any intention of really bringing back the Australian servers, because this clearly shows otherwise. This did not need to be said like this- not only was it demoralizing, but it is simply not true. Another large Australian server (which I'll mention later on) has no problems communicating to it's US database, and no matter what demographics you look at, Australians and New Zealanders (and probably Asians too) will play on AU servers because we get too much lag on the US and EU servers. Australia already has extremely slow internet speeds. American servers are simply unplayably bad for most of us.
3. When players started to speak up, mods started to delete.
I believe that for a community to thrive, there needs to be transparency. That's why Reddit does so well. Coming from being mainly using reddit for over a year now, back to the MCSG forums, I'm shocked when I see moderators going around deleting and editing posts at their whim. There is one mod specifically who I am talking about, who went wild on the deleting on Chad's post announcing the discontinuing of the AU network. This needs to stop. The main reason for this is that Chad and the developers need to see the Australian response to something that concerns us so heavily. If all of our most passionate people's posts are deleted from sight from mods hiding behind the wall which is their rank, when ordinary players can't see through it it creates tension between the staff and the ordinary users. That's why the moderator who messaged me after deleting my posts is to be commended- I need to know who and why deleted my posts, or I might begin to think that someone is out to get me. I think that it should be mod policy, or at least common courtesy, to let a person know that you deleted their post and why you did so.
4. The other Australian server.
Most of us know what it is. Unfortunately for MCSG, yesterday this server released an Australian survival games server. This means that anyone who still wants to play survival games can go over there and play. This is very bad for MCSG. There is an anti-MCSG stigma on that network that I've experienced myself. Players who become invested there may never come back. This is a massive problem for our network and could lead to the disintegration of the AU MCSG community.
So how do we fix this?
5. The Australian response.
To all the Australians out there who are upset by the change. We need to speak out for Chad to hear, loud and clear that we are upset. People who want us to lay off of the developers and leave them alone because they'll figure something out are deluded, because from what Chad says it seems easy to believe that the AU servers may never come back. Chad needs to know how much he is losing by treating our entire community like this. I'm definitely not as involved in this community as I once was, but I have faith that we have enough voices to be heard. To our moderators- LilBub , Cameron and other moderators whom I don't know simply because I've only been back for one week: your voices are stronger than ours. Let senior staff know that this situation is not right. We haven't been treated as we deserve to be. If we speak up loud enough, I believe something can be changed.
6. A timely response from the senior staff.
I believe that Chad's post was really not sufficient. We need a better explained, more detailed post from somebody, and we need it fast. The AU community has already lost the little faith that it had in the senior staff. A timely response would do so much for our confidence in you. If you are to add Australian servers back, it needs to be announced quickly because as I mentioned earlier, the other server has added survival games and this could mean the end of Australian MCSG, which I'm sure nobody wants.
7. Mod transparency.
This one probably seems off topic. But I believe that just a quick message to somebody who's post has been deleted could go a long way in staff to player relationships. Also, senior staff need to be transparent in their decision making processes. This idea of removing an entire community could be seen as being done on a whim, when I'm sure it was not. I know what I said probably doesn't make a lot of sense, but believe me, a bit of mod transparency will go a long way in making this a much tighter-knit community.
At the end of this, it could already be too late for Australia. The other network is very popular in Australia, and if people get as invested in their network as they were here it could be game over.
Thanks for reading. I'd really like to hear your opinions on this, as I want to play on these servers again- I've only been back 1 week!
TL;DR: Read the bolded headings above
EDIT: After reading this again I realized I failed to properly address one of the problems with censorship. If we say something that might break a forum rule but actually contributes to discussion, I believe that just the offending part should be omitted and the rest should stay up.
