Post by Swim on Jun 21, 2010 16:07:41 GMT -5
*peels off rubber mask*
Hey everyone, its Swim back from the dead. Sorry I didn't just come right out and say it in the first place that I was dragonsbane, my intention wasn't to deceive, in fact I think I made it rather obvious who I was even before I posted my Brawl code, or at least as obvious as some of our members controlling the Shattered Reality NPCs.
I had intended to say this after the carnival was over, so as to not bring down the mood, cause unnecessary drama, or whatever else this post might result in but since Nightmare and Xero decided they just had to tell everyone that I was Swim I'll just have to say it now. I've had too many questions about why I left and what I'm doing back and its easier to answer publicly. I'm going to state right here that this post is meant to state my honest opinion, and if that offends anyone I'm sorry, but that's how I feel. And I think ZV has a problem that we need to come together and fix.
I left ZV five months ago because it no longer felt like the welcoming, friendly community it once had been. I realize that a forum grows as years go by, we add more members to our ranks and our members grow older and change, but I feel like the years have brought negative change more than anything. We've devolved from a tight knit community of people who enjoyed helping one another and having fun together into a circle of fools which exists to feed the egos of a few. I remember when every member was shown respect, regardless of how many posts you had or if you were a mod or if you'd been here a week. It didn't even matter if you disagreed with the core beliefs that another member had, you were still expected to be respectful.
My breaking point came in December. I'd begun to feel alienated from the forum long before that, but I remembered the good times and I liked having a little bit of ZV in my life so I posted when I could but I still felt like a second class member. I was swamped, with final papers, projects, tests and all those other things that life likes to throw at you toward the end of the year and to blow off a little steam I thought it'd be fun to jump into the chat for 30 seconds and /epic. I did this three times over a couple of weeks, never knowing that people didn't like my doing that. I expected that the chat would do a collective "..." and continue with whatever may have been going on but I can understand that the interruption could make people angry. I want to apologize again for that, I am sorry. I only wish someone had PMed me so I'd have had some idea that people were angry. I first became aware of this when Nightmare tried to make me meet with him and Xero. And it had to be by this Friday or I wouldn't like the results. I had finals due all week, I'm sorry that I can't just make time at the drop of a hat for my lords, I explained this and asked what was so urgent but my only response was a cryptic threat. I made time toward the end of the week, found out that I was in danger of losing my moderator position because I had no idea I'd made people angry in the chat and apparently a simple PM wouldn't have done the job. I had a paper to complete still, and I couldn't believe that this was what was so urgent. I explained my situation, I apologized and promised it wouldn't happen again but apparently I was supposed to grovel for forgiveness and lick his feet too so I posted the chat log and left ZV.
I'm still disgusted by what I see now. I'd hoped that after a couple of months things might have improved but sadly they haven't. Since I've been gone I understand that Alter came back, stayed for a day but was treated so badly that he left again. And he's not the only one. You guys have been horrible to Sonic, Tony left for a day because you guys don't know when enough is enough and that's just to name a few.
zerovirus.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=other&action=display&thread=3006&page=1385
This is the big one. This is when a few of our members were able to acknowledge that we have a problem, but we couldn't solve it, we pushed it under the rug and decided to talk about peanut butter and bacon instead. I'm not discounting peanut butter or bacon, but that thing under the carpet is still there and its better off dealt with.
It began by a request that Xero ramble and a challenge by Alter that he could ramble better. Now we all know that Xero's rambles are a treasured part of ZV, but that shouldn't mean that he is the only one allowed to try. But what could have been humorous ramble-off contest of sorts became a pissing contest, with several members saying rude things to Alter and everyone just generally trying to hump Xero's leg, which it seems that he got off to.
Read till about page 1388.
There are a few individuals who seem to horde all of the respect, who have let their egos get out of line and basically require that the other members praise them like gods. And if you're not in this inner circle then these people get to stand on you to boost their own egos. Get over yourselves, being admin of an internet forum does not make you any more important than any other person here, I don't care what color your stars are. And I'm not discounting everything that they've done for the forum and for individual members. We get it, he's been a mentor. He's helped you through tough times. That doesn't give him any right to act like he's heaven sent or some crap. I've helped people and guided people myself, as have most of ZV I'm sure. Does that give me the right to prance around like I'm better than anyone else? No.
Despite all of this, I still have respect for these people, I just think they need to pull their heads out of their butts and stop the "holier than thou" attitude. We're all mortals, and up until recently I thought that we were all a family of sorts. And friends don't come into the chat room, interrupt conversation and tell everyone else to shut the f*ck up so that they can all listen to you whine about your day. And then kick people who were having pleasant conversation already and want to continue, they're all going to hear about your day and they're going to like it. Which is somewhat ironic since a certain admin blew up over me interrupting the chat with an /epic, but its ok when he does it right? Its time to grow up.
I think that chatroom is partly to blame. The kicking has gotten far to excessive, and certain members have become proverbial punching bags. And its all funny because you have all the power. Its also served to alienate members who don't have 5 hours to spend in their per night. If you can't then you're not really a member of ZV anymore, you're a second class member at best. Its just gotten insane, and instead of posting nonsense and joking around in the pointless thread, members are having pissing contests in the chat room. We wonder why the pointless thread goes without posts for hours or days...
Anyhow, this is not just about me, its impacting the whole forum and it has continued in my five month absence. I'm not the only one that wants the old ZV back, and a couple of their old friends back. I'm sorry if this offended anyone but it is my honest opinion of the situation and I hope that you have the maturity to see that this post was not made to troll or to flame. I think with a little more consideration out of everyone ZV can become a family again.
Hey everyone, its Swim back from the dead. Sorry I didn't just come right out and say it in the first place that I was dragonsbane, my intention wasn't to deceive, in fact I think I made it rather obvious who I was even before I posted my Brawl code, or at least as obvious as some of our members controlling the Shattered Reality NPCs.
I had intended to say this after the carnival was over, so as to not bring down the mood, cause unnecessary drama, or whatever else this post might result in but since Nightmare and Xero decided they just had to tell everyone that I was Swim I'll just have to say it now. I've had too many questions about why I left and what I'm doing back and its easier to answer publicly. I'm going to state right here that this post is meant to state my honest opinion, and if that offends anyone I'm sorry, but that's how I feel. And I think ZV has a problem that we need to come together and fix.
I left ZV five months ago because it no longer felt like the welcoming, friendly community it once had been. I realize that a forum grows as years go by, we add more members to our ranks and our members grow older and change, but I feel like the years have brought negative change more than anything. We've devolved from a tight knit community of people who enjoyed helping one another and having fun together into a circle of fools which exists to feed the egos of a few. I remember when every member was shown respect, regardless of how many posts you had or if you were a mod or if you'd been here a week. It didn't even matter if you disagreed with the core beliefs that another member had, you were still expected to be respectful.
My breaking point came in December. I'd begun to feel alienated from the forum long before that, but I remembered the good times and I liked having a little bit of ZV in my life so I posted when I could but I still felt like a second class member. I was swamped, with final papers, projects, tests and all those other things that life likes to throw at you toward the end of the year and to blow off a little steam I thought it'd be fun to jump into the chat for 30 seconds and /epic. I did this three times over a couple of weeks, never knowing that people didn't like my doing that. I expected that the chat would do a collective "..." and continue with whatever may have been going on but I can understand that the interruption could make people angry. I want to apologize again for that, I am sorry. I only wish someone had PMed me so I'd have had some idea that people were angry. I first became aware of this when Nightmare tried to make me meet with him and Xero. And it had to be by this Friday or I wouldn't like the results. I had finals due all week, I'm sorry that I can't just make time at the drop of a hat for my lords, I explained this and asked what was so urgent but my only response was a cryptic threat. I made time toward the end of the week, found out that I was in danger of losing my moderator position because I had no idea I'd made people angry in the chat and apparently a simple PM wouldn't have done the job. I had a paper to complete still, and I couldn't believe that this was what was so urgent. I explained my situation, I apologized and promised it wouldn't happen again but apparently I was supposed to grovel for forgiveness and lick his feet too so I posted the chat log and left ZV.
I'm still disgusted by what I see now. I'd hoped that after a couple of months things might have improved but sadly they haven't. Since I've been gone I understand that Alter came back, stayed for a day but was treated so badly that he left again. And he's not the only one. You guys have been horrible to Sonic, Tony left for a day because you guys don't know when enough is enough and that's just to name a few.
zerovirus.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=other&action=display&thread=3006&page=1385
This is the big one. This is when a few of our members were able to acknowledge that we have a problem, but we couldn't solve it, we pushed it under the rug and decided to talk about peanut butter and bacon instead. I'm not discounting peanut butter or bacon, but that thing under the carpet is still there and its better off dealt with.
It began by a request that Xero ramble and a challenge by Alter that he could ramble better. Now we all know that Xero's rambles are a treasured part of ZV, but that shouldn't mean that he is the only one allowed to try. But what could have been humorous ramble-off contest of sorts became a pissing contest, with several members saying rude things to Alter and everyone just generally trying to hump Xero's leg, which it seems that he got off to.
Read till about page 1388.
There are a few individuals who seem to horde all of the respect, who have let their egos get out of line and basically require that the other members praise them like gods. And if you're not in this inner circle then these people get to stand on you to boost their own egos. Get over yourselves, being admin of an internet forum does not make you any more important than any other person here, I don't care what color your stars are. And I'm not discounting everything that they've done for the forum and for individual members. We get it, he's been a mentor. He's helped you through tough times. That doesn't give him any right to act like he's heaven sent or some crap. I've helped people and guided people myself, as have most of ZV I'm sure. Does that give me the right to prance around like I'm better than anyone else? No.
Despite all of this, I still have respect for these people, I just think they need to pull their heads out of their butts and stop the "holier than thou" attitude. We're all mortals, and up until recently I thought that we were all a family of sorts. And friends don't come into the chat room, interrupt conversation and tell everyone else to shut the f*ck up so that they can all listen to you whine about your day. And then kick people who were having pleasant conversation already and want to continue, they're all going to hear about your day and they're going to like it. Which is somewhat ironic since a certain admin blew up over me interrupting the chat with an /epic, but its ok when he does it right? Its time to grow up.
I think that chatroom is partly to blame. The kicking has gotten far to excessive, and certain members have become proverbial punching bags. And its all funny because you have all the power. Its also served to alienate members who don't have 5 hours to spend in their per night. If you can't then you're not really a member of ZV anymore, you're a second class member at best. Its just gotten insane, and instead of posting nonsense and joking around in the pointless thread, members are having pissing contests in the chat room. We wonder why the pointless thread goes without posts for hours or days...
Anyhow, this is not just about me, its impacting the whole forum and it has continued in my five month absence. I'm not the only one that wants the old ZV back, and a couple of their old friends back. I'm sorry if this offended anyone but it is my honest opinion of the situation and I hope that you have the maturity to see that this post was not made to troll or to flame. I think with a little more consideration out of everyone ZV can become a family again.