Serious Some Necessary Clarification

[john]

One of my absolute biggest issues with the community is this weird sense of entitlement that seems to follow when people make genuine suggestions and bring forward issues. People actively engage, they take time out of their day to make suggestions on how to improve on a server that from what I know serves as a livelyhood for a few of the people here, and more often than not they get snarky replies or their stuff just simply gets ignored, to me that's extremely disheartening.

This community also seriously lacks communication, this thread is a rare example of how I think everyone on Nebulous should behave, owning up, discussion, communication and genuine, honest criticism.

Much of that issue translates to how I feel everyone is kept in the dark, I have absolutely no idea what direction the headstaff have planned for the server and if I did I'd certainly care to partake in a more active way as part of the community, currently it's just some cryptic and strange "Us vs Them" dilemma where it feels like everyone's on a different side and it just creates this bitter taste in my mouth where everyone's purposely divided, there's no reason not to be transparent.

This bit definitely went to show when we were due to switch to Helix and I was the crafting lead, I genuinely asked and prodded for a good three months as to what I would do for the future of something I was taking care of, and I got absolutely no response. I got told I'd "know when I had to know", which was apparently when we switched to Helix and I was informed by the new trading lead at the time and kicked out of crafting with absolutely no thanks for taking half a year of my life doing something for the server, that really doesn't give you a lot of confidence or feeling.

I was very tempted to leave at the time but what kept me around was all the amazing people taking part and participating in what makes this server so good, but you can't have a community unless you work with that community, thats just an extreme contradiction. This post comes from a genuine place, and know that I do want the server to succeed, I do want the best for everyone here or I wouldn't have been trying for 3 years, engaging with people, making friends, constantly pushing suggestions and always looking for ways to improve.

 

[Khiel]

I think another big issue (stemming off from communication) is that certain people will get told stuff that others wont, and then when the people act on this info of a new option / action they can take, the people who've told them about this will usually just go "Well you could've done that too!" when there's been no indication that it was even possible to your average joe.

 

[Rabid]

Much of that issue translates to how I feel everyone is kept in the dark, I have absolutely no idea what direction the headstaff have planned for the server and if I did I'd certainly care to partake in a more active way as part of the community, currently it's just some cryptic and strange "Us vs Them" dilemma where it feels like everyone's on a different side and it just creates this bitter taste in my mouth where everyone's purposely divided, there's no reason not to be transparent.

The biggest handicap to being transparent is Neb as a community has the amazing tendency to take one side of the story (or not even that in some cases) and run with it anyway. They'll create drama and blow things up before anyone actually has the chance to respond to the situation or even remotely sort it and by the time people get the truth it won't matter what it is because people already have their views of how things should be and anything else isn't satisfactory. Hell there's even been cases of people lying to their friends about what was said in a conversation which ended in them flipping out on the forums.

Thats speaking specifically to drama of course but it goes for a lot of things - from suggestions to punishments wherein the majority have different views on it. In fact I'd wager that ties into your point about server direction - as recent events (literally) have proven, publicly making promises you may have to change or alter later due to circumstances is going to net you in more shit. People don't stop to think about the wider implications for the most, and even when they do the assumption is usually "well they can be handled, right?" even when they aren't the ones having to do it.

I don't mean to sound so pessimistic, because I care about this place too and a great deal of the people in it are those I'd consider friends who are constantly working to better it but there are a lot of people who'll jump at the chance to stir the pot and have a laugh when it suits them and that really drains you.