flow of thoughts/a (perhaps slightly too much so?) serious and emotional talk about this server

i don't know what the fuck the title of this thread should be man. nor the intro. just come and read my dumb little stupid inner catharsis. i've put more emotion into this thread than on a lot of the shit i've wrote in the past year so let that say a thing or two lol

what a fuckin server this is, huh?

it feels like it's been years since everyone on here had always been foreseeing the inevitable

the server is dying
the server will close
"DEAD SERVER LMAO"
the old days are over

they go on
and on
and on

and yet

there we are,

the server still is. we're all still here. what's happening? it's new year's eve 2021
sometimes i can't help but reminisce all those nights spent on skype, doing skin comps on creative1 & turning the wheel of time on this massive digital sphere. we would spend all those sleepless nights rocking away on the forums speaking with strangers. speaking with people from america, europe, even asia. it took a place so tremendous that at school all you would think of is looking forward to go home in order to go log onto minecraft one more time to go speak with all these people with who you created this incredible journey through time that seemed eternal

there was the good and the bad

time spent with the troublesome cliques
amassing warning point upon warning point

then the time spent within (and inside!) staff (who was, in a way, a clique of its own!)

this little dumb beige cyberspace
all gimmicky and shit
no fuel to ignite a spark of magic
and yet
years upon years
the fire still burns

oh the internet
it's crazy how much this little digital sphere became my own little safe space where all my worries and anguish would go away because i knew that in there i could truly explore the world and beyond

this place taught me to speak english in 2014 when i'd hop on random ts3 and skype calls with this inseparable trio: andy, loling and ben

one would be restrained not to go on about a thousand unrelated life stories that all somehow have to do with damn online community

and yet, somehow, here i am
sitting in front of my computer screen at 2am
peeping with my little eye thorugh my glasses
itsjerryandharry.com
writing nonsense that will appeal to maybe a person or two
cuz maybe god forbid they'll relate

what the fuck am i doing with my life? i took some magic mushrooms earlier, maybe that's what sparked this whole nostalgia infused fuckassery
will drugs be the thing that bring back the golden days? fuck no
well idk, maybe

we're all complainign about the fucking server dying and what not cause our own little collective mindspace is all boggled up with this omicron shit, all the news, trump, biden, russia, china, europe, everything is too much, so we lose hope
we lose our childlike hope
we can't enjoy the small things anymore
not much has changed on j&h afterall, other than the player count...

i barely even play on the server anymore. whenever i'm on there i feel like it drains my time away

is this a community? i feel like we've grown beyond and apart from that
is this art? certainly not, it's a fuckin kid's minecraft server
is this entertainment? certainly. but it's also much more than that

how many are we? it feels like the void compared to what it once was
and yet
we're all still here
so few
but enough at once
for this place to keep going

we take this seriously enough
this still has a certain part in our lives

let us not talk of those who have grown uninterested and have left us along the way
let us not reminisce, let's fuckin enjoy this to the fullest. whatever this magical thing is.

we're not leaving this behind
even the owners, i don't know who the hell they are really, but to keep this server going they must feel some kind of attachment

i cant be the only one

because somewhere
just somewhere
we're all children

right?
i'm going into my adult life now and this place is still taking on a magical place

and if you're reading this
it's because you're, you too, attached to this place

fuck i love this place

i don't know where i'm trying to go with this thread
i don't know what the message is
or who it is directed to

will that dumb little thread get likes?
will it be that touch that will "relive" the server
will the existence of this thread spark a new era of life for this dumb little minecraft server
surely not, that's hysterical (and i dont even mean this in a pretentious way)


will it spark a bit of hope perhaps
maybe this is what it is about
hope

always hope

there's still hope for this little community and something tells me it won't end soon
you know why?

cause i still got that damn little j&h forums icon on my chrome taskbar and whenever i find myself sitting alone in front of my computer, i always somehow find my middle finger clicking on the wheel of my mouse to open a new tab on itsjerryandharry.com just to look and see if i have a new red alert or not

and so are you
the fuck are you doing here if you don't have a certain passion for this community
the fuck do you do here if you don't care
leave this place behind like all the others if you don't care!

and hell, even the owners, the oh-almighty owners who have the power, at any time, to pull the plug
who give themselves this almighty
mysterious
detached figure
perhaps they will pull the plug

and perhaps they will not
because they, too, are attached
and they, too, no matter where life takes them, a certain part of their existence will be linked to this place

maybe this is who this thread is dedicated to, the owners,

man this is the least structured, least academic thing i've written in my life
i dont know if this is a call for help
a call for change
a call for something
a call for someone

will you read this, you? are you still reading this? have i lost everyone's attention by now?

i still have a fucking helper application opened here? that's true

i don't know man
is this a vent?
a rant?
a short story?
a poem?
i don't know
all i know is this my most serious and important thread ever in 7+k messages
and also my least important
what am i still doing here

all these people who left the community
all these former staff members
do they sometimes think of us?
we look at all these dead forums profiles like mist evaporating from a graveyard

do they still lurk

do these hours spent with us,
do these hours sometimes pop up in the back of their minds? or are they simply somwhere else now?

personally i hope i never stop thinking of j&h
i hope that on my deathbed i'll still be thinking of j&h
becuase god damn it im crying as im writing this
but j&h is a good metaphor for my childhood

for our childhood

gone and forgotten

like what remains of a raindrop after a storm

it's still there
but not truly forgotten

time flies

-happy new year 2022-

 

I used to love long threads. Nowadays whenever I see a wall of text with a lot of likes I just click away, they're usually not worth the time it takes to even read them. But this was kinda fun, I read it. I relate.
This place used to be that safe cyberspace for me too, now I'm just one of those Gthangs who roam the forums without posting anything.
I'm a team leader in a military but still I'll never be able to leave until J&H pull the plug.

 

I've only been in this community since February of 2021, but I can relate and understand to this a lot. Even in my own communities, it's sad to see them slowly fade away, and from talking to all of the much more OG members here, I can tell that this community used to be a great one. It's kinda sad that now it's just old people and 11yr old racists thinking they're funny that lurk the j&h server chat, but I still think that the server still has a long way to go. I don't think you'll ever be able to experience such a beautiful, personal, and nostalgic memory of j&h again, but I don't think that's possible with anything in life. Change is normal, and instead of lurking on what was, it's better to focus on what will be. This server can continue dying as you wipe your nostalgic tears away, or you can work on bringing this community back together. Maybe not back together... but back to life, so that when the new group of children like yourself stumble upon this server, they can also make memories that they'll look back at for years.

But what would I know? I've literally grinded this server's pk for almost a year and I still can't hold a single wr lmao

 

I’ll have whatever this guys having

 

I can agree 100% with all you said
J&H taught me most of my socialising skills, I became fluent in english because of this server. I really miss the old times where i'd go on skype or teamspeak with random people and play a bit of survival games or do fucking high school rp on creative, skin comps oh and the old parkour community i miss it. But time goes by, People mature and move on from this. I don't know why the fuck i'm still here. I should be gone and I have been dissapearing for 2 months, 5 months, years? I don't know what keeps me coming back here. I don't even have many friends here but I just love coming here to shitpost or annoy the fuck out of some people because that's funny to me.
I do hope that the server does life on or will be remembered at least in all of our hearts.

 

A nice thing I've picked up here is that new friend groups come by when the old ones leave, and then you're the coolest because you've been around the longest B)

Yeah though I've been through about four major groups of friends over the last six-ish years of playing on here, and I miss them all. Some of my best builds and stuff were made on creatives 3 and 1 with a bunch of those dudes. Reminiscing hurts in a good way if that makes sense. I miss those guys every time I think about them, but it's nice to know what I had.

The cool thing is that there've always been more people to hang out with once the old ones stop playing, and that's kept me going since 2015. My name on here was still burke46, which blows my mind to think about cuz that's forever ago!!!!!!!!!!! ! ! ! ! ! !

 

man, first of all thanks for the shoutout. i don't think i'll ever fully appreciate how the people we interact with here lead entire individual and unique lives, and for me to be remembered in decent light like that means a lot. even as something simple as a TS memory.

i read this whole thing and i feel the same way

hell look at my forums name, and yet im here still

if i could contribute a thought, it'd be that i think many of us use ijah as a way of peering back into what the good old days were like


it's staggering the amount of times ive tried to separate myself from ijah, and the ijah community from me. we always find a way back together though. it's hard to measure what ijah has done for my life, good or bad. surely a lot of time wasted that could've been used more constructively. but who the fuck cares? i turned out alright with all the time spent in front of a screen.

if not for ijah, i wouldn't have one of my most valued writing partners. without him, my two latest projects would look a lot different. if not for ijah, i would not be playing fantasy football with several folks from here annually. with real life, sometimes thats the only way i talk to those guys anymore. and, the shit talk is unregulated :). without ijah, i wouldn't have learned the nuance of talking to people different from me (irl i lived in an echo chamber until age 19).

my middle school mandated "digital literacy" lessons to teach us how to be online properly. it was horribly outdated and barely scratched the surface of the important shit. if not for what ijah taught me about the dangerous goldmine of the internet, i would not be as inspired by the online ecosystem that i am, and my online privacy would be nonexistent. let's just say, if you can, recall my very first forum name. it's a far cry from my anonymity today. ijah was a prime example of running a business on the internet. @ItsJerry and @ItsHarry showed us that we can make money in cyberspace, even if we were dumb children.

if not for ijah, there are valuable lessons i would've learned in my 20's rather than me teens about being a good person and how to treat others, even from behind a keyboard. i go back to my irl echo chamber comments. there are situations we experienced together where maybe yall saw me as an asshole for a long while, where i genuinely felt i came out as a better person. and selfishly, im grateful to have gone through those trials online rather than irl. cause i gotta say, if i went out as an adult without learning those things, my life would look different.

i think the fact that we oldies still go on here for the community rather than the game says a lot about the community. everyone here is fkn awesome in their own way.

shoutout: andy, loling, jwd, jit, scout, yfi, willy, harold, safa, ezz, t3, emma, bluenet crew and anyone else i've crossed paths with here. i'm forgetting A LOT. but its nye yknow. hehe.

Spoiler

if you have any good memories on ijah that involve me, i'd love if you replied with them. too often lately ive thought about my past in a dark way, and being reminded of some positive stuff from the good ole days would be good for the soul

i hope if the forums ever get shutdown, the owners allow a grace period for us to exchange contact info so we can stay in touch beyond. thanks guys

 

Nowadays, I don't know if it's just me being burnt out from school where reading lengthy paragraphs on a forum becomes something I have to mentally pull myself through, because I initially just grazed over your post, Jerome. If this were me in, say, 2018 or something, I would've read it straight-through the first instance I saw it and wouldn't have said another word until I knew what I had to say in response. After a few minutes reflecting, and glancing at the replies, I decided to say screw it and dove on in.

All in all, I find your post to be... fascinating, interesting, and true in many of its aspects, Jerome. And it does make me ask myself this pertinent question:

Why am I still here?

I haven't played on the server in months - it's been years since I played it regularly... and yet, I typically still check these forums at-least once a day. It's not like I'm being rewarded for checking this place; heck, when I was staff I don't think anyone ever gave me a pat on the back for "checking the forums every single day". I don't post much - I used to post a lot, just check my message count, but nowadays my role on here has changed from that of an active participant to more of a passive spectator who sometimes gets involved when they find a topic interesting.

I've said it many times before and I will continue to say it again, for as long as there is an audience here to potentially hear my side. I would not be the person I am today without my experiences in the IJAH community, from the days of me roleplaying in Creative 1 of the spring and summer of 2015, to when I applied and got accepted into the staff team in the summer of 2016, the period when I worked myself up the ranks for multiple years before finally resigning in June of 2019, when I gave my initial farewell to my days of playing every day.

Funny enough, it's been so long since those days of 2015, 2016, and so on, that I barely remember any of the more simplistic adventures I had here. Usernames associated with my past, some I still know of to this day, some who haven't stepped foot in this community in years, but others I have long since forgotten. But even though the memories I still have and once held slowly begin to fade, the impact they've had on me as a person will forever live on within me for as long as my heart continues to beat. This community, this server based off a block game taught me how to properly respect others. Being staff taught me how basic management works with different ranks, different responsibilities, and how to respectfully work with others. I learned basic human decency through my time as staff and even before, lessons which taught me that some remarks or thoughts are wrong and deserve no place of being put vocally, or verbally. School taught me about online safety, how to appropriately behave online, but playing on IJAH practically every day from 2015 until early 2019 gave me that first-hand experience of actually, actively communicating with people online.

IJAH, to me, wasn't just a server or a forum website. It was a social outlet for me. It was a safe-space for me to go and hang out with people who, like me, loved this place and the game it was set in.

I believe that even after all this time, the reason I am still here is not one simple one, but many. For one thing, the access to these forums is easy and miniscule. All it takes is me having this website pinned to my google chrome homepage as one of my main 10 sites I use. It does make me wonder if I actually removed this site from the homepage of my chrome if I'd even be willing to put the small, extra effort in to type out the url each time I felt like visiting. I think a large factor that also plays a role is that despite all the hardships, how the server's decreased in size over the years, this sense of community I once considered myself a staple in is still here, even if posts aren't as common as they used to be, or if the people visiting this site each day aren't many in numbers.

I've changed as a person in many ways, but the lifestyle I currently find myself in doesn't require me to take time off from the internet, or social media. I'm still young but if I were to compare my situation now, on New Year's eve 2021, to the fall of 2018, for example, the biggest difference is the change in my schooling format.

I joined this place in 8th grade and I'm now a sophomore in college.

Maybe one day once I'm out of school and I have a fulltime job, if this place is still around by then I might just not have the energy to check in every now and then. But I don't foresee that happening. If I were to look back on my habits for these past few years and make a calculated guess for what the future holds, I would say that I will continue to check in with this place because of the small sentimentality I still have, as well as those memories, and because of how simple it is to do such. It doesn't hurt that I know these forums, even after the change in layout, like the back of my hand even to this day.

I hope life's treating you well, Jerome, as well as anyone else who may read my little speech here.

 

thank you so much everyone for the kind words and comments
i've been immensely enjoying reading you guys' experiences and i'm so glad my dumb little psilocybin-induced catharsis regarding new yrs & adulthood sparked all these beautifully written responses that give me an immense nostalgia and open my eyes on what this server and community has really done for me in my life

after reading ben's post and now that i am sober i think that it would be fair for me to give a shout out to all these people i've met on here who have affected me for the better. i really want to thank the following: valentino, andy, tyler, xeno, teitan, treekillerman, themint, progtrash, cheezi, smurfskii, aiden/misadventuress, androo, magical, emma, captainjackvaldy, n00bhouse, skillz, davey, muffin_mobber, darkstorm, mark, deadly, ezzerland (i've always appreciated you a whole lot despite the shit in 2019 <3), and everyone else with who i've ever had the incredible chance to interact with on this server

i'm looking forward to reading any future comments that will be posted on here, and if anyone wants to catch up, please write a message on my profile or add me on discord (ActuallyImJerome#7733). i'm really glad to have you guys and i hope i am looking forward to see what this server still has to offer to me in my life & never ending internal childhood

Spoiler

 

I was thinking of saying,” you sound like me in my notes when I’m on shrooms.”

But then I read the whole thing and just sat there.

Somewhat teary-eyed, not even in a weird way, this made me feel happy, thank you.

(I’ll give a more detailed response when I’m sober, popped in to take attendance)

 

it's weird to think years later so many of my memories on a god damn block game server are so vivid
i remember clearly all the friends i met over the years
the day me and @Bruhtrash met after her brother @hologramable introduced us because he got staff at my dumb ass club on creative1
i remember meeting so many people in creative and hanging out with them for the whole ass day and working with them building hotels and shit
thinking back when we were recording stupid ass videos and building bluenet and shit

i'll never forget the day when @ItsWilly replied to my application on christmas and interviewed me
the day i got helper and nearly passed out from excitement, same with the morning i got mod and mod+
i'll remember talking with @Ezzerland after YFITOR resigned about "wondering who the next admin will be" and then screaming like a little girl when i got it

thinking back now shit was such small achievements in the overall grand scheme of things but they mattered a lot to me
it was always fun going on build and talking with jerry and harry every so often, creating something that would eventually be introduced to a pretty small audience, but the fact some people enjoyed it overall was enough for my ass man shiieet

even though i don't really talk with many people anymore people still see me in game and say "OMG CHEEZI?!" which is the weirdest fucking shit
and honestly i'd love to one day build again for the server or some shit because man lifes been boring and i'm rusty

 

OMG CHEEZI!?