We can't help your newbies if you won't help them.

[Ebania]

gaia_gaiagold gaia_gaiagold gaia_gaiagold

[Ebania]

gaia_gaiagold gaia_gaiagold gaia_gaiagold

[Rayatia]

sometimes i feel the feedback forums is as useless as the dirty on our shoes...they don't read it anymore and the ones who did read and listen have moved on...we are just left with this new site..i for one after almost a decade of calling this place home, of all the laughter with friends from all over the world, have decided to slowly detach myself from gaiaonline....there is no longer a community, no longer a time to laugh, no longer a way to help others achieve goals, its either pay or you don't play now...it is said what they have done to this once thriving, beautiful, inspiring, talented, overwhelmingly amazing user-based that grows less and less daily.

[Ebania]

Detachment from things that once meant a lot to us can be a healthy, cathartic experience, and I don't blame you at all. I do think, though, that there is a wonderful community here -- it's just been horribly weighed down by decisions from Headquarters. It's such a shame.

Rayatia

sometimes i feel the feedback forums is as useless as the dirty on our shoes...they don't read it anymore and the ones who did read and listen have moved on...we are just left with this new site..i for one after almost a decade of calling this place home, of all the laughter with friends from all over the world, have decided to slowly detach myself from gaiaonline....there is no longer a community, no longer a time to laugh, no longer a way to help others achieve goals, its either pay or you don't play now...it is said what they have done to this once thriving, beautiful, inspiring, talented, overwhelmingly amazing user-based that grows less and less daily.

[Ebania]

Legal bump.

[Goddamn Winchester]

To be honest, every time I visit the welcoming forum, I have the sudden urge to tell each and every one of them to save their money, turn around, and never look back but I'd probably get in trouble for that.

I'm so very sorry this is happening to you and your team. It's not fair and shame on Gaia for making it this hard for generous people such as yourselves. I have little hope that this place could ever be as awesome as it once was but if Gaia can just stop being greedy and see how it's affecting the new people and hell, veterans like myself, this can be a really great place again. Something needs to change soon because I don't see a future for gaia right now. Not a very good or lasting one at least.

[Ebania]

I agree 200%. I think that things could someday change, perhaps under different management. This is not the Gaia I knew. Not even close.

Goddamn Winchester

To be honest, every time I visit the welcoming forum, I have the sudden urge to tell each and every one of them to save their money, turn around, and never look back but I'd probably get in trouble for that.

I'm so very sorry this is happening to you and your team. It's not fair and shame on Gaia for making it this hard for generous people such as yourselves. I have little hope that this place could ever be as awesome as it once was but if Gaia can just stop being greedy and see how it's affecting the new people and hell, veterans like myself, this can be a really great place again. Something needs to change soon because I don't see a future for gaia right now. Not a very good or lasting one at least.

[Raining_Nights]

Ebania

I do not feel comfortable encouraging newbies to give their time, love, or money to a website to which I have very little desire to give my own time, love, or money. How can I, in good faith, ask a newbie to give this place a chance when, in all actuality, I feel like this place has run out of chances to maintain my affections and loyalty? How can we, in good faith, tell newbies that this place is a safe and welcoming environment for them to spread their wings, make friends, and have a good time, when we, veterans who have devoted years of our lives to this site, are struggling to believe that Gaia genuinely cares about its members’ online experience?

This is so disheartening, but I couldn't blame you at all for feeling this way. I think that there are still a lot of great people on this website, but the website managers themselves just drive this place into the ground. They've disappointed us so many times that we aren't surprised when they sink even lower, we simply expect to be disappointed again. Every time we think they might give a little, we get the middle finger instead. Like the goldsinks we asked for, all turned into a scam and ironically corresponding with even greater inflation than before instead of anything being fixed. We asked for fewer gold generators or even no gold generators, and now we have multiple releases every day. The CEO and the marketing team are a joke, the website itself has been turned into a joke. I see so many people who say that this website is a sinking ship, and given the circumstances, that's how I feel too.

Gaia is increasingly becoming more of a pay-to-play website. Most of the site's updates and announcements are in the cash shop. Any non-cash updates and events favor the rich users, mainly those who have spent cash. Non-cash users can't even quest for many premium items because they're put so far out of their reach. These new achievements are bought, not earned. A 'free' manga update is now a reward for dropping a lot of gold. If you're loyal, you can look at an exclusive shop, and even buy from it if you're also a rich cash user. Even the cash updates are really shady, with permanently 'reduced' prices and LQIs that show up again just different enough to be considered a new item.

I joined Gaia as a young teenager and I didn't have money to spend on pixels, and I definitely didn't have money to spend on any of the $50-$1,000 pixels. This was also a PG-13 website, and now they promote their newer porn-friendly 18+ website here. If that's wasn't enough, the avatars on this website are becoming increasingly sexual (mainly the females). Box of Godina sets definitely look like a nude avatar with pubic hair. Not to mention the infamous Kama and Punishing sets.

I ended up typing more than I meant to. I've actually started a charity myself, and I also created a thread for affordable avatars in case anyone's feeling poor with only millions (more or less). Though thanks to inflation, most of the avatars that actually fit the price range for my thread use primarily gold shop items. And thank goodness for gold shops. (There's usually about a minimum 10-20 million gap between goldshop avatars and a single decent premium item these days.) My charity thread has been doing pretty well since most of the items I donate are items that older users don't want anyway, but can be fun for newer users or can help them get a start on some gold. Both threads are in my signature.

I've spent a lot of time in the welcome forum and I do see users tell people to get out while they can. I hate seeing it and I don't want to be one of those people. I try to show people ways to still enjoy the website and not feel as though they need to pay-to-play. But Gaia just doesn't help. Cash ads are constantly shoved in our faces, free and fun aspects of the website are collecting dust, and events are just a chore that they put minimal effort into unless they can monetize it.

[Darth Vindicaa]

I joined Gaia three months ago and thought everything was fine. But now Gaia's just one huge goldsink stressed

[Ebania]

Thank you for your response. I completely agree with your assessment of Gaia's current and future state, and I definitely want to check out your charity. And yes, I totally feel that frustration in trying to help people and finding out that your gifts are less helpful in the cold, harsh reality of the Marketplace. It's depressing.

Raining_Nights

This is so disheartening, but I couldn't blame you at all for feeling this way. I think that there are still a lot of great people on this website, but the website managers themselves just drive this place into the ground. They've disappointed us so many times that we aren't surprised when they sink even lower, we simply expect to be disappointed again. Every time we think they might give a little, we get the middle finger instead. Like the goldsinks we asked for, all turned into a scam and ironically corresponding with even greater inflation than before instead of anything being fixed. We asked for fewer gold generators or even no gold generators, and now we have multiple releases every day. The CEO and the marketing team are a joke, the website itself has been turned into a joke. I see so many people who say that this website is a sinking ship, and given the circumstances, that's how I feel too.

Gaia is increasingly becoming more of a pay-to-play website. Most of the site's updates and announcements are in the cash shop. Any non-cash updates and events favor the rich users, mainly those who have spent cash. Non-cash users can't even quest for many premium items because they're put so far out of their reach. These new achievements are bought, not earned. A 'free' manga update is now a reward for dropping a lot of gold. If you're loyal, you can look at an exclusive shop, and even buy from it if you're also a rich cash user. Even the cash updates are really shady, with permanently 'reduced' prices and LQIs that show up again just different enough to be considered a new item.

I joined Gaia as a young teenager and I didn't have money to spend on pixels, and I definitely didn't have money to spend on any of the $50-$1,000 pixels. This was also a PG-13 website, and now they promote their newer porn-friendly 18+ website here. If that's wasn't enough, the avatars on this website are becoming increasingly sexual (mainly the females). Box of Godina sets definitely look like a nude avatar with pubic hair. Not to mention the infamous Kama and Punishing sets.

I ended up typing more than I meant to. I've actually started a charity myself, and I also created a thread for affordable avatars in case anyone's feeling poor with only millions (more or less). Though thanks to inflation, most of the avatars that actually fit the price range for my thread use primarily gold shop items. And thank goodness for gold shops. (There's usually about a minimum 10-20 million gap between goldshop avatars and a single decent premium item these days.) My charity thread has been doing pretty well since most of the items I donate are items that older users don't want anyway, but can be fun for newer users or can help them get a start on some gold. Both threads are in my signature.

I've spent a lot of time in the welcome forum and I do see users tell people to get out while they can. I hate seeing it and I don't want to be one of those people. I try to show people ways to still enjoy the website and not feel as though they need to pay-to-play. But Gaia just doesn't help. Cash ads are constantly shoved in our faces, free and fun aspects of the website are collecting dust, and events are just a chore that they put minimal effort into unless they can monetize it.

[Ebania]

Unfortunately, all of this madness started at around this time last year -- August of 2013. That's about when the first ever gold generator, Flynn's Booty, came out and was advertised as a one-time thing. Gaia saw how much money they got from the purchases, and it's been a downward spiral ever since. Things three months ago were also terrible, but things have only gotten increasingly bad as time has passed. 2014 has been rough for Gaia, for sure.

Misty Sunwing

I joined Gaia three months ago and thought everything was fine. But now Gaia's just one huge goldsink stressed

[Ebania]

Legal bump.

[Phantasmai]

You know I started a few threads and even a simple quest recently to get myself motivated to be active again, but it's just not working. I literally felt your anguish reading the first post, and it's how I've felt myself within the past year. I became more and more of a lurker, hell I just got my 90 day perfect attendance achievement the other day and I can safely say that aside from the Chatterbox and quest thread bumps I've done almost nothing else but lurk. I've dabbled in the old games a little like Blackjack and Fishing, and I gave in to GCash a bit to get a couple new shinies, but there's absolutely no replacing that which made me love this site, that which is completely gone.

- The fact that the guild I lived in for a majority of my Gaian life is closed (because everyone has left Gaia due to its current practices)

- All but a couple of my friends do not sign on anymore due to the same reasons, and

- The one thing I forever wanted to quest for became impossible to do. I achieved a million blue carnations back in 2009 when Towns was still a new thing and that was after over a year of questing. Even then, I went for ANOTHER million because it was so fun, and with each trade/sale I had more and more of them, it was a never-ending goal but also a never-ending feeling of accomplishment. I was away from the site for about two years due to life outside the internet and when I came back this kind of questing seemed impossible to do because the flowers are so ridiculously expensive, and that is due to the games being in disrepair and their availability dwindling. I would give anything to be able to just collect them again without needing to resort to buying GC to fund it (honestly any quest feels like this anymore).

I want newbies to come in, hell yeah, and I want them to love it here just as I did when I was new. I want Gaia to feel like a vibrant, social getaway again like it used to. As much as we all want it though, I agree that this cash grab they are doing right now (and the people who are buying the gold generators as well, I won't turn a blind eye to that either) is seriously dissuading our new members. I brought my husband and a friend here about a month ago and their activity has been absolutely nothing outside of logging in once or twice to change their avatar, and laugh at the announcement spam. I feel as well that we cannot bring people here and ask them to stay and enjoy themselves if we, the current and older users, cannot stay ourselves and find reasons to enjoy the site.

[Ebania]

You're totally right. I'm so sorry that some of your long-time friends have left already; I can't imagine how you must be.

Phantasmai

You know I started a few threads and even a simple quest recently to get myself motivated to be active again, but it's just not working. I literally felt your anguish reading the first post, and it's how I've felt myself within the past year. I became more and more of a lurker, hell I just got my 90 day perfect attendance achievement the other day and I can safely say that aside from the Chatterbox and quest thread bumps I've done almost nothing else but lurk. I've dabbled in the old games a little like Blackjack and Fishing, and I gave in to GCash a bit to get a couple new shinies, but there's absolutely no replacing that which made me love this site, that which is completely gone.

- The fact that the guild I lived in for a majority of my Gaian life is closed (because everyone has left Gaia due to its current practices)

- All but a couple of my friends do not sign on anymore due to the same reasons, and

- The one thing I forever wanted to quest for became impossible to do. I achieved a million blue carnations back in 2009 when Towns was still a new thing and that was after over a year of questing. Even then, I went for ANOTHER million because it was so fun, and with each trade/sale I had more and more of them, it was a never-ending goal but also a never-ending feeling of accomplishment. I was away from the site for about two years due to life outside the internet and when I came back this kind of questing seemed impossible to do because the flowers are so ridiculously expensive, and that is due to the games being in disrepair and their availability dwindling. I would give anything to be able to just collect them again without needing to resort to buying GC to fund it (honestly any quest feels like this anymore).

I want newbies to come in, hell yeah, and I want them to love it here just as I did when I was new. I want Gaia to feel like a vibrant, social getaway again like it used to. As much as we all want it though, I agree that this cash grab they are doing right now (and the people who are buying the gold generators as well, I won't turn a blind eye to that either) is seriously dissuading our new members. I brought my husband and a friend here about a month ago and their activity has been absolutely nothing outside of logging in once or twice to change their avatar, and laugh at the announcement spam. I feel as well that we cannot bring people here and ask them to stay and enjoy themselves if we, the current and older users, cannot stay ourselves and find reasons to enjoy the site.

[Ebania]

Legal bump!