Saturday, April 08, 2017

Let's chat


Well, I did say I would try to write a couple of times a month O_O
(I guess I wasn't exactly true to my word, but I've written enough posts apologizing for my lousy and sporadic updates).

To be honest, the reason I'm writing this post is because I want to get real about the community on Animal Jam. I haven't written up any notes or prepared some mind-blowing presentation on the intricacies of Animal Jam and it's community. And I am definitely not outing or exposing anyone for being rude (not that anyone cares, really). 

I apologize, I'm not going to be my usually bouncy, bubbly self in this post. It honestly isn't who I am in real life anyway. When I'm at school or at home, I'm usually a sarcastic pessimist. When I'm at home, not doing my homework, this is basically me:


In addition, I'm not going to sugarcoat anything in this post, it's mostly just me spilling my thoughts on Animal Jam, and while your input is appreciated in the comments, I will not approve comments attacking me or my views (not that I will get any hate anyways, I'm not that big of a voice in the community at large). 



Fakers

One of my least favourite things on AJ to encounter are people pretending to be someone else. If your username is not "Aparri" then I'm not going to believe you're him. The real Aparri would not have to try to convince anyone that he is Aparri because he would be on his own account. 


Now, if you recognize an impostor on AJ, the absolute worst thing you could ever do is call them out! I know that you have good intentions, but the reason this person is impersonating someone is because they want your attention. Now, what is the exact opposite of what they want? You guessed it! 

 So if you see some "New Jammer" hanging out around Jamaa, make sure you don't approach him, just walk away or report and block, whatever you need to do, but under no circumstances must you interact with that person! Now if we spread the word "do not interact with impersonators" they will no longer have an audience to troll, which takes care of that problem. 

Even if people still try to unmask the impostors, if you walk away, you don't have to deal with them!



Politeness


Another thing I would like to point out is something that has actually improved over the years, but still requires lots and lots of work: manners

Look, you don't have to talk to everyone like they're the queen of England on Animal Jam, but at least observe the basic code of human decency. Such as saying hello when you enter a den or other simple things like "yes please" or "thanks bro".

If I'm trading with someone who does not observe courtesy, I'm not going to want to trade with you! 
If you barge into my den and - without saying hello - blurt out "hat 4 yr carpet yes r no?" This is what I'm going to think:


But because I'm an upstanding - mostly - polite human being, and they are a person I have never met before, I must obey social conventions. Even online. So I will say "sorry, not thank you" and I will not lock them out of my den but wait for them to leave so that I can leave as well.
Even though this is a virtual world, it is still a world. I shudder to think of a future when people do not even have the decency to say a simple "please" or "thank you" when making deals with real people. 

I'm probably just way overreacting here, but this is the truth. We must treat each other like real human beings, and remember that there is a person behind the avatar.


Age Demographic

The age demographic on AJ is a little bit screwed up. We have the people who started back in 2010 when they were very young, only to grow up and stay with AJ through all the way to 2017 and probably onward. Then we have the little siblings or the New Jammers that have just joined, who may be younger than those older Jammers.


Well, yes. This does present a problem. We have these older kids, who know a lot more about the game, and these younger, more gullible younger Jammers who do not know much about AJ.

These younger children are mostly non members. I think this is where the "all non members are annoying and don't know the first thing about Animal Jam" stereotype comes from.

When the older, more learned kids meet the younger - and generally more immature - jammers, this could lead to the younger jammers getting scammed easier and - more often - with the older Jammers becoming annoyed and possibly causing fights between a person from high school and a second grader.

Now I know for a fact that the older kids can be exceedingly rude, and are not above possibly cyberbullying the younger kids.

The simple solution to this problem is to just be kind. Report the mean dudes and help the less fortunate. Whenever I see a kind Jammer making someone's day, it just makes me so happy.




Thank you

To finish off this sarcastic and rather - dare I say - rude post, I'd just like to thank all of you for your positivity, because I know that none of you are these people, it's just me venting my thoughts. 

Just keep doing what you're doing, and AJ will be a great place again.



Sunday, February 05, 2017

My Friendship Cottage

Hewwoooo peeps :)

I've been gone a while, haven't I? Sorry about that, but I'm sure you've all somehow found a way to cope without my magnificent self around heehee!

I've been off pursuing some personal things, developing my french capabilities a little more outside of school, as well as helping some of my friends who are going through tough times, so I SWEAR I'M NOT SLACKING OFF! XD Well, maybe a little...

Anyways, I'm back, but I'm probably not going to be posting nearly as much as I normally would, some things are more important than Animal Jam after all...

This post is really just to show off my newly decorated Friendship Cottage, even though it isn't completely finalized yet! I'm not 100% happy with it, but it's home, I guess!


This is the area that I'm most proud of in my entire den. I spent so much time trying to make it perfect. It's a really easy part to work with because of it's size, you can fit a few small things in there but you don't have to feel like you need to add so many things and have to walk the line between empty and over crowded.


This is actually the only outside area that I decorated (because I just didn't have enough stuff to fill the other parts of the yard!) and to be honest, it's kind of all over the place. I think I'll have to improve it later, but I'm just way too lazy right at this moment :P

On a side note, see what I did to some of the plants lining the sides there? When decorating my dens, I like to stay away from placing random plants in random places. Sometimes it looks good, but most of the time it turns out pretty messy and random, which is what happened in my case :l


At this moment, I'm severely lacking in orange/brown decorations, so this part of the den is very bland and boring at this time. I guess it passes, but I really need to add to this part...


Ahh, yes, more plants! I don't know what it is with me and bringing outside plants indoors, but it certainly gets the job done!

Notice the one out of place bookshelf just sitting there like it doesn't have a care in the world *snickers*. But for real though, does anyone find that books are just really calming? I own a ton of books in my room and use them for anything from shelf furnishings to really large bookmarks! I always have to include at least one bookshelf in my AJ dens as well, it just has an air of homeliness, doesn't it?

I'm not going to show you guys the last part of my den because it's still under renovation, and I'm just way to embarrassed to show it, let alone take a screenshot!

See you on AJ and play wild 'n all that good stuff :P

- Pin

Monday, January 02, 2017

A Tour of Snowyclaw's "Hogwarts" Den

Hey dudes!
For the last little while, Snowyclaw's den has been locked, so only her buddies can access it. This made me wonder what huge project she had been working on. Well, recently, she has just unlocked the den, so I had to check it out!
Turns out, she was building a Hogwarts in her Gilbert Den, how cool :O
So here's a tour of the castle:



In the largest part of the den there are huge feast tables for each of the four houses


 At the front of the Great Hall is Dumbledore's podium, as well as a large feast table for the teachers. Throughout the great hall hang the banners of each of the houses as well.


Behind the kitchens sits the Hufflepuff common room.


Up in one of the "towers" is the Ravenclaw common room, which includes many books and a ton of blue... well, everything!

 In the other tower sits Gryffindor's common room (of course it's one of the largest ones). Snowyclaw even included some of Fred and George's fireworks in the corner! Can you find them?


She even included the flying car in the whomping willow!! The attention to detail in this den is really impressive.


 Off to the side of the den lies Hagrid's Cabin. It's rather small, but I think it's supposed to be far away :P


The forbidden forest is pretty chilly around this time of year, I guess!

The Slytherin common room has the largest amount of space by far. I boasts a warm fireplace, comfy chairs, and lots and lots of potion paraphernalia.


 The Slytherin common room is by far my favourite part of the den, even though I'm not a Slytherin (Ravenclaw all the way!)

Anyways, that was the Snowyclaw den tour, hope you enjoyed the post!
-Pinpun