Hello everyone,
Now, I would be lying if I said I know what I'm doing. I don't. Prepare yourself a cup of coffee and an open mind before reading this. And please, for the love of God, READ ALL OF IT before commenting!

Considering this is my first article I should probably tell you about my Minecraft history. I first heard about Minecraft from a friend at school when I was 11. I originally thought it was a Runescape rip-off, but after looking into it it seemed interesting. I made an account then started playing Classic. My first server was one called something like OptiMine. With no idea what I was doing, I jumped straight into a huge multiplayer game. After some friendly help from fellow players, I joined the public build world. Two minutes later I was banned for griefing. After that I worked out how to place blocks as well as remove and spent most of my time on the Team9000 server.

I was satisfied with Classic for a while, until a friend showed me the full version of Minecraft. I played survival on his computer for about half an hour, and loved every moment of it. The first mob I killed was a chicken and the first item I got was seeds. As soon as I saw the survival aspects of the game, I knew I wanted to buy it.

On the 29th October 2011, my mum let me buy Minecraft Premium. After reading up on the Minecraft wiki for the best part of two hours, I was ready to take on Minecraft in it's full form.

My first survival server was Cole2sWorld server (still up, I believe). I joined MinecraftWiki and PlanetMinecraft under the username 'finalfantasy7fan' (I was 12 at the time, so that's why my IGN is so... Douchey). I took part in what was for the most part a creative, original and exciting community that was full of life and metaphorical tonnes of amazing original mods, texture packs and server games! I was very proud to tell everyone "I'm a member of the Minecraft community" - However, I never did it to the extent that I would loudly talk about it to everyone I know.

However, over the following two years, I watched what I loved fall into what seemed like an abyss. The game really started to take off - which I liked in the beginning. However, the huge influx of new young players began to take its toll on the community. This is where I begin to tackle the issue that the title suggests - deterioration.

Firstly, I saw the general appearance of Minecraft to a general (non-player) audience degrade. When I first joined the community, I aspired to be one of the great modders or skinners that people talked about on Minecraft Forum. When I thought "Minecraft", I thought "creative, inspirational, an awe". Now when I think of it, sadly I follow the stereotype and think "immature, unoriginal, almost a taboo subject". Now don't call me a hypocrite - I know there are young players of Minecraft who behave exactly as an active member of any community should (and good on you too), but with the mature young players came even more immature young players. I got a front row seat as the wonderful image of Minecraft was torn and vandalised until it was almost hard to look at without cringing (if you'll pardon the metaphor).

Secondly, I saw the Planet Minecraft community be brought down to a low level. Planet Minecraft was my #1 destination for finding new mods, skins, texture packs and more, with my #2 being copying the Yogscast. Sadly, now this is not the case. While I still do see original, creative content, it just seems to be low quality content or more of the same stuff, which is why I generally make my own skins now.

On the subject of Planet Minecraft, I have one word for you: BLOGS. I am unable to find a decent blog that I can sit down, read and think "yes, I agree with this and/or think this raises a good topic for discussion/debate". It is, again, more of the same. "How to become popular on PMC!", "Sexism/ageism/racism", and oh God, the RANTS. Don't get me started on the GODDAMN RANTS. These are really one of the things that irritates me the most. I see nothing but rants on Planet Minecraft. And the "popular blogs" are just filled with them. What I expected (and originally got from) blogs was well-informed, detailed opinions on a subject which was then open for discussion.

While this may seem hypocritical, I feel that I needed to put a point across - this is what's happening to the Minecraft community. Feel free to discuss and give feedback in the comments, I would greatly appreciate it. However, I do not appreciate single word comments such as "hypocrite" or "idiot", thank you.

Footnote: I do not mean to target any one person or group of people. Like I said earlier, young Minecraft players can be wonderful in the Minecraft community.