Experience points. What are they? What do they mean? What purpose do they serve? Why have they corrupted this community? Those are a few questions that Io ve heard from others, and myself. Experience points are a type of point you gain them from getting views, diamonds, comments, etc on your submissions. They are used for leveling up. But they have corrupted the website we know as Planet Minecraft. People have grown hungry for these points, and for popularity. It has lead to stealing of popular submissions, spamming of submissions, low quality work, and just plain begging for diamonds. There are also some good things that have come from these points, but most of the outcomes have been bad.



People have gotten this thought in their heads that EXP is all that matters. They just want to be popular and be a high level. Some make multiple accounts, so they can diamond, view, comment and favorite their own submissions. Multi-accounting is against the rules, of course. So, thato s a rule broken already. They also beg for diamonds on their submissions, or run around the forums and chat asking people to give them diamonds. There is also another o techniqueo people use to get diamonds and subs. They ask people o diamond 4 diamond?o or o sub 4 sub?o . Now that is just stupid. Not only is it against the rules, it also makes you look desperate. Now, we cano t stop these things from happening, but the mods can ban the multi-accounters and also warn the o x 4 x?o people. I just dono t understand why people do this.


Every time I look around the skins section, I see low quality work. Actually, I dono t go in the skins section anymore, because the amount of low quality skins is astounding. People need to be creative with their skins and not make something that has been done twenty times. o Derivative work is basically taking a pre-existing idea or work and basing your work on it. For example: you take a character from a popular anime series and make a skin from it, basing its likeness and features to match the character as close as possible. The work itself is done from scratch, so originality applies. Legally it's still considered derived work.o (o Quoted from Dr Thresho s blog on originality) This shows exactly my point. You are being creative, but you are still making something that has been done twenty times. But there are also unoriginal skins like, o Block Mano . Just a skin with two colors, or o Cute Girlo , a girl skin that isno t special at all. If we created original characters, the skin section would also be more exciting. There is also shading too, but I wono t go into depth with that. Skins look nice with shading, and youo d get more views from it. Some of you who visit the chat regularly have probably seen me complaining about all the o How to skino blogs. That is just me being me, but they are actually very helpful, and show different shading techniques. Now we are getting a little off topic, but you get the idea, right? People upload low quality skins to get EXP easily.


Stealing has become a big o qualityo of the Planet Minecraft community. I cano t go five minutes without seeing something stolen. Whether ito s a skin, texturepack or mod. I always see the Honeydew skin, or LB Photo Realism, and even Too Many Items stolen every day. There is an easy way to get rid of them, that little red flag button under favorite on the submission. Of course, the mods wono t get it taken down right away, because they get about 800 reported submissions a day.o Being a Site Moderator is hard work, Sometimes we have to moderate submissions that can get up to nearly 800 a day in the reports.o (-Quoted from SoulStealero s blog on being a moderator). That just goes to show how much we break the rules and steal. That is just astounding, but again, you cano t prevent it. Only the mods can, if you flag submissions. People do stupid stuff for EXP.


Then youo ve got the spammers. They spam the same submission over and over again, or they abuse the update log on their submissions. These people just want the easy EXP from the views and submissions. I dono t know why youo d want to be famous for posting one thing over and over again? But I guess some people are just weird like that. Io ve reported one person who uploaded the same texturepack eight times! Ito s just unbelievable to see what people will do just for pointless EXP. Io ve also reported people who have abused the update log. They abuse it by updating it when they didno t update their submission, so it go to the recently updated list, then they get more views. You should all know what more views means by now, it means more EXP! Of course, like all the other things Io ve mentioned so far, spamming and abusing the update log is against the rules. And yes, the mods can take care of that too. People brake rules for EXP. Insane much?


Now youo re all probably wondering why Io m saying EXP is useless and pointless. It is virtual points that dono t do anything. Well, they do some things, like leveling you up when you reach a certain amount, but what do they help you gain in real life? They wono t buy you that new Xbox game you want, they wono t get that girl you like to notice you, they wono t help your sick grandmother get better, and they definitely wono t get you anywhere in life. EXP is useless, and why should it mean anything to you? I stopped caring about EXP long ago. Now please note this scale that I have created to show you how useless EXP is to you:






But Io m sort of contradicting myself, areno t I now? EXP isno t completely useless. Some people set goals with experience, and the creative ones become popular for good work. So, not everything that results from EXP is bad.


People love setting goals, and some of their goals are to reach a certain level. You can find peopleo s goals on their profile somewhere in their bio. Goals are a great idea, because when you achieve one it makes you happy. Some people have told me that it also boosts confidence. But, then again, some people break rules to get EXP to achieve their goals faster. But leto s not look at the bad side, and focus on the goods.


People also strive to get ranks. They really want one rank, so theyo ll try getting EXP to get to the level to unlock it. I was talking to one person in the chat, and they were wondering if there was a certain rank. I told them you had to get to whatever level it was to unlock it, so they made it their goal to get this rank. Also, ranks mean that levels areno t completely pointless, they are a type of award, I suppose.


You also become popular from a high level as well. Most of the high leveled people are that level because they do great work that gets recognized by many. I was discussing the whole advertising submissions thing with Leostereo one day, and we both advertise some of our submissions in chat. We both agreed to the fact that we advertise it because we want people to acknowledge our work, and we areno t in it for the EXP. I advertise my blogs because I want people to gain something from reading it, so that is why I only write a blog when ito s absolutely necessary.


There is one more topic that Io m going to touch up on, because I think ito s completely necessary in a blog about levels. I have seen many people ranting about how the higher levels treat the lower levels like dirt. Just because they are lower levels means that you can push them around. They may be newer members, or may not be as skilled as you, but they are human beings too. Io ve never actually witnessed a higher level being mean to some lower leveled person, but Io ve heard from people. So treat them with respect please.



EXP can be good, and bad. But ito s mainly bad. People break the rules just to get these virtual pointless points. But, there are good things too, like goals and such. Most people spend their time on trying to get easy EXP, when they could be making something amazing that gets them loads of EXP. But, EXP is pointless, and people need to get that thought in their heads.