For some people, figuring out what they're going to be doing tomorrow is a difficult task. Nevermind next week, or next year, or the next decade. For some, 10 years may as well be a synonym for eternity. Consider what's happened in the last ten years of world history, and then the last ten years of your own history.

Provided you're not psychic, there's no way you'd know that the U.S. would lose 3,000 to terrorism and subsequently assassinate the mind behind it just under a decade later. You wouldn't have guessed the world would lose nearly 670,000 lives to major earthquakes, or close to 200,000 to other major cyclones and floods. We got a black president. Middle eastern countries fought for what they wanted.

Oh, and we found even more ways to kill each other on purpose.

Sometimes, though, the little things are actually the big things. Imagine how different the Mona Lisa would "feel" if she were wearing a wedding ring. Or how many days can be brightened with a simple "Hello, how are you?". How much a lamp in a dark corner of a room can make even a smaller room seem slightly larger. What a photo of your wife, or even your mother, kept in your wallet says about your values. How big a difference, when bringing someone over for the first time, having a stack of empty instant noodle cups on your desk makes on their impression of you as compared to if it weren't there.

Even still, people are too wrapped up in their little bubbles to care.

A decade ago, May 17th 2001, I was 14 years old. I was in grade 8.

4 months later, an event that would shape the next decade of North American mentality would occur.

A year after that, my then-best friend, Chrssy, would move away. This would create a ripple between us I was never able to repair.

Not long after this, I would lose touch with everyone I was friends with the previous 6 years. We'd drifted apart like two petals from a tree, not even 2 inches per second, for so long that we can't even see eachother on the ground anymore.

I'd make new friends. My new best friend would eventually move to America, join the American military, and be dispatched to Afghanistan. I'd live with one of them for 6 of the 10 years.

A forum would enter my life that I just can't seem to stop going to despite my extremely tenuous connection to it. I'd be in power at it for 6 of those years.

My mom would kick me out of the house at 17. She'd later move away and marry.

I'd meet a Japanese girl and act the big brother I never could be for my sister. For 7 years. I never would have imagined this would completely alter the course of my life one day.

I'd live with my dad. He'd throw away his life's work and declare bankruptcy. He'd come out as a chronic speed user. He'd be part of a $2,000,000 drug bust and enter witness protection.

A graveyard worker at a cornerstore would keep me from falling off my own track for 6 years. He'd marry and buy a home.

A girl I fell in love with would move abroad. I'd later become friends with the guy she left me for. She'd intermittently be homeless.

I'd be held at gunpoint as two drug chasers search my house for $5,000 of cocaine that the police would later find next door.

I'd start learning Japanese. And Korean. And Mandarin. I'd start teaching English to ESL students as volunteer work.

A hospital would somehow end up with me on its payroll.

A friend would tell me he's positive I'll be wed before I'm 30. He'd have no idea when he said this that I've been considering proposing to someone.

I have a fish. He has no idea when his next meal will be. Not long ago, he was in a tube in a pet store. Now he swims with bamboo. He may not have a memory that lasts longer than a few seconds, but even so - he had no idea that his home would eventually become significantly larger and comfier and not even by his own doing. The actions of others completely defined the entire outcome of his story. From some random person deciding to buy him at a pet store, to the employee that put his tube where it would eventually catch the purchaser's attention, to the store owner that bought the whole batch of fish, the breeder that raised him: it all adds up.

Ten years ago, I was that fish. Everything that would happen in the next ten years would slowly and surely, inches per second, move me toward what would eventually become my present tense. I find it slightly more difficult as each day passes to have the conviction to say I had any conscious say in getting to where I am now.

And there are at least 6.5 billion different variations of the last 10 years, plus one that takes all 6.5 billion as statistics: we call it world history.

For everybody here, though, it's a little different. We all have at least one thing in common: we're members of this site. For whatever reason, whether its RPG Maker itself or connection to another member who was here before, we're here. During another episode of Magpathy.

This site also has a rather long history - in 8 months the Mag will become a decade old. It has had over 600 members, some stay but most go. It has gone through periods of activity and periods of paralyzing disinterest. Our members have met in person several times. Even so, with the last meeting so shortly behind us, I have to start to consider.. it's merely a shadow of what it once was.

6 years ago, most of the significant friends in my life posted here. One who wasn't would eventually become a friend. We'd sit around spending day after day posting on these boards because, back then, we were but fish. The next day was too much to ask for. For better or worse, this forum was the common thread that tied us together.

Now, though, the Mag feels like any other group gathering under a single interest. It's hard to keep an entire group of people tied together as friends all on the same level with only one or two interests - this is how cliques form. It's not always based on something superficial, but possibly even more strongly on how close people are with the other people. Divisions go further and further until suddenly you've arrived at the relationship of best friend to best friend. For each of us, not just the last decade but the entirety of our past has a hand in determining how we got to where we are and to the people we talk to - and will continue to be the wheel to your car.

Alas, I honestly feel the Mag as a community is in danger of dying. That's not to say we're all going to go our separate ways, as I'm sure by now those of us that developed stronger friendships with others here will continue to talk with those they have been outside of here. All that means is that this particular common thread isn't quite so strong a bond anymore. There's been no new blood to keep the vampire that is entertainment strong, and as such the cliques that have developed between us all will continue to get farther and farther apart. The effects of this are being seen right now: another episode of Magpathy. Posting is seeing a huge lull in lieu of people conversing with the people they think will be interested directly, rather than addressing in the public domain. A true sign that we, as falling leaves, are drifting apart. Another day, another few inches.

How many more will it take before a gust of wind blows us back into the same direction again? Or, how long will the air stay stagnant as we drift further and further apart until these 10 years as a community become history?

I've done my best since January of 2010 to promote activity among members, particularly those capable of normal interaction, and still activity continues to drop. There is little more that I can do, and soon I may stop trying to be the gust of wind that pushes us all in the same direction.

I wonder; How has the last decade shaped all of you? Do you still see only the next day? Do you look into the next decade? Where do the little things, such as a forum, come in? Do you blame everyone else for its death?

Blame has no place. Inches are turning into miles, and in ten years you may be speaking of this place the same way I am now:

In 2021:

There was a group of people I was friends with at the beginning of this decade. We drifted apart, inches per second, until we couldn't see eachother on the ground anymore.

[...]

Don't let history write itself.

Wow, a lot of things can indeed happen in a decade. 10 years ago, I was a college student who felt very alone and was struggling to find his identity. Now... well, a lot of things happened, with me loosing pretty much all the friends I made over the years in a single swoop, and feeling lonely once again.

I find the relationship some of you have enviable. I was never able to form strong bonds with anyone online. During these episodes of "magpathy", at least some of you still have each other. But that is not the case for me. Many times I've wondered if perhaps I should just stop posting here, but I don't think I can. I mean, currently, I feel more at home with the blogging community on GameTrailers, but still the mag is special to me. I can't explain why.
So... yeah.

Quite drastically, and yet barely at all.

a great deal has happened to me in the last decade but i guess thats bound to happen when its about a third of your life that has passed. so much of my adult life has been about learning that things are not black and white and what you thought in your childhood is far from the perfect reality they teach you in school. life is a much greater challenge then i ever thought.

Being a newcomer, I'm not particularly close to anyone here. Nor am I the type of person to get close to anyone, no matter the circumstance. I scarcely consider myself close to any of my family members, for that matter.

I'm also not quite sure that I am the target audience for this open letter.

That said, I'm not sure why I stick around here. Basically this place is the only kind of social interaction I get, such as it is. I think the Mag satisfies an itch I have, for whatever reason. When I first came here I was rather struck by how decent people are here. My past experiences interacting with others was never quite so... civil. So that's probably why I stuck around (well, minus my three or four month absence).

I wanted to contribute, to help this community stay alive, and Kupid (as well as all those other half-started never finished projects) was my way of doing that. But when I first came here, I was really a different person, with a different life. A lot has changed since then.

A bit more than a year ago, when I first came here, I was an utterly unhappy college student with a lousy job, who felt like he wouldn't ever have any kind of a future. I couldn't see how I would ever be happy and I was sinking in a pile of debt and loneliness.

When I came here, I started all these projects thinking that they would fill some void in my life - that creating these things would somehow make me happy, and that it was my best shot, at least in the short term.

But then, out of nowhere, I got a great job opportunity from a friend. It speaks a lot about me that I thought I'd find what I was looking for by looking within myself, and working on a bunch of projects, rather than looking to the one friend I actually had. This job changed everything for me.

I was finally doing fulfilling, challenging, work that I am passionate about and getting paid well enough that I could drop out of college and pay off my debt. Now I'm working, whittling down that debt, and looking for my own place - planning to move away from home and build my own life.

I feel really bad about not continuing work on all those other projects. I started them because, at the time, I needed something. But now I'm finding that something in my work and don't have time to continue them. I really want to make the translation of RPGT4 happen, if only as an apology to this community for not doing all the other things I said I would.

With all the things happening and changing in my life now, it's certainly scary in a lot of ways, stressful at times, and I can't say that I have any better an idea of what the future hold for me than I did ten years ago, but I've never been happier.

I think of the Mag as kind of a stepping stone for me. It helped me to kind of figure out who I am, and what I really want. Even if I later find out that those things are quite a lot different from what I think they are now, I feel for the first time in my life that I'm in a good place to respond to those changes. At least in a better place than I was before.

I expect to stick around here as long as the Mag continues to exist. Even if all I'm doing is visiting once a day to see that there are 0 new posts.

But before this begins to feel too much like an obituary for the Mag - as long as Ix gets V6 implemented, there may still be some life here yet. And I will do my best to get the translation of RPGT 4 completed (eventually...).

There was a huge upsurge in activity here and at the Pav when my Kupid project was in full gear. Maybe the translation effort, when it gets started proper, will have a similar effect. Or maybe not.

Maybe there will be a new RPGM released someday and the Mag will rise again.

Whether or not all of you are here if and when that happens, or if the Mag even exists at that point, who knows.

I have said many times that I would be the last person to leave the Mag. Now, that might not mean I'll be the person actually RUNNING the site, but I can't think of leaving all the history and people behind me.

@Nex, you shouldn't stop posting here. There. I said it. You bring a unique flavor to your posts that I would miss.

@all, please don't give up hope that nothing's gonna change. I promise you that you'll be seeing the next version of the Mag before our 10th birthday. In fact, the progress I've been making on the design is going pretty well. I won't say when because that's a recipe for having to delay it. However, I'm really taking my time and planning/drawing out each page before I start coding this time. It's gonna make the entire process much easier to finish.

Lately, I've had a rather hard time noticing drop in forum posting. There seems to always be at least someone posting in their studio at least. But that's not really why. It's because I talk a good deal with some of the members outside of the forum. I have a good few of you on Gmail or AIM. I have spent many many hours on Live playing games and having a great time (and 1ce has jumped in on a few games, which is awesome. The more the merrier). And there's always meeting in person (not only our yearly trips, but those I can get to swing by... like ShadowFox or other members I've known outside the Mag like Kajak and SK).

But I have noticed that I've been relying on these methods more than I have really posting in the threads or hanging out in the Magchat. And, as far as what I can do, I will make more of an effort to be specifically here. I know that isn't really much, but I do value this site and these forums a great deal. I've been part of many forums over my time on the net... and I eventually have left every single one. But not here.

The problem with these droughts of no activity is that there is no answer for one person. If you were to come to me as HoF and ask me, "Well HoF, what do we do now?" I'd only be able to shrug my shoulders and just mention that we can hope for the best. I could encourage (or straight up ask) people to post more frequently, or to share things here that they normally would have just decided not to because no one would really find it that interesting. But that's not going to stir genuine interest in the forums, I don't believe.

If I had to settle on any one thing, I think one thing that would get blood flowing is if we all had something to get behind and push. Something to generate real effort. Something like Thutmose's project to translate RT4. We'd have a (technically) new maker to use, and it wouldn't be one given to us... it would be one we all had worked extremely hard to get.

Also, there's the team contest we're running. It's really slow getting off... but I really would like to get as many people on board for that as possible. And these are two forum based activities that I believe could get us out of these kinds of ruts. Aside from this, I don't really know what else to do. But I can confidently say that as long as the Mag is being hosted on the internet, I'll be here.

I'm trying to get the translation to a place where it isn't so dependent on just me.

My main concern is that the work of translating the game isn't fun or glamorous (most people wouldn't think of it that way). It is mainly going through lines and lines of text, submitting ideas, tagging them, taking screen-shots, and debugging (once we get to that point). Lots of tedious, monotonous work. I've done a fair chunk of that, but I can only hope that other people are going to be willing to participate and will do what needs to be done, even though it's not the most fun thing in the world.

Once I get the system online, though, it will have a life of its own. I don't need to sit there all the time and look at everything all at once or micromanage it. As long as people are using it, the system will be alive. Even if I disappear for a week or a month, it will still be there storing all that data, making it available to anyone who wants it.

I want the project to succeed. But I've got to get it off the ground first.

I'm going to try as hard as I can to get this to work.

I hope I didn't come off as trying to put pressure on you, Mose. I know you are driving the bus on this one, and it would be selfish of me to push you to do this, specially if you are busy with mandatory things. I just wanted to mention that it should be something we could all come together as a community to work on.

No, it's fine.

I work best under pressure anyway.

The last thing I need is to become complacent.

I'll try to be here more often as well. Apologies for my inactivity.

Ix is right in what he says, Guar. Even if you, as you appear to be saying, don't always feel a sense of belonging (for lack of a better term) here, or even feel more comfortable with an entirely separate internet community, I don't think there is anyone here at all who would wish to see you stop being a part of the Mag, no matter how small the part may seem to you.

Stythe, it was actually quite interesting to get a brief glimpse of many of the events in your past ten years of life that you felt to were important enough to mention in your post. I cannot think of any other way to respond here other than to tell you that it appears to me you are the kind of person to ponder and reflect quite a bit, and you are much more adept than I am at articulating all of the things that go through your mind and heart to everyone else here. That is always a good thing.

Sorry if I sounded gloomy... I'll be trying to be more involved in the mag's stuff.