Story About A Tree

Wow. When I read the story about a tree about that online gaming community it sounded JUST like my Neopets family! I immediately went to the guild and told my guildmates to google that article. It is not difficult for any of use to see how we really DO make this more than a game by the friendships we have formed. And because of the restrictions of the Neopets site (because it is geared towards kids and is therefore trying to be a safe environment) many of my guild memebers have exchanged MySpace addresses and we can share photos and our daily blogs there...we can also chat about more personal topics on MySpace than we could on Neopets like religion etc. However, our connections through MySpace have greatly enriched our guild! It really helps connect you with eachother when you can put a picture/face to a username. We know about eachother's families, jobs, hobbies, habits and more! YES, we DO talk about the game a lot, but that is not the biggest part of our guild. The biggest part of our community is sharing our daily lives with eachother and being there for eachother. For example, one of our members just got laid off yesterday! She was totally shocked and posted a simple message about it. Many members proceeded to not only post messages of encouragement and support to her on the guild board, but also sent her personal emails with encouragement and sent her gifts! (neo-gifts as in pixels that are only worth neopoints...but make a difference in the game). THIS is just ONE of many instances where we reached beyond the game to try and impact someone's real life in a real way! I was a very proud guild leader at that moment!