Hey all.
So a couple of us have been testing out Discord and I think it better fits what we need.
We will be using Discord as our main source for instant communications and organisation. I will setup a group Skype channel later on for those who prefer Skype, but I encourage everyone to join the Discord server and use it when ever possible.
You can download Discord here: https://discordapp.com
It has a browser client, a desktop client and mobile app clients.
To join the Auscraft Discord server, use this link: https://discord.gg/0kLVIKttHT4ueJr2

Hello fellow Auscraftians,

Just a warning, this is going to be a long one.
As most of you have probably noticed, the server has become devoid of players. To give you some idea of how inactive the server has become, the last donation made to the server was in July. But money is not the issue here.
As I am now working full time, the staff and I were happy to fund the server from personal funds so long as people were playing on it. Now that there are no longer people playing on it, it is just wasted money.
I feel like many of you feel the same way as I do about Minecraft now, it has run its course and is no longer fun. I may be wrong in this respect, but that is the way I feel.
Having said that though, it was never about Minecraft for me. When I took over Auscraft 3 years ago, I agreed to run it not because I wanted to keep playing Minecraft, not because I wanted the power, but because I did not want to see the Auscraft community die.
So you've probably guessed what this message is about by now.
Yes, we are planning on shutting down the server in the very near future. We tried adding things to the server that we thought the players wanted, but that did not bring them back. We had intended to wait until 1.9 was released to see if interest picked up again, but with no estimate on how long that may be, and no indication that people would actually return, we've decided it's just not worth it.
However, from the ashes something new will arise.
As I said above, I didn't want to see the community die before, and I don't want to see it die now. You are all good people, and I would hate to see us all drift apart.
So I have been discussing with my fellow staff ideas on what we can do from here, and I gave them an idea I had recently.
We are thinking of transforming Auscraft from a Minecraft community, into a gaming community. A community focused on not just a single game, but on all games, with the intention of encouraging people to play together.
As some of you know, I'm a pretty heavy gamer. I often find it difficult to find people to play games with. Sure, I could join random people and play, but I feel like that is less fun than playing with people you know.
So the concept is to create a gaming community that makes it easier to play games with one another. Ideally we could implement some sort of system where someone from the community can create an event saying "I'd like to play this game on this day starting this time." and people could see that and join them.
Obviously a new name and some rebranding would be required, but I think it could work.
As community members, we are seeking your feedback on this. Would you like to be a part of something like this? Got any other ideas?

It will be sad to say goodbye to Auscraft, but hopefully we can create something even better from this.

Hey all!
So we've decided to try something new.
Greenlisted players now have access to a small creative world. You can get there using "/warp creative"
Same rules as the main world apply on the creative world. Be extra careful not to build too close to anyone else, as being creative, they will probably want to expand.
After consideration, we decided to go with a normal world as opposed to a flat world, should make for more interesting builds.
The world is 2000x2000 to start off with, if there's a good amount of interest, we will expand it further.
So got an epic build you want to build, but couldn't be bothered collecting the resources? Now you can build it!