So I was talking to a friend on here the other day and I brought up the elephant in the room (if anybody doesn't know what that means, let me know and I'll explain): the instability of internet friendships.

You know, how you can become best friends with someone online and have what feels like an unbreakable bond that could NEVER end, then one day you login or email them and they're gone. Quite often there's no warning, they just disappear, leaving a hole in your heart until you finally just move on and try to make new friends and fill that void. This can happen in real life friendships as well, but internet friendships are much more notorious for it. There's usually no closure for them.


And the reason it's the elephant in the room here is because, while we say this is a game community, it's actually more of a friendship community. Vizzed is just about a bunch of friends hanging out really, and as such it's hard to face the facts that eventually probably every one of us will just fade away from existence here. It happens all the time, and with members who have vowed to never leave the site. That's just life, and that's just internet relationships. It's happened to me with four friends on here, though two are still technically around, it's just a very rare treat to see them online at all. The other two are GenesisJunkie and GuardianZack. These two will never be replaced for me. It's also happened with at least four others (and a few more, but four that I actually missed. Lol) that aren't on Vizzed. Most of them just flat out disappeared one day for apparently no reason. For the heck of it I'll list their names or aliases here: Jeddin/Killz, Jackie, Azrael, and Princess. I miss all of them, some more intensely than others, and I've even discussed Princess on here before. But enough of that.


The point of this thread is two fold: first to say "I know it'll happen some day, but I plan to enjoy our friendship like it's never going to end. And when one of us does drop off of the face of the web one day, I hope you remember me, because I'll never forget you." to a select few who I won't reveal here. They'll know who they are though.

The second point is to ask: have any of you experienced this with an online friendship before? If so, was it on here?

Oh and also, to the Vizzed community as a whole: thanks for being cool guys. I love you all.

Despite everything I'm still waiting for EideticMemory to come back

EideticMemory : Oh you

It's not big deal if he doesn't come back I guess but yeah it's something that would be cool
Otherwise no not really, though I imagine I've done it to a few people myself. EM's disappearance didn't bother me emotionally but it's quite the mystery and I'm definitely interested in figuring him out. I already found the hidden poem in his bio and I've looked through records looking for his real location. I've also talked to some of his IRL friends and they say he's in college and fine so he'll probably be back, might rereg or something but he'll be back

If he does rereg though I'm keeping quiet about it so he'll stay

Yep, this has happened to me before, but it has yet to happen in Vizzed. My only problem is that it was ME disappearing.

I've talked a few times about my disease. When I was still piecing back my life, I used to be in some online games and sites. I made a few friends here and there, but one stands out from the rest: Dragonmaster (the alias he used when we met). We grew close, even playing a few online games together beyond the one we met in, and he even made me a mod of the community he created shortly after.

However, due to my life conditions, I was doing and undoing things everytime, and one day, not before trying to bring some activity to his site, I disappeared. I don't remember why, but it could be the depression of dealing with my disease. I don't even remember the name of the site, so I don't even know if it's still out there, nor have I met him anytime after.

I wish I could see him again, really. Now that I've grown past my disease and my life is going steadily uphill again, I'd like to at least apologize if I could.

I have learned my lesson, though, and I won't let that happen again. Now I overly treasure each and all of my friends, be it in real life or internet, so if I'm ever leaving or becoming inactive those who I consider important or would care of my whereabouts will know. I feel like what I did was horrible, and I'll have to carry that weight on my shoulders forever more, so I don't want to add even more weight.

I had a good online friend met him before the Nintendo removes games happened. We had great chats while playing Pokémon mystery dungeon red rescue team then when the Nintendo issue happened he stopped going online. He hasn't being on since.

Well this got replies much faster than I expected.

yoshirulez! : I actually had him on my mind while writing this. I didn't know him well enough to say anything about him, but I fully expected him to cross some people's minds when they saw this thread. He was super active and then just one day *poof*. Weird how that happened. I was concerned because he seemed to leave in a hurry and I wondered what was wrong.


EX Palen : See I left the game that four of those people I listed were on, but I tried keeping in touch otherwise. Still nothing. Also one of them left first, but eh. Point is we tried to take precautions to stay in touch (or some of us did) but it just didn't happen. Sometimes it's frustrating because it seems people don't care enough to try, but other times I realize it's just life man.

Sorry to hear you lost contact too. That really stinks. Your post makes me wonder if that could be what happened with my lost friends to some extent. Actually I suspect it IS what happened with one of them. Demotivated by depression and just quit caring about anything.

But hey, it's good to know you don't plan on dropping off on us without a warning and contact info. I hope I make that notification list.


BolterX : Ah sorry to hear that, man. It really stinks when friends disappear like that. It leaves you wondering what happened or why no warning was given at least. Idk. Life's crazy.

I have lost a few friends on here. Some I've forged lifelong bonds with, others I've had rough falling-outs with. Some of them disappeared without a word, others managed to REALLY make me mad, others just suddenly decided to hate me forever. But the best thing is to focus on the friends you do have, and not let any wounds from past friends hurt you anymore.

Yeah actually, just like you I experienced that with GenesisJunkie. I used to message him back and forth everyday actually and he would participate in my role plays that I used to do. He was probably my best friend on vizzed here at that time. One day he just didn't message me back and hasn't been active since. You can't really help but wonder what happened, right?

I actually have his personal email but I feel as though it wouldn't be appropriate to use it XD

I know there has been a couple other instances too but I can't really remember them all that well.

BluemageKyle : I used to talk to you on and off. Not quite sure what happened to you but I think I've seen you post a couple months ago maybe. Could be wrong. Would be nice to talk again XD

A user of this : True. That's a lesson I only learned over the past few years too man, just appreciate what you have now, live in the here and now, the past is over and done. Another thing I've noticed with life is that the "meh" of now always looks wonderful in hind sight, so I try to recognize the greatness of each moment as it's happening.


MoblinGardens : Yeah, I more or less met you through him actually as I recall, well that and role plays. You two would always jump in on my role plays and I think I joined one of yours and I know I joined one he made (which was really good too). I miss those days because not only were you guys both around and involved in my RPs, but there was almost always a good RP going. Now it's rare unfortunately. We need to change that.

And I wonder what happened to him. I kind of knew what happened the first time, but he came back afterward, actually I think it was sometime last year that he came back (not sure if you knew it or not, but you probably did since like me you PM'd him all the time). When he left that time it was all at once. So weird. I guess I secretly hope he comes back again one day. Lol Can't hurt to hope, right?

And same here! I have thought several times about emailing but I just feel like I should back off and leave it be. I doubt he'd mind but it feels weird since we never emailed just for communication purposes before. If you ever do get an email or anything from him, let me know how he is.

Eirinn : First, on a side note, definitely1! Maybe I'll think about getting a new RP going if there would be enough interest in one That would be insanely awesome.

And yes, I knew about him leaving the first time and when he came back we started talking through PM again like nothing happened, resumed our last conversation from where it left off and then he vanished completely sometime after that (I don't remember exactly when, it's been a little while). I could probably make a guess about why he left or went AWOL but I won't post it. I could be completely wrong though. He could have just left the site.

I also feel the same about the email thing. Like you said, I'm sure he wouldn't mind (If it's still his email that is) but I just feel weird about it as we only used it for sharing MP3 files and stuff. Never for regular communication. And I would definitely let you know if he ended up contacting me or something.

GenesisJunkie : Summoning you just for fun!

Anyways, sorry for the sandwich post XD

Well, in terms of losing a good friend due to them disappearing, that's only happened twice to me, which is two times more than I would like. One was an RGR friend named TatacoolThreat. We haven't talked in almost a year, and it's a shame since we were pretty good friends. The other was a pretty well known board user called 0ddie, who left the site about 7 months ago, and has only logged in 1 or 2 times since. 

I have had a few fights with friends on here, but we've almost always resolved it. The one that comes to mind first, was a prominent user who was my best friend on the site for several months, although we had a bunch of mini-fights like every other day, lol. We had a big fallout 2 months ago and were on bad terms for a while, but now we're talking again, albeit not nearly as much as we used to before. I feel bad, since some of it was my fault, and it'd be nice if we could be good friends again some time. 

I have lost contact with some of my friends and we're not as good friends as we used to be, but hopefully that will change soon. 

I hope I wasn't part of what instigated this thread, and part of me feels like I'm a bit conceited if I think it is. LOL I wish I could be online more. I don't have friends in real life, so the users here make up the best connections I have. I don't know why, but life just tends to get so busy for me. I always intend to stick around and have a good time and hold great conversations and build relationships. Then stuff happens and I just stop coming around due to being overwhelmed. I've always considered myself great at time management, but I have begun to doubt this. I'm pretty sure that if I was as good at time management as I like to think, I wouldn't get so busy and have a hard time coming around. Just as an example, I have a side email that I use to write an online friend in Finland. I was doing a pretty good job of writing her regularly and then haven't even checked the email for two and a half months. It's not that I intended to ignore her, but I got so busy that I found it difficult to keep up with my online friendships. I think a lot of people assume that I forget about them during these periods of inactivity, but nothing could be further from the truth. I thought about the friend in Finland quite often and felt guilty will my lack of attention to her. I even feel the same about many vizzed users. I miss them and I feel terrible that our friendships have been diminished by my inactivity. When I first visited back a week ago, I noticed that many people have removed me from their friends list. It made me sad, but I can't blame those people. I can't expect a relationship to stay the same when I'm not here to maintain it. I wish they would stay the same but it's not fair to those people iv left behind. It probably also doesn't help that I sold my laptop, but it's not much of an excuse. I hope I didn't make very many people feel forgotten or unimportant to me. I'd feel terrible if I made anyone feel that way. I constantly want to re-establish my friendships here, but I feel spread so thin. Life is getting better for me in the real world despite being busy, but my only friends are here and I should make more time for them. To anyone who I made the important or unimportant, I am deeply sorry. From the bottom of my heart. I miss being here. I miss seeing and interacting with all the great users. Nothing makes me happier online than when someone here tells me how they've been, stops by my page to say hello, or trusts me with a personal conversation. I value vizzed and its users more than I can explain. Even those I sparingly talk with when I'm here. I just love them (you all) so much.

Whoops!

Yes I have *frowns* I'm not talking about people who just leave the site, I am talking about someone who died that's called losing a friend. Its a touchy subject I rather not talk about. Not unless you want too it will have to be in pm eirinn, but I do have to warn you if you do want to know, it will be a very long story behind the death.

Eirinn : throughout the five years that I have been on Viz I have lost 4 online friends however it,s understandable that sometimes people have to leave due to personnel reasons but I still keep their names on my friend,s list just in case someday they happen to come back

Tons of times. Sometimes I leave for just two minutes and when I come back they are nowhere to be found for weeks. lol

Ive lost bunch of friends, people left, people did dumb stuff, i just blantatly said I hated them, whatever the reason, tons of them are gone.

Many times, but that's just life. Sometimes I think some nice person I met in internet but cant remember his/her account or they no longer use that site so, it's hard to find them anymore if you want to catch up with them.

RDay13 : Yeah man I've lost a few because of bad calls that I made, so I know how that feels. Good to hear you and that person made up. Here's to hoping it'll go back like it was before some time.


Singelli : Late reply, but I'm good at those. Nah, you weren't the reason you conceited person you. Lol jk Honestly I've just lost a seemingly abnormally large amount of friends online over the few years I've actually been doing things online. Most of them were never on here to my knowledge, but a few were.


Eniitan : Well now that reply makes me feel really bad for neglecting to reply to this thread for so long. I'm sorry. I wouldn't want to make you feel compelled to talk about something painful, but at the same time I'm always here if you feel like you want to discuss it.


no8120 : Yeah life happens man, and I think that's a big problem for a lot of people: life goes on and we try to make it freeze in place, but life is meant to be lived. We have to let things go when it's time for them to. It's all about enjoying the here and now while it's here now. Once it's gone you can always remember it, but don't be stuck in it or try to force it back because that will never happen. I like your outlook on it.


zanderlex : Well while it's never a good idea to proclaim to someone that you hate them, it's like I said to no: life just keeps going on and that includes them leaving. Stinks though. Sorry to hear you've lost your fair share of people too man.


Cactuar : Indeed, that's just life. As for the comment about forgetting their username or they leave a site or something, that reminds me of a friend I tried to get in contact with again once: I sent a message and they never replied. Years later I randomly logged back in and they'd messaged me, so I replied and again they were gone. I want to say that happened again, but I'm not sure. Either way we kept reaching out just a little too late and never did make contact again. Crazy.

Eirinn : Well honestly there have been times where just saying I hate them have been even the right of right thing to do. In those cases, its one of the those people who just be don't know about things like what you do or how you live and always try to take advantage of that, without stopping to think that I can't be a part of whatever they want. Which ends up starting stuff and I'm the end I had to do it. Luckily that hasn't happened in years.

Oh definitely. I have lost online friends from this site and on deviantART too. I have three cases of losing an online friend: they stop showing off, I have falling out with them, or they passed away.

In the first case, when I first came to this site, I befriended another user who I really enjoyed talking too. Then one day, she stopped coming to the site. It's been 3 years now, but I still miss her.

In the second case, I had a falling out with someone on this site, and they stopped coming around the same time we stopped being friends. This issue is actually more complicated than it is, but I'll leave it at that.

At the last case, I was friends with this woman on deviantART, and we always copied each other's journals and said nice things to make ourselves feel better. One day, she made a journal saying she was going to travel to meet with relatives. The next day, her cousin went on her account to announce that during her travel, she got caught in an accident... she didn't make it.

While it's hard for me to remember the details this has happened a lot to me. I used to be very deep into some mmos like Runescape, Mabinogi, FlyFF, AQ Worlds, Canaan (which doesn't even exist anymore) the list goes on. During the course of playing those games I usually didn't make a ton of friends, but the ones I did make I often became pretty close with. However almost none lasted after I burned out on the game since we usually didn't get far enough to where we made friends off site. Understandably since a large part of the reason I played them at first was because I felt lonely and it was about the only way that was easy for me to make new friends through. This is in most cases several years back so it's hard for me to remember names or what exactly we talked about.

One I can remember is when I played mabinogi and met this one girl, who was a few years older than me. She helped me get acquainted with the game. This was a more recent one but it still happened a few years back. I forget her username. We used to just mess around, go do dungeons with her friends (usually I'd mostly sit back being low level lol) or role play (game had a pretty big role playing community) or do activities like fishing in the game while talking. It was a lot of fun and it even turned out we both lived in Sweden though different cities (originally from the US but had a Swedish BF and could speak Swedish pretty well). So we started talking about lot of things. We didn't get extremely close, but fairly close to the point where I considered her a loyal friend and we sort of started having a brother/sister relationship.

In the end I was the one who walked out on her. I simply lost interest in the game and found little reason to return aside from talking with her. I think that was helped by me having my national exams so I didn't have a ton of time to come on either, in that sense other stuff happened in my life that made me stop thinkign about it. When I eventually wanted to return to play the game again I was having problems with it getting to run so it never happened, and by this point I'd also long forgotten what email and password I used for my account.

I think I have her added on skype still but haven't talked to her in a long amount of time. Not sure if she even remembers me or how she would react if I tried starting a conversation with her now.

Another example I remember was from playing another game called Ourworld. Which wasn't really an MMO oddly enough more like a chatting virtual life game if that makes any sense. Similar to Habbo if anyone has played that but with graphics closer to that of aq worlds. In any case I usually went around there chatting to people. Like the odd, naive person I was. I didn't really realize at the time that the reason a lot of people played was for online dating. But I kept playing and eventually made some friends, I met these two female players and became friends with them a bit after starting. I forgot how it happened or when but we started hanging out and talking. Eventually one of them became a bit inactive and I didn't talk to her much, but I kept talking with the other who was also relatively new to the game. We didn't talk extremely often but when we did we sometimes talked for hours about stuff like anime, video games or just life.

It kind of just ended as I realised the true nature of the game and lost interest since I didn't have any reason to go there aside from talking to her. She became more and more inactive as well so it was rare for me to catch her online. The one thing I remember about her from the last conversation we had was that she was moving to Italy, not sure if that caused her to go inactive or she was just never on when I was.

I'm sure there are many more friendships I had that ended in these games, these are just two that I remember from the top of my head. Probably because they were some of the ones that happened later on when I was big on online gaming. Many are too far back for me to really remember much of anything. None of those friendships were really as close as the ones I made on vizzed though, usually only lasting for maybe a month or two at most. I have some friendships here that I've had for years now so it's safe to say that it's had a much more lasting impact, and while there's likely going to be a day I become inactive I don't think it will be any time soon or that I'll disappear without a trace.