Anjie B.

Gaia lost its way but started moving forward again.
I've been a member on Gaia since 2007. I've survived an unfair ban (never got an answer for why but I built a bridge), inflation, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, what not. I'll admit that for a few years Gaia went downhill. It almost caused me to quit and I had even started looking at other websites.
After the site was sold off (Lanzer leaving because the site wasn't making enough revenue), the members who decidedly stuck around found that they basically became cash cows. Cash sales and cash shop updates were shoved down the throats of every person who logged on. Every. Day. Without fail. Gaia changed with one wrong decision and things kept going downhill from there.
The forums turned into chaos. Outrage was unanimous with the community and things got so bad that some members even started threatening the lives of Gaia Staff, which is deplorable.
Not only that but the marketplace went bad too. Inflation is pretty terrible right now and it's very difficult to make gold. Unless you were already rich or buy gaia cash, which a lot of members aren't. It's still very difficult to make gold without buying gaia cash.
Staff did attempt to communicate with the community throughout all of this happening though. They held Ask The Staff, asked for feedback concerning different things. They also released a new game called Lake Kindred, which is essentially like Pokemon. Which you can play to earn money, it's also possible to earn money without spending Gaia Cash through that game. Which is what I personally use to make money.

Gaia did lose a lot of its members with the recent changes but those who stayed did get to see something good happen for once on Gaia. This past December, the Gaia community saw hope again. A light at the end of the tunnel. Lanzer returned to Gaia. And with his return, the management team who took over in 2014 left. There are still some things that need to be fixed but I'm confident that with Lanzer's return there will be progress.
This is enough for me to keep me going on this website.

"This is my family. I found it all on my own. It's little and broken, but still good. Yeah, still good."