bebetoo, I'm not going to say much, but I do wish to address a few points. Perhaps I jumped to conclusions, but when reading the words " socio-academically-pc unsavvy challenged donators" it sounds like you're calling them stupid. Unsavvy is another term for inexperience, which is a synonym of ignorant...one of the words I chose to use in my post. I was merely pointing out the fact some people do not know how to extensively use google, or where to even look in order to find out how to improve lag on a server. I know I personally know nothing about what it takes to run a server (as I stated above). Does that mean my opinion is any less than that of someone who does? I've been here (and for the most part active) for two years. I would like to think if I had a question about the lag, if I wished to discuss it just because I don't know how to make it completely better doesn't mean my concerns wouldn't be appreciated. Granted, sometimes its gone about the wrong way. Sometimes out of frustration members lash out a bit. This does not mean they are bad people, or bad donators merely that they love this server enough they want it to work. If they didn't well hell, they could just move on to one of the other servers on all of the vote pages where they select Minetown instead of anyone else.
I did not mean any of that part as an attack on you, sadly you were the staff on the last page that posted something that I found to be unprofessional. I could have posted from other people as well but I didn't want to go back two other pages and look for it. You're staff, if you volunteer or not you chose to be staff. Sawine did not come up to you and say "Bebetoo you are staff whether you like it or not! BAM!" If he did you could merely chose not to play if you didn't want what comes with being a staff member. Perhaps it is because I am an adult but I expect staff to act with a degree of professionalism. Yes, you donate your time graciously to the server. I think most of you are awesome and wish nothing but good things for taking on such a daunting task. I know other, smaller, crappier servers that have to pay their admins to keep their site running. Its great that Minetown can be what it is and allow our donations to go straight to the server and keeping it up/making it better.
I did offer a solution, perhaps not to the lag problem...I have no knowledge in mods and add ons and whatnot. My brain is too filled with dead bodies and forensics to allow any sort of minor information (a game as simple as minecraft) to become an obsession at this time. Perhaps a sticky for lag questions/options? One the moderators could look at, see people posting recommendations and address? It could go in the Support tab as thats where I see most of these lag complaint threads. That way moderators who can't really touch down on what is being done can redirect players to that thread. It could be as simple as once a month someone taking the time to say "Hey guys, we know there is lag and we're working on it, contacted Susie Q about the server hosting. We're still not getting anywhere with them but we're still trying" or "Sort-it-out mod is still giving us a bit of a lag issue...we're trying to fix it up"
Some of the players do coding, some of them are IT professionals, some are moderators, admins or even hosts of their own smaller servers. Perhaps they've bitten off too much in the real world to apply to be staff on such a big, busy server. That doesn't mean they wouldn't want to help if there was an issue they knew they could fix.
Your analogy is not the best...but I guess it explains the point. I would like to stress the following about your analogy. At least in the military, if there were to be a train wreck with mass casualties to the point people are running around chaotically things wouldn't go perfectly. In fact, the doctors (Server owners) would triage the patients(updates, new plug ins) and figure out which level of severity their injuries (Iag) they are suffering from. (For this amount of lag I'm going to assume this is a mass casualty exercise, where the train was a passenger train and there are wounded bodies everywhere). Seeing as there are so many patients the doctors would not be the only ones handling the issues, they'd have nurses and Medics (whoever else can help with add ons/mods) to help triage. Sadly, in a mass casualty some patients don't make it. Those with severe, life threatening injuries that wouldn't make it back to the hospital without dying aren't helped...at least not medically. They're given morphine, helped to be as comfortable as possible and allowed to pass away.
As for spectators, well the police (moderators and Admins unable to help with the addons/mods/lag issues) would create a barrier (perhaps a forum post sticky) or use their magical yellow tape to keep the patients from the doctors and nurses. Granted, sometimes the spectators can get rowdy and force has to be used to keep them at bay. Most of the time they are sent home. Then the news casters on the local news (perhaps Forum Moderators? Or any kind moderator or admin who has the time to do so) get on the tele and explain all the facts they've found out about the crash (Perhaps a forum sticky (as mentioned above) about the issues with lag and just a minor update on whats going on). The Spectators won't like it when they find out patients died. Some of them may be sad, but in the end you can't save them all.
Enough of the analogy though, I think I've covered all I want to say with it. That was also my last bit actually directed at Bebetoo, the rest is just hitting what else I've read in the forum/engaging in conversation. In a forum that people can start flame wars over the smallest thing, of course lag can cause great controversy. That is why we have forum moderators. You could set up rules on what to post on it. Perhaps "Its laggin so bad" would not be allowed but constructive things like "Hey, does the server use spigot or (made up mind you) Lesslagablock?" That way people can see what the server is running, what the issues are and better help create a solution for the server. Also, if a moderator or admin were to say "We're having problems re-coding such and such add on to play cooperatively with this add on" maybe one of those code savvy players would be more than willing to give a crack at it pro-bono to help their favorite server. Those who do not post constructively in the thread (or at least think they're being constructive (IE: I've noticed when I break cobble it lags forever with a cobble pick axes but my eff 3 unbreak 3 pick cuts through easily)) would receive in game jail time for breaking the rule. Granted it wouldn't start out as a very long punishment, but with each wrong post their jail time would increase?
A common consensus with the members is that we have no idea whats going on, we're left in the dark and told "its being worked on." We were told that back in classic and we're still told that even now. In the two years I've been playing that has always been the answer. Sometimes people get a bit restless after hearing the same answer over and over again. We put in time on our builds, make friends in the game and we don't want to risk losing them because we can't all log on and play together. I can't count the number of people I've brought to this server to play that have left for other places because of the lag issues.
Although EMT is wrong about the whole donators being a paying customer the server does indeed need us players in order to remain on top. Back when we lost a lot of players at the crash of classic voting went down, in fact they beefed up what you get from voting so people would do it more. Its still a customer service issue, even if we're not paying for a product. I worked in a lab drawing patients blood for testing. They did not pay me for the phlebotomy procedure, they did not even tip me if I did a good job. I still had to be professional and polite/courteous with the patients. I couldn't sit there in pajamas, blowing bubbles with bubble gum and putting dirt covered hands all over the patients. I couldn't tell them they were stupid because they thought the needle hurt or tell them I know how to do my job so just keep your mouth shut while I stab you with a needle. If I did that I would be fired. If a patient was scared of the needle I couldn't just jab it in their arm, I had to calm them, assure them everything would be fine and only when they were settled down could I perform the phlebotomy.
Its my personal opinion that although a sticky would be hard to maintain, it would also help ease the majority of the populace. It would let us know we're truly cared about. It would allow those who complain about lag a place to look and see whats being done. It would keep these threads, which everyone seems to hate repeating themselves on, a reason to be locked and removed after the poster is redirected to read the lag thread.