Apology to EcoCityCraft. ~ blowtube123

Dear EcoCityCraft,

I am here, posting this apology, to explain the regards of my Spawn Build submission.

First, I would like to create a timeline of my entire venture through building the spawn itself.

• December 11th, 2013 ~ EcoCityCraft “Spawn Building Competition” has been announced and is open for submissions. Link: http://tinyurl.com/o5jdrb9
• December 15th, 2013 ~ Blowtube123 applied for a Solo-Signup for the “Spawn Building Competition”. Link: http://tinyurl.com/pcfw47d
• December 16th, 2013 ~ I began my quest to create a new spawn for EcoCityCraft by creating my single player flat world and beginning to create a 142x142 circle. I knew I wanted a circular spawn, therefor this is how I started.
• December 17th, 2013 ~ I went looking on Google for these specific searches “spawn builds”, “minecraft spawn builds”, “spawn build inspiration”, “spawn portals”, “multi level spawn”. With these searches I found many inspirational ideas to use towards my spawn. Here is a list:
  • Circular spawn build: http://tinyurl.com/n348b7k Although I already had the idea of this, I thought this screenshot would help show me what a large spawn could look like on an enormous circle like the one I was making myself.
  • Larger and better looking portals: http://tinyurl.com/o68ff53 With this link, I thought about the great idea of much larger portals with a cooler shape, just like the ones we had on EcoCityCraft before the new spawn.
  • Circular compass center spawn: http://tinyurl.com/qd2y6az With this link, I thought It would also show that not only did I use more than 1 inspirational spawn build, but I used upwards of 10-20 pictures I liked on Google.
  • Multi level spawn build: http://tinyurl.com/l6r9q6d I know this is most likely the spawn everyone is talking about, and here is the truth. Read carefully. The outer column area structures of this spawn, were the only inspiration I took from this. From what the lining up of my spawn and this spawn shows, I did in fact recreate the first floor to the best extent I could with this one picture (Meaning I did not WorldEdit this spawn into my own single player and work on it from there. Honestly, I do not know how to add specific coordinates into a different world other than the one I was working on.) I remade each of the pillars, remade the outer arches, and remade the somewhat similar outer fountains. These are the only things I somewhat copied, everything else was made by my own hands and with the help of LegendaryTrio.
  • Lastly, these are the majority of inspirational spawns I used to create the best spawn I possibly could. I did not go into further exploration for url pages other than the pictures themselves that I found on Google.
• December 18th, 2013 ~ I spent the day trying again and again to download WorldEdit to make building my spawn much easier and quicker. With WorldEdit, I could create a better spawn because I had more time for it. I finally figured out how to, but could only get it on 1.6.2, therefor I had to build there and then convert it later to 1.7.4 without WorldEdit later.
• December 19th, 2013 ~ Update Link: http://imgur.com/Z6PqYj6 I began to create columns, arches, and fountains at my single player spawn. By this point, I learned how to use WorldEdit and was able to make 1/4th of the spawn to replace three more times in the other locations.
• December 21st, 2013 ~ Update Link: http://imgur.com/ibVmv2W I began to create a second floor of the spawn build and filled in the bottom grass floor. Each of these additions were created by WorldEdit from the build I had in the last day of building. Also on this date, I finished many things including creating the globe with the help of this sphere generator (Link: http://www.plotz.co.uk). Here are screenshots of my additions I made on this date. Links: http://imgur.com/yK4Swcc, http://imgur.com/VfFFhwH, http://imgur.com/bFyRy9S, http://imgur.com/prk2zae.
• December 22nd, 2013 ~ Update Links: http://imgur.com/b2oKIq0, http://imgur.com/6bBoMUn, http://imgur.com/6bBoMUn, http://imgur.com/RUPTOmn. By this time, I had moved from 1.6.2 to 1.7.4 meaning no more WorldEdit, and everything had to be hand made. In the screenshots, I created many things including the compass spawn shape, four main portals, and the second floor architecture (Done by hand).
• December 23rd, 2013 ~ Update Links: http://imgur.com/WKPYdyz, http://imgur.com/33iW5nA, http://imgur.com/WHI4lum, http://imgur.com/8HrhqXQ, http://imgur.com/Ba4WOIf, http://imgur.com/UprBVy4, http://imgur.com/1um4DNq On this date, I finished many things including tutorial, survival games board, and all portals. This was around the time when I finally finished the first build (3 builds in all).
• December 29th, 2013 ~ On this date, I posted the actual build for judges to see here: http://tinyurl.com/mfdj3r9 Not to mention, I was updating EcoCityCraft on my build [throughout the time I was creating it] with many of the screenshots posted. I posted these pictures on this thread then edited them every time I updated the build. Link: http://tinyurl.com/pvqau99 Later this evening, I edited the build being that Andrewkm said we could have until 11:59 PM to re-submit them. Within this time, I fixed many problems I thought I had and could fix within the time period. For example, adding the circular second floor balcony, re-editing the tutorial, and changing many things from flowstone to redstone lamps. I reposted my submission around 11:00 PM with few updates, but I thought it could be a game changer.
• January 2nd, 2014 ~ On this day, I found out how to get users to help me on my build via Multiplayer. Meaning, I copied my spawn world file and put it into a different folder. From the 2nd to the 9th I had these users come on to the Multiplayer. Kukelekuuk00, Falconaire, and of course LegendaryTrio. Kukelekuuk00 and Falconaire were on to help LegendaryTrio and I with any additions they thought we should make (By this time, I considered LegendaryTrio a part of my team). Afterwards, I asked LegendaryTrio to private message Andrewkm on IRC. Which I believe he did so. In the message, we included screenshots and a nice paragraph telling Andrewkm that we had been working on the spawn past the deadline. We did so because I believed, if we were the true winner, he would accept any updates from us.
• January 10th, 2014 ~ On this day, Andrewkm mailed me in-game asking me to talk to him. Later that day, I got ahold of him on the forums. There, he asked me to post an update to my spawn build within 12 hours because it could be what makes myself win or lose.
• January 11th, 2014 ~ My Spawn Build Submission now became the winning submission, and was soon to be added on Monday/Tuesday of that week.This was an extremely exciting time for me, and I could not believe it. Therefor, I apologize for all cockiness on EcoCityCraft. I was too excited to control my flow of good emotions, it ended in the worst.
• January 14th, 2014 ~ My Spawn Build Submission was now added in-game and was finally showing ECC what my strong suit was when it came to MineCraft. Building. (I understand I did not build it all, but I do believe I should take some sort of credit to myself for my own builds I created.)

I admit to partially replicating the spawn “Blood of Chaos Spawn City” created by Pibbert. You can find this spawn here: http://tinyurl.com/mafzb6e. I used this spawn as my major inspiration because I thought the spawn would be an amazing addition to EcoCityCraft. As I am dedicated to the server, I wanted to create the best spawn Andrewkm could ask for. This was just one step I did not achieve in, due to the fact that I did not give credit to Pibbert. Once again, I give full credit to Pibbert for creating the spawn that I took major inspiration from. It was my responsibility to credit him, which I did not do so until today.

As for coming back onto EcoCityCraft, over the next two weeks I will be thinking about my actions and will reflect on my misconduct in this spawn build. I know this should not have happened, so I am going to make this a lesson to myself. I will not let anything like this happen again, and will grow from the terrible consequences that were give to me. Within my waiting period, I have already matured more than I have before. I made new friends on EcoCityCraft that I did not even know I had. I learned to always give credit to anyone for the pure purpose of doing what is right. Lastly, I learned where my heart is. EcoCityCraft is my family, without it I do not know what being a teenager would be like for me. Even though some people say they hate me, I still love them because without them, EcoCityCraft would not be what it is today.

What I failed to do is something I will learn from in real life. I have educated myself from my wrong doing. From this day on, I will never plagiarize, copy, or reconstruct anything unless given the permission to do so. I will also give credentials to any source that was not my own. These last two days have been the most disappointing days I have gone through on my EcoCityCraft career. I do not want this to happen again, so please learn from my mistakes.

I would like to inform EcoCityCraft that my intention was not to copy Pibbert’s spawn, or frankly anything from anyone. While I was creating spawn, all I was thinking about was EcoCityCraft. “What would EcoCityCraft like?; How can I create a better spawn?; etc.” I did not even think twice on whether I should credit Pibbert’s build because 1) I was not thinking clearly, I was extremely excited to build a spawn for EcoCityCraft and 2) I did not know whom created it, due to the fact that I found it on Google and did not click the link. My actions were uncalled for, end of story.

I admit to replicating, not giving Pibbert credentials, and not being a loyal member to EcoCityCraft. I wanted to show all of you a worthy spawn that I had created, which lead to my failure.I was not thinking clearly at the time, but I do believe my consequences are suitable for my actions.

This event shows me that I am setting the perfect example as for what you should never do on EcoCityCraft, online, or ever in real life. What I did was wrong and has major consequences, each of us can learn from my failure. Please take extreme caution when copying, plagiarizing, or reconstructing from any sort of source. It can lead to many things from, a permanent ban on EcoCityCraft, to getting expelled from college. This is an important lesson. The lesson is do not copy or plagiarize, and never ignore attribution.

By reading this entire apology, I hope you all know I am here to last. This major slip up may be my endpoint to EcoCityCraft, but I am going to strive to my utmost extent. I will be back on the server, even if it takes me everything I have.

EcoCityCraft is home. ​

EcoCityCraft is family. ​

EcoCityCraft is what I love.​

​

Please forgive me.​

 

AgentHare is right, I failed to mention my apologies to other contests whom submitted spawn builds. I am sincerely sorry for my misconduct. I realize that each of the contestants spent hours on their own build without taking inspiration from another build like I did. I would like to apologize to each and every team member. What I did was wrong, and they deserve my absolute respect.