@Lord_Bowserinator (View Post)
If you don't have a paid account you won't be able to join ):

Other people can post their account names here or PM me with the name. I'll whitelist you when it comes up. cracker64 set up some anti-grief plugin now but I haven't seen what it does.

Update: We are now using this protection mod: http://www.spigotmc.org/resources/griefprevention.1884/

I disabled most of the fancy but restrictive (non-vanilla) things like preventing creeper holes, disabling fire, etc. It will definitely be very useful in claiming your own land though.
Short usage tutorial:
  Right click with stick to check if an area is claimed
  When you place your first chest it will claim that area automatically
  For more claims, right click with a golden shovel and select both corners
  Right click a corner with a golden shovel to expand the area. You then right click again to select the new corner
  You only have a certain number of claim blocks, which grows over time.
  Claims sizes are two dimensinoal. They go up to the max height but only down 5 blocks from where you used the shovel. Dig down to make the claim move down.
I'll update this later as people get confused, there are nice tutorial videos you can watch though.

Also, the IRC link works. I'll probably open up the server really soon now that the main plugins I wanted are all set up. I still need to do a little more work, also I need more usernames to whitelist :P.
Edit: should I even have a whitelist though? I could possibly disable it.
Edit2: updated the first post, check back there for updates
Edit3: backup plugin works (probably)

@ChargedCreeper (View Post)
I guess I haven't been following minecraft development too closely, I know that 1.7 had some changes where you had to update. 1.8.4 was just a security update too. But anyway, if the protocol is the same then i'm sure any 1.8 client will work.