Yeah, I joined sometime before 1.5 beta(not exactly sure when; I didn't pay much attention in those days) but I never actually joined a server until 1.8 beta, where I found many a great servers to play on. Now, when I look at the server list, I see half of them are the same. They are all factions/pvp/hardcore raiding jlkadafjhadukhfjlaws. I don't even know.
There are some GOOD pvp/factions servers, though. I used to play on a relatively small one run by a family (including the parents; the children didn't ruin it, they weren't staff, but they helped their parents make descions about the server). It was very fun, me and some of my buddies played there and became pretty powerful. The staff weren't abusive, the place wasn't over run by hackers, it was nice.