Having been on 8wayrun, I can vouch for this.
As for me, I can't say that MLP has profoundly changed my life or anything like that, but it has positively impacted it nonetheless. Like many, I have trouble with depression, and MLP is a way of escaping everything that makes me feel bad. For as long as I want to, I can give myself the luxury of seeing a world where everything always turns out OK. It lifts my mood when nothing else can, and makes me smile, even when I don't want to. It's a refreshing change from all the stuff people my age are "meant" to like. There's nothing adult, nothing sexual, nothing crass, nothing violent here. Just good clean fun and laughs, like cartoons used to be. MLP gives me the chance to be a kid again for a little while during the times when the grown-up world gets to be too much. I know it's just a kids' cartoon, meant to sell toys, but I owe MLP and its creators a lot for giving me that.