TDS’ KA History (But Again)

So uh, Kirby Amino just turned 4, and a day after so did I!

I mean, I didn’t turn 4, my did. Honestly if I was 4 and posting this stuff it would be kind of impressive.

anyway…

Over the course of the 4 years I’ve been on here, it’s meant a lot of different stuff to me and, honestly, it’s been one heck of a journey. I love to reading about people’s experiences with this place, so to celebrate my 4th year on here, I thought I would revisit #MyKirbyHistory , since, well, a lot of stuff has changed since the last time I wrote one of these. Call this an update if you want, but to spare you from my awful writing from, like, 3 years ago, I’m gonna try to recount everything from the beginning.

So really, this is more like an enhanced port of that old post than anything else, just with some extra DLC

This post is kind of long, but I tried to keep it engaging by adding some jokes, little story sections, and other stuff! I hope you enjoy!

~

》Part 0: How Did I Get Here?《

Honestly, I have no idea how I ended up here. (Well, I mean, of course I do, but the chances of me ending up here were so incredibly small I still can’t believe it happened.) Really, the stars had to kind of align for me to find KA.

Let me take you back to a time before KA, when little me was obsessed with Pokemon. Not the games, no no no, the games were for the people who owned a Nintendo DS, and I didn’t, uh, have one. You see, I was obsessed with Pokemon Trading Cards; obsessed to the point of going to tournaments.

Was I good?

Not at all.

BUT I kept playing because I enjoyed the game with one of my IRL friends, who introduced me to Pokemon Amino.

I never really found a place on Poke-Amino, since I didn’t really know how it worked or what I was doing. Not knowing how the app worked, I made a total like 3 low-effort posts (which are long-since deleted), but they never seemed to get any attention from the community! It didn’t make sense that Poke-Amino didn’t like my sorry excuses for text

Emotionally distraught, I went outside. Also, it was raining.

“Why don’t they like me!!” I screamed to the sky in the middle of a downpour.

As the camera slowly pulled away to make me look small and insignificant in the frame, I had a striking moment of clarity: This whole Amino thing just wasn’t for me, and that’s cool!

Oh how wrong that poor sweet innocent me from 4 years ago was...

Fast forward a few months, and I got a notification from the Poke-Amino App telling me the “Amino App was live!!”

Or something like that

Obviously, I was intrigued.

I mean, I already HAD the Poke-Amino App? What new thing could they have possibly released? Amino 2: Electric Boogaloo (Ft. Poke-Amino)?

And, well, I guess I was bored or something that day because I told myself “screw it!” and ed the app. Turns out, I was right! In the new Amino App, there were like, tens of new communities!

Of course, I immediately started to look for a Kirby Community.

~

》Part 1: First Steps Into The Unknown《

So, uh, yeah.

I ed Kirby Amino.

I guess this is the part where I come clean~

Confessions

There are two important things you need to understand about me before KA:

- Before Kirby Amino, I had absolutely 0 interactions with any fandom of any kind. I had no idea what an OC was, what an RP was, or what I was even ing. I didn’t even know what the term fandom meant. Honestly, it was ridiculous that I blindly ed a fandom. Just like I blindly ed that one cult when I was younger.

- me mentioning how I didn’t have a DS? Well, I also had never played any Kirby games of any kind before ing the Amino. I know that sounds kind of ridiculous, since it was the first Amino I ed, but really I fell in love with Kirby because of playing Smash 4 at my friends’ houses. Because of Kirby’s design, I watched the whole anime, but that’s about it. I was a fraud.

So uh call me Elsa or whatever because I was basically venturing

Into the Unknown

I guess I picked things up pretty quickly, though?

My First Posts

On the day I ed, I really wanted to contribute something, so I wrote a blog based entirely on the Kirby Wikia, Youtube videos, and the Anime (Which I have since learned isn’t canon, along with learning what the term canon was) called “An In-Depth Look at Meta Knight”.

Saying that my first post was “good” would be, uh, very nice of someone to say, but also very wrong. I never revised the thing, but honestly this has never been my strong suit, so just like all the announcements I write, this post has an insane amount of spelling errors. Additionally, I had committed the greatest sin of all: Inserting bad jokes into the blog.

Despite this, the post somehow got featured, proving that quality control has gotten better over the years, and the post got around 30 likes

which was a lot at the time so back off >:(

So I went on to keep writing posts!

At some point, the other few dozen started to notice me, and I was noticing them. More specifically, I noticed how they all seemed to have these things called “OCs,” whatever that meant, but after a brief trip through google, who knows all, I decided to create the most generic recolor OC imaginable: Kai. The name was definitely taken from the fire ninja but nobody needs to know that. Guess I shouldn’t have put it in this post then. Oopsie.

Somewhere along the way, I decided I wanted to do something special for the community: Host an OC tournament I called “The Great OC Bracket.”

Unfortunately, my great master plan involved a bunch of people writing what were essentially essays, and it wasn’t fun at all. In fact, it was super stupid.

Despite the glaringly obvious flaws in the events design, it started out as a success! Kind of.

I mean, it was during this time that I met some of my early somewhat kind of friends from KA like Mint, Aci, 8Bit, Digton, Jay, WDD (Amphi), and Kewtwo. The thing is, I didn’t really talk to people on here very often, and when they asked me if I wanted to “RP,” I still had no idea what that meant, so in the end I wasn’t *super* close with any of them. That said, they were all pretty cool!

~

》Part 1.5: Hehe I Go Bye Bye《

I wish I could say that the OC bracket kept going without any problems, but the problems with organization and structure kind of made being on KA a chore for me at the time. About a month and a half after ing, with zero explanation to anyone, I left KA and abandoned my event 2 rounds in.

That was, uh, not my best moment ever

But I guess I left at kind of the right time~

Now, I’ve never been told the full story, but from what I’ve gathered I had missed a *lot* of super intense drama. I don’t want to go into details, mainly because I wasn’t involved, don’t know the whole story, and I think those events are best left in the past, but I’m kind of glad I missed everything.

~

》Part 2: The Return of the Not Really A King At All《

Let me take you on a journey through time, back to early December, 2016. The air was chilly, children and adults alike were getting excited for the holidays, and Crown Prince Maha Vajiralongkorn had just been declared King of Thailand.

Snow had started filling the streets of Kirby Amino, but the frost somehow brought a comforting warmth to its . It was almost ...peaceful, in a way.

A man walks through the small town, almost purposeful, but stops when he reaches what appears to be the town square. He raises his head, and shatters the silence with a loud cry:

“WHAT’S UP WORLD, I’M BACK!!”

But nobody knew who he actually was.

A Different Community

That’s right, after a long 4 month hiatus, I was back and better than ever, ready to be praised for my earlier scholarly work. But I wasn’t greeted by the same KA I left behind.

New were around, most of my old friends had left or had forgotten about me, having new profiles/personas I never ed them having before.

I really didn’t know anybody either.

But honestly, I think there’s some beauty in the fact that the community can change so much, and some fun in discovering what’s new, so I decided I would come back with a bang!

The Amino Cleanup Project

That bang would be, because I’m a super rational human being, telling the mod team how to do their jobs better.

Alright it wasn’t really like that- It was nicer ...I think

Regardless, my return post was titled “The Amino Cleanup Project” and, well, it basically detailed some of the problems I had with the amino, potential solutions for those problems, and how the community could improve. Mainly regarding the featured feed.

Now I know what you’re asking:

TDS, if you hadn’t been on the amino for so long, did you really know what it was like and what changes needed to be made?

...no

TDS, were you in any position to make this post?

...also no

TDS, Did the mods have ANY reason to listen to you? I mean, they were the ones with experience.

...you know, at this point I think these questions are pointed

In reality, the leaders had no business listening to anything I said. But they did (for some reason) and after a few PMs with me about what I discussed in my post, the mods created the first ever “Suggest a Post to be Featured” blog, and started making some efforts to feature more writing.

After what I considered to be a success, I decided to really come back.

Posting, But Like, Again

After the “Amino Cleanup Project” post, I wrote a few more posts and failed at a few more projects. Specifically, I tried starting two more OC brackets, but those never got beyond the discussion phase, I wrote a theory about Kirby’s Anatomy, did a second (pretty stupid) Amino Cleanup Project, and started chatting to a few people like Amphi (the agent).

I guess I was really enjoying my time on KA~

~

》Part 3: I Guess I’m Modding Now《

What???

I mean, seriously, what?

Sure, I had submitted an application, but if we’re being honest I was still pretty new to the whole “community” thing, I barely interacted with anyone, my posts were mediocre at best, and there were probably people that applied that were WAYYY more qualified than me.

I don’t really know how, but I guess because of a combination of my Amino Cleanup Projects, posts, and kind-of-friendship with Amphi, I woke up with a new title:

Curator

In the beginning I loved being a curator!

It was a way for me to help out around the community, and gave me the opportunity to work on challenges, discuss the guidelines and what should and shouldn’t be allowed, and start projects I had always wanted to, like the Kirby Amino Times!

Somewhere along the line, I started making new kind-of-monthly themes for KA, switching up the colors and stuff to keep it looking interesting! It was a lot of fun!

Looking back on it a lot of my earlier themes were kind of god awful, and I’m sorry I ever subjected you guys to them, but it was a learning experience

...right?

Anyway, I would like to think the themes don’t look god awful now, but I guess we’ll revisit that a few years down the line lmao

Anyway, The mod team was great to work with, and I had really felt like I had found my calling. (At least, my calling for this random online community about a family-friendly game franchise)

The thing is, although I was helping make decisions about the community, I really struggled to integrate with the community themselves. Besides some like Luna, ProjectKMR (Cade), and of the mod team at the time, I didn’t really have any people I would call “online friends.”

I’m not the best at holding conversation online, and as someone who didn’t RP during a time when that was what most of the friend groups on KA did, I didn’t really have the best relationship with the community itself.

That didn’t really bother me, though, even though it probably should have.

Becoming One With the

One day, a poll was posted.

“Who’s your favorite Curator?”

And I was dead last. With one vote.

I wasn’t really hurt by the poll since I could care less about the opinion of strangers on the internet. I mean, I expected this, since it was a community vote and I didn’t ever really talk to the community.

That said, the poll did make me realize that making some friends and chatting on here was something that I at least wanted to *try*

I started talking in the Popstar lounge, and made a few more friends. It wasn’t much, but it was baby steps to a me that actually talks to people on here, I guess, and that’s good progress in my opinion.

The Lulls and Spikes of Activity

All of this sounds great, but you should probably understand that I do a *lot* of stuff outside of Amino. I do sports (ew gross sports) like soccer, cross country, and track, as well as theater and interp (speech). Because of this, I haven’t always been the most reliably active member, and my activity tends to come in the form of spikes.

Around August of 2017, I stopped posting a ton of stuff outside of new KAT issues. I was still relatively active in of moderation, but I wasn’t really posting a ton of my own content. Around November, I posted a few more things and had a bit more of an activity spike, putting out two small art things, but going into 2018 I was mainly putting my focus into new KAT issues and moderation. This was partially fueled by the new curator promotions in February, which brought a lot of new life and great people to the team!

In April 2018, following the release of Star Allies, I posted another analysis blog (which is the type of content I consider to be my best) called “An In-Depth Look at Dark Matter,” which I thought was pretty good!

It was at this point, however, that I stopped working on new issues of the KAT, since they took a lot of coordination to put out. For about two months in between my Dark Matter blog and July, I was on kind of a mini-hiatus. I wasn’t completely inactive, but I’ll it that the community wasn’t really my top priority at the time.

In July, I kind of returned, posting my “Boredom Strikes Again” edit which, somehow, found its way to the featured feed and is my most-liked non-KAT post

I’m sorry but 203 likes on an edit is kind of ridiculous

I kept up my activity throughout December and into January 2019, when I rebooted the KAT with a more structured feel to it!

I loved making the posts, but between January and June of 2019, my activity slowly dipped more and more. I was becoming disconnected from the community, the mods, and moving away from Kirby Amino, only releasing 3 KAT issues and nothing else.

In August, I was barely reaching 100 minutes a week of activity, and was dropped from the mod team because of it.

~

》Part 4: A Weird Return《

We’ve done this before.. Haven’t we?

Well, I mean I guess you know the story by now: I come back and it’s a completely different community yadda yadda whatever

The community at this point didn’t really know who I was, but I was cool with that ^^

It’s hard for me to pinpoint exactly why I came back, but around October I started lurking around the mod chats and community again, and slowly became more and more active. In November, I posted another analysis blog “Why Kirby Needs and Overhaul, and Why It Won’t Get One” which was also featured, and started posting some more art.

The Events of January

I was slowly warming up to the new mods, and tentatively working with them at this point, since I had kind of been involved during the whole “Blaui leaving” situation, but I didn’t really get super involved until January.

Following Blaui’s departure and throughout December and into January, tensions were rising between several of the of the mod team, and everything came to a head during January.

On January 17th, I posted my blog “Unnamed OC Does a Glowy Art Thing,” which I was pretty proud of! It ended up getting a feature, which I thought was pretty neat. The thing was, this feature ended up leading to a major confrontation between a few of the mod team , including Scribblous, which came to a head after Kirbster posted his deconstruction.

I’m not going to rehash old arguments, and everything’s been pretty well documented at this point so it’s not worth mentioning, but at the end of the day, these discussions/arguments were kind of what drew me back into the community for the long-term, and made me want to keep working with the mods in the future.

A New Relationship With the Team

I guess this is the part of the post where I should discuss my relationship with the mods, what exactly I do, and how I feel about everything.

I’ve always felt a little bit guilty, I guess, that I kind of showed up and inserted myself into a new mod team that didn’t really know me right as a bunch of drama was going on. Honestly, I think the drama is part of the reason nobody ever asked what the hell I was doing giving advice and stuff, but I guess that worked out for me? It’s hard to say I guess…

My new relationship with the team was kind of weird, at least in my eyes, because of the drama situation and the fact I was, well, kicked off the team because of inactivity a few months prior and was just kind of reinserting myself into everything. That said, the team made me feel welcome and appreciated, which I will always feel grateful for (thanks guys~)

Anyway, my newfound appreciation for the team led me to what I guess my job is-

I’m not a of KA. I hope nobody gets the impression that I am.

What I DO do here is help guide them sometimes, offer my opinions about rules, changes, and bans, as well as help organize events. The team does trust me with Sans Doll, but I try not to really do any moderation stuff on the that isn’t theme-related.

Anyway, I’m really happy with what I do on here now ^^

It’s a lot of fun and the current team is super nice to work with, and I owe them a lot for putting up with me, heh

~

》Part 5: Here We Are In The Present《

So I guess that brings us to today ^^

Nowadays, I kind of do mod stuff, but I’m also a lot more generally active within the community.

I’ve started chatting a bit more, and I’ve become a cohost in Neb’s chat and Coffee Island, as well as being active in the Crownocalypse chat, and I really enjoy talking to everybody in there ^^

I’ve also just become a lot more active in general, with about half of my total posts being from these last few months alone! In that time I redid the layout of the Amino, tried out writing a little, hosted the Great Art Bracket (which was SUPER fun!!), released a follow up to my “Why Kirby Needs an Overhaul” post called “The Next Steps for the Kirby Franchise” where I detailed some ideas I had for new games, redid categories, hosted the writing spotlight day and a cover contest, posted some art I was pretty proud of, and did some incredibly stupid looking vacuum requests.

All in all, I’m happy with my amino journey, and even though I might take a few breaks here and there, I have no plans in stopping it any time soon :))

Thank you all so much for being such an amazing and ive community~

- TDS