I hope all of you had an amazing weekend & you're having an amazing start of a new week. I'd like to start this post out by apologizing for the lack of blog posts lately. I haven't been feeling well lately due to migraines. These migraines have prevented me from making new Wizard101 & Pirate101 blog posts. I promise that I haven't forgotten about this website.
One thing that I have been doing lately behind the scenes is planning out things that I haven't done on this website for a few years now. One of these things is Holiday-themed contests! Another type of contest that I really enjoyed having in previous years was art contests. Have a look below at one of the winning art entries that I had a few years ago for a contest that I had on this blog for Wizard101's 8th Birthday.
It's going to be so much fun bringing contests like these & other fun contests back to this website. Really other than thinking about what type of contests I could have, I have been resting & enjoying the snow while I can. I may have shoveled a driveway with well over a foot of snow yesterday. ;) Although I still had a migraine - and a few hours of sleep - I didn't miss the opportunity to shovel the driveway. By the way, I also made a video about the snow for all of my Twitter friends. Feel free to watch it below:
The past few weeks have been different, but I'm still pushing forward. I look forward to making new blog posts again once I'm feeling better. I already have like 20-30 blog posts planned, but haven't had the time to make them. You may see a lot of those be published towards the end of the month. Anyway, thank you all so much for supporting this website. Until next time, I'll see you around the spiral. :)
As many of you already know, we've recently changed the twitch channel "EdwardLifegem" to SpiralVision! We had a contest last year for the community to choose our new name to represent all of the community & the streams that we have. This new name really got me thinking about what I want the channel to be in 2019 & the years ahead. So today, I'm going to talk about a few goals that I have for this channel.
"The" Community-Themed Channel, Not 'A' Community-Themed Channel
One thing that I want our channel to be a part of is the community, not a community. When I joined the community in 2009, there were many different fansites. Although they were all different people with different opinions & views, together they were still part of the same community, not separate communities. Nearly a decade later, I'd love to follow what they started - which I believe really made the community boom (feel free to read my post: "A Growing Community: The Beginning").
This really ties into the inclusive & exclusive stream conversation. There are many streams outside of our community that are exclusive where you have to pay to feel like you're involved. I'd love to make SpiralVision the complete opposite of that to the point where people feel very welcomed at the events, group questing streams, and many more streams that we will have in the future. This is in no way saying that our streams are better than streams who may do this. It's an entire spiral of different opinions. Let's just say, we have a different vision. ;)
Staying True To Ourselves
I love visiting the different streamers, to name one - WhiteTiger93. I look up to people like him for many different reasons. His channel is very nostalgic to me because he is a family-friendly YouTuber & Streamer. You may have noticed that I am a fan based on the event recap posts that feature his recap videos. As I said I look up to people like him & many other family-friendly YouTubers & Streamers in the community for putting the community first by staying true to themselves.
Staying true yourself means not changing who you are because of what others may or may not think of you. If you have to change who you are in order to fit into a group of people, that group is not for you. Once think about it, a group like that isn't for the people in that group. My main goal is to make SpiralVision a place where we can be ourselves. If you ever stop by the channel during an event or group questing stream, you'll hear some very random stuff from ASMR to favorite food conversations. I'd love to see SpiralVision continue on this pathway in 2019 & beyond. I mean because why not? :D
This year is going to be amazing as long as we stay true to ourselves. The only way we can make the year amazing together is to follow what I said above & have a positive outlook on the future. I am beyond thankful for each & everyone of you that have supported our streams. I know not all of you are able to make it to our streams but you do support them. You're the reason why the events exist & why any stream that we have on this channel occurs. To anyone that has supported the events & streams that we do - whether you're able to attend or not - thank you. Here's to an amazing 2019. Thank you all for reading. Until next time, I'll see you around the spiral.
It's been nearly a month since I've made a group questing post. Today I thought I'd start anew with a post about where we are in our group questing adventures. As you can tell from the title above, our amazing group of friends has finally made it to Dragonspyre! Let's talk a bit about what we have planned for this world and when & where you can catch our next stream.
As many of you already know, we've quested through each world in Wizard101 as a group. We quest every Tuesday (subject to change in the future) at 6:00 pm Central for nearly two hours of main questing. When we're not questing or streaming, the group has the option to go and do side quests in each world. If you miss a stream one week, then you can catch up with us on our main quest which will always be posted on this blog and on our new Spiral Vision Twitter - @thespiralvision. Keep reading for more information about our next quest and when we'll quest/stream again.
Everyone is welcome to join our group questing streams whether you have a character that you want to quest with us or whether you want to help us out on one of your higher level wizards. We always quest through the Kelvin Realm so feel free to hop on to join us on our new adventures in the Spiral. Thank you all for your support & here's to an amazing 2019!
A few months ago Autumn & I announced a contest for a new Twitch name - which would be chosen by someone in the community. We had many great entries & we're thankful for all of the great names you sent in. We had to choose one & that one name was SpiralVision which was sent in by Esmee Stormweaver! We're excited to announce that we will use this new name & link for all future events, group questing streams, and more. We look forward to growing this channel in terms of community togetherness in 2019 and beyond. :) If you would like to access the new channel & our new Twitter, feel free to click on the links below:
I hope you're having a wonderful first week of 2019. I wanted to make a blog post today about the community. The community has grown through multiple social media platforms such as Amino, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, etc. The community is growing every day! Today, I'm going to talk about what made this awesome community grow to such large numbers across social media.
Let's start with what the community is like today before we talk about the past. The largest communities today are the Central & YouTube communities. They, along with many other communities, provide great information about the game and have helped those communities grow for years now. While you can link your other social media accounts from YouTube, that wasn't how communities outside of these two boomed. Let's travel back in time to see how the community really got started.
Nearly 10 years ago (it's unbelievable that it's nearly been that long - but it has), Wizard101 teamed up with Wizard101 Central to have a contest on Wizard101's Official Facebook Page. As you can see in the video above from Technodude67, a danger hound was given away to everyone who liked their official page & was a Central member. This contest was used to get the Wizard101 Facebook page to 100,000 likes. This was one of the sparks that got the community growing & was effective. I still have my danger hound from this contest on my ice wizard. This was an awesome contest & I hope Kingsisle considers having a contest like this again in the future. :) While this contest helped the Facebook community, what got the other communities to grow? Simple answer: Podcasts & Fansites!
The first podcast that I can think of is none other than Ravenwood Radio (currently Spiral Radio). The first episodes of Ravenwood Radio aired in October of 2009. This podcast was the very first podcast/stream to ever occur in the Wizard101 Community. Many people would tune in every Wednesday night to listen to this awesome podcast by Stephen Spiritcaller & Leesha Darkheart. This podcast, for me at least, was what introduced me to The Friendly Necromancer aka Tom, Diary of a Wizard, and all of the other fansites. I was first introduced to this podcast by Wizard101's promotion of Ravenwood Radio on their official launcher - this was nearly 10 years ago, so I could be wrong. But I am thankful that Kingsisle promoted them because I wouldn't be making this post right now if they didn't.
From there I'd listen to Ravenwood Radio every Wednesday night with the rest of the community. They would have special events such as the Mali-Fest of 2010. They made a lot of Wizard101 History because this was the first Malistaire-type Livestream with four well-known wizards (Leesha & Stephen of Ravenwood Radio, Thomas Lionblood of the Friendly Necromancer, and Fallon Shadowblade of Diary of a Wizard). It was awesome to see four great death wizards defeat Malistaire Live. Livestreams like these introduced me to the other fansites in the community. When people tuned into Ravenwood Radio, they would tell their friends about it. I remember inviting my friends to their podcasts & events. From there, the community grew even larger.
Diary of a Wizard teamed up with Ravenwood Radio and other great fansites in the community to have one large event in Ravenwood known as the Ravenwood Ball & Birthday Bash. This event brought so many people together that the event grew each year. These events were one of the largest (if not, the largest) events to ever occur in Wizard101. I was very shy when I first started attending these events but started talking a lot more. I was inspired by all of the people that promoted/threw these events that I created this website. There are many other fansites that were inspired by fansites like Ravenwood Radio, The Friendly Necromancer, Diary of a Wizard, Ditto Wizard, Paige Moonshade, and many other great sites that they created their own. They even started joining social media pages to follow them. From there, people would tell their friends about the community & it would continue to grow from a few hundred to thousands and today tens of thousands of active wizards across various social media platforms!
While I know not everyone will agree that this is how the community boomed - it really was. Through contests & most of all, podcasts & fansites, the community grew. A lot of people, including myself, were inspired by these amazing people to start having events, creating blogs, podcasts & more to pay it forward. A decade ago, I was going through such a tough time. I'll always remain thankful to those who inspired me & many others in this community to pay it forward just as they did. They did what they did for free & some still continue to do that - those are people to look up to. Thank you to everyone who helped this community grow to what it is today across all social media platforms. Without you, there's no way the community would be as amazing as it is today. Thank you all for reading this random Saturday morning blog post. Until next time, I'll see you around the spiral. :D
