TEN TPM YEARS!

[Mikachu Yukitatsu]

So, when I look at the member list,

http://www.pokemasters.net/forums/me...joindate&pp=50

I'm amazed that we already don't have got a topic like this around.

http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z...10yearsTPM.png

So, let's celebrate our forums' TENTH anniversary! We don't have so many message boards this old here in the Internet. I know it's still March 23th here in Finland but the sun is rising somewhere already.

And here, we could also tell our own TPM stories. Why and how did you come here in the firsty place, and so on. I'll post a longer reply later this week, perhaps.

[shazza]

Yeah, I was planning to post a topic later but forgot. I'll post a longer reply later, but I'd just like to wish The PokeMasters on a fruitful ten years. I am, for the most part, extremely thankful for allowing me to spend most of my youth here and giving me many memories that will remain with me for a very long time.

[Lady Vulpix]

Just yesterday I was thinking I'd been on TPM for over 9 years. And those years have flown by... I don't even know how. I'm glad to know the forum is still here. It's been through hard times, but it survives thanks to everyone who makes an effort to keep it alive.

Happy 10th anniversary, TPM! Here's hoping for many more years to come.

[Jeff]

Woo!

10 years!
That's quite a feat for any online community, especially one that went for 4 years without a website.

[Blademaster]

Well hot diggidy damn. We've managed to cling to life for a decade. Nice work, everyone.

[Magmar]

Yay, 10 years of TPM! Ten years since I signed up!

I'm glad we're all still around. I have fun here, it's a relaxing retreat from real world bo-shit. Congratulations Kevin on keeping the forums running for 10 years even if it's been totally laissez-faire since like 2001.

<3 Tsuki no hi kari wa ai no message.

[Telume]

Congrats TPM, you're the old lady of pokemon interwebz feel prouuuud.

[Drago]

Congratulations, you inanimate concept you! Just think about all the things that have happened in a decade, all the lives that have changed, all the careers that have progressed, and all the lessons that have been learnt, and know... we're still here.

...I should really get off the damned computer. :x

[Fett One]

Hard to believe the TPM has been around for 10 years. A lot of sites don't last this (especially pokemon websites). Here's looking forward to another 10 years.

[Asilynne]

Wow. Ten YEARS. TEN YEARS....

Congrats *mind blown*

[EngiMatikul]

Now I feel old. D:

[kainashi]

happy 10th anniversary, tpm!

second most important date is coming up too: april 4th

[Katie]

Good lord. Happy birthday TPM. I'm not sure why I still come here after all these years. Not in a negative sense, but in a genuine don't-know sense. 90% of the people I knew have left. Something special here, I guess. Here's to 10 more! (but seriously if I'm still here in 10 years please please please stalk me down and kill me)

[firepokemon]

Oh god I fucking forgot.

[PancaKe]

ten years is a long time.

I first found the forums when I was 12. I didn't know what forums were, because I was 12 and all I knew was neopets and the chatroom. I loved the fanfic section of the website, and always submitted bad fanfics to be rated by firepokemon Alas, then it got pulled down, and I wanted to read and write fanfics. And it said "go check out the fanfic forum." so I asked my mum if I could join the pokemon forum, and I was allowed!

And I've been here ever since.

[Mikachu Yukitatsu]

OK, here's my TPM history. Prepare for a dull history documentary!

I learned about the main site somewhere around spring 2000, when first time in my life, Pokemon became the big thing. I remember, TPM was the best site out there. I didn't have a clue what a message board was, but I joined in september 2001.

Back there, my main means to get online were my school's computer classes. I was hooked by the forums and sometimes woke up at 6.00, run to the school and waited for the doors to be opened by the cleaners at 7.00. Also, after the school ended at 4 PM, I stayed in the class. I even used TPM secretly during the classes. Or perhaps secretly wasn't the right word, sometimes all the others but the teacher saw it.

I thought about the forum everyday and everywhere, and wanted to be more noticed. I wanted to make a difference, but with so many members and posts around, my little posts got only little attention. My favourite forum, Pokemon Anime, was full of new replies ever day.

Then the main site disappeared somewhere, and I took also part in the EzBoard. That summer, in my own eyes, I got a fair amount of posts gathered through using TPM at my town library, but of course they were gone after that period ended.

Autumn 2002 was a bit odd. Sailor Moon anime began here in Finland and I began to prefer Sailor Moon to Pokemon. The truth was, I was horrible at the games, I only knew the anime, and my relation to TPM was somewhat superficial. I was also tired of reading my own stupid replies, so I left TPM for some months.

I came back in 2003 as a 'Renewed Restoration', I don't remember when I changed my title into 'I Finnished Last'. I started to post more widely, even translate TV Tokyo Pokemon episode previews. I even joined some other Pokemon message boards but still remained most faithful to TPM.

When Ruby and Sapphire came along with the new main site project, I offered myself and took action and translated all the Pokemon entries from English to Finnish! A big project, and it covered my whole hiihtoloma back there! (Hiihtoloma = Skiing Holiday, a holiday week from school somewhere in March).

In 2004 I had to leave so much behind, and as far as TPM was concerned, I don't even remember what I was going to do with it. I couldn't use it when I was in the army, could I?

Anyways, I made a brave comeback in December 2005. First time in my life, I found TPM a great way to release my creativity. My biggest new thing was to take part in PCG games. But I was still recovering from a sickness, and I began to lose sleep due to the lack of other activities in my life. That's why I quit TPM somewhere in spring 2006.

I came back in January 2007, and decided it was for good. I posted more and more as I got more and more time to use here. I still didn't even have a computer of my own, but luckily we have this house called Mielikkitalo here in Ylivieska. I got my word more and more through, and was even suggested as a moderator although I never was a mod before. I didn't get modded though, in 2008 I began to express myself even more openly, posting things such as 'Truth About Mikachu Yukitatsu'.

I had to quit for some time last year though, it's impossible to get online from a hospital as far as I know, and also, I had to focus on my getting better, but now I'm back.

I love TPM and I think it's my INTERNET HOME. No other webpage has taken so much space and effort in my life!

[Jeff]

Well, my story goes way back. Not sure when I first found the site, it may have been before the forums started. I do remember back in 2000 though when I used to buy up any magazine that had anything to do with Gold and Silver. Me and my brothers from time to time would go online to get any info we could on Pokémon. This was back when we had dial-up and only one phone line, so we had to ask our parents whenever we wanted to go online.

We would go on pokemon.com, but I would often find myself clicking any link I could find, at first not even realizing I had left pokemon.com. That might have been how I found TPM. So it was sometime between 1999, when the pokemon craze happened, and October of 2000 that I first found this place. I know it was before October of 2000, because I remember the countdown timer that counted down to the release of GS. Like Mikachu, I didn't know what a message board was back then, but instead of saying "what the heck, I'll join" it was more like "meh, why bother".

I continued to visit TPM whenever I got the chance. Crystal was the first new main series game I found out about through TPM, and kept coming to find out more about the new games dubbed "Pokemon Advance". After the site went down I got on periodically to see if it was back up. The only other sites I went to, Pokémon Abode and Bulbagarden, were both gone by that point, so I held in there waiting for TPM to return. After it did return, I found the main site didn't have all the info I wanted on Ruby and Sapphire, so I checked the forums for the first time. I only lurked in the RS forum for a while, lurked again for FR/LG info, and eventually joined in 2004, the year we were all introduced to Munchlax. I made an introductory post, made some lame joke about being a "master debator" and became a regular poster, but stopped posting as regularly less than a year later.

In 2005, I joined a bunch of other sites, like the revived Bulbagarden, Wikipedia, and Facebook. I spent most of my time on Wikipedia, but a few years later after the TPM main site revival project was unveiled I started spending most of my time here. It was my hard work to create a prototype of the new site that got me my current mod position, and that hard work combined with everyone's ideas and contributions culminated in the launch of TPM's third, and current, main site.

[Ash_300]

Congratulations old friend. You were a distinct part of my childhood and although we walked down different paths, our life forces are one and the same.

[shazza]

Congratulations old friend. You were a distinct part of my childhood and although we walked down different paths, our life forces are one and the same.

nigga you high

[PancaKe]

Man blast from the past. Talk about nostalgia. Happy freaking birthday TEE PEE EMM

[Knight of Time]

Woo hoo, count 'em guys: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 years of TPM. Man, what a feeling.

Being as this seems to have the greatest effect on TPMers from our first year (me included), I have to admit, not much can top this.

Happy anniversary TPM!

[Magmar]

On March 24, 2000, I never would've thought ten years into the distant future I would still be here. Still in Rhode Island, still in school -_- and still... listening to Green Day every now and then...

I might as well have an act like I'm 13 party by myself, explain it to no one, and sneak around the house pretending I'm not really drinking alcohol. Haha

[Little_Pikachu]

Happy birthday TPM and congrats to everyone who's still here.

[Telume]

^ And to all the people that may come.

[Ash_300]

nigga you high

Very.

[MeLoVeGhOsTs]

I just wanted to post in this topic. It makes me look cool.


HB.

[Zak]

Happy birthday TPM... though I've only been here nine years, not quite a decade yet.

[Roarkiller]

Happy birthday TPM... though I've only been here nine years, not quite a decade yet.

Long enough Zak, long enough.

Not much of a history here, sadly, since I was never one to stand out much anyway, even less online then offline. The army kinda tore me apart from pokemon for a long time, and the distributor for the TCG here being an ass who couldn't care less about the players made it even more so.

But still, there were fun times. Thanks to all the old TCG players (bad at names, sorry if I forgot you guys), I grew from neighbourhood player to third in my country, where I created my own style of player, and also the ban of coins in my country because I rocked too much with my sneasel deck and 80% heads, lol. Oh, and from a deck rater (gawd I miss those days) to finally being a TCG mod. The last TCG mod.

It's been months since I came back here, and only because I dusted off my Crystal and Blue cartridges that I remembered that TPM existed. Good to see that most of the guys I know are still around; especially glad to see that Pancake came back and fp still being a jerk all around (in a good way).

Gotta say though, the only thing missing from all this is Kevin. Head honcho is like the Head of Ninja, never appears.

[Andrew]

Let's all take a suicide pact if we're still here in 10 years.

[Blademaster]

Deal.

[pidgezero_one]

Sweet jesus. 10 years?

TPM was my first forum and first IRC room back in 2001. Once in a while I run into people on other networks and channels from those days, and then it really hits me just how long it's been. Damn you, internet!

[IndianaSnorlax]

I just posted in the other thread about this but, I cannot believe I am logged in right now as one of the original people who were here when it first started.

Awesome.

[shazza]

I was trying to write an epic history of TPM, and of my own, but I didn't make it by 2003 because I am a bad procrastinator and ADHD cunt. Here's what I wrote:

"I'm slightly hungover and tired, and need something to do to procrastinate from my 1.5k word essay, so writing my history (even though we've had so many nostalgic threads to the point we can now be nostalgic about nostalgic threads!) sounds like a great idea!

I started getting involved in online communities around about 1998, when I was 9 years old. First it was a chat site called Chatropolis, then I started using Microsoft Comic Chat. I didn't join a forum until early 2000 on a site called PDark.com - a site obviously dedicated to the Nintendo 64 FPS, Perfect Dark! I was only posting on there for a couple of months, but my interest in the game was winding down as the Pokemon fad in Australia was hitting a peak. I loved the anime, I was obsessed with collecting all the original cards and I was a master at Pokemon Yellow; though, I didn't have it on Gameboy but already knew how to use ROM's.

I started trying to make fake cards to trade at school, and I think that's how I stumbled on the site in about September 2000. But I was taken away at all the different areas the site had to offer, that it instantly made its way into my Internet Explorer 5 favourites. I stole much of its content, as well as the ROMs, and attempted to sell CD's at $5 a piece at the local market; I was not successful.

I found the chat pretty soon after, and tried to talk about some Pokemon. I recall thinking the bot, Carrots, was a real person until some point after. I remember people like Onix11 and that dude that owned Carrots, and of course Aeriana and firepokemon. Firepokemon was an AOp and kicked me out a few times for, presumably, retardation, and I was highly apologetic for things I couldn't comprehend, but I definitely feared him.

I noticed the forums but didn't join for a month after. I really liked the poster, Flying Destiny, and thought Kasumi was really sweet. I was astonished at Ash_300's number of posts in such a short time, I thought Little_Pikachu was some hip young 20's chick that couldn't care for the rules, and Hyrelian_Genius was a bit of an asshole. There are so many members of the past that I can still recall, but to name them would take too much time.

One of my first posts involved posting in the Gold and Silver forum that they have already released the #252 Pokemon; it got closed pretty fast. I remember the forum was down and I thought I got banned, so I emailed Kasumi and she told me not to worry. I felt so privileged to talk to PokeChamp - who was an admin at the time - on ICQ, making me feel I have some worth in these new forums. Pretty early on I desired to be a moderator. I befriended Vidgamergbc in Other Pokemon Games after we had a fight, and decided to just become friends.

The day I found out Flying Destiny was the same person as firepokemon really blew me away. On the one hand, I really liked and respected Flying Destiny on the forums, yet I feared and was beginning to dislike firepokemon on the chat. Needless to say I didn't know what was up and what was down.

I, along with many other members during those days, had the perception that postcount = a higher self worth. And the higher your self worth is, the more chance you have to being a moderator! I was posting in most topics and making my own, and I was becoming obsessed with the forums. I would wake up as 12 druing the summer holidays and just go onto TPM to see all the new activity. It felt very special. Master_Pokemon H and I were in some form of posting competition - well, that's at least how I perceived it is. I was making more friends with Australian's, with the likes of totodile_girl, Bronze_Umbreon and cool_daddy_47 (all of whom I still talk to on an occassional basis). The forum Polls & Clubs was recently created, and H_G and LuGiA007 were made admins, so I tried my best to get noticed. When Vidgamer was modded there, as well as LIIIF, I was pretty jealous to say the least. I started making polls almost daily, and was getting rather known for my "originality" in polls.

I recall the [glow] features and everyone using them, including yours truly. They were so abused that a rule was set in place that they could only be used in signatures, for people started using it as font.

I had my first e-girlfriend with Chikoslavia's Revenge - who turned out to be a pretty attractive girl - but at the same time, the Malasyian chick silverMaurari or whomever also wanted me. It was my first taste and being a manwhore.

There was a mod spot in the now Polls, Clubs & Games forum, and I was worried it would go to squirtle_flame. I went into #pokemasterspbs - which I was beginning to frequent more - and I was complaining how my internet for the past few days had not allowed me to go into TPM. LuGiA007 then said that then I hadn't realised I had been modded. I was in total shock. I couldn't believe it. So I went to check and it was working finally, and I noticed my new found position and a congratulations topic! I went running around the house screaming with sheer excitement, jumping up and down and proud to tell my mother.

A month or so after being moderated my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer; my world had been turned upside down. So, I was not active for a fair few weeks and people knew why, but TPM became a huge distraction for me when she was sick and after she had passed on. Not only was it my online home, but it had become a much needed distraction. I would think of it when at school, the current politics and the friendships I had made there.

I was extremely excited when the forums upgraded to UBB6; it was a fresh makeover. Unfortunately, the servers couldn’t handle it and it went back to UBB5 pretty soon after. A second attempt occurred and things all worked well. While there wasn’t enough addons, and it took awhile for things to be normal, there were many new exciting elements. The first, of course, was the name change ability. I straight away went from pokemastershazza2000 to shazza, but soon enough it became pretty common to change your name to whatever you felt at the time.

I got modded in UBB Help, mainly due to my mascerade that I knew what I was talking about when it came to UBB 6. And I guess, in a way, I did, as my EZBoard, Shazza’s Spooky Slide, was recently upgraded to an illegal copy of UBB 6. I was now modding two forums, and felt pretty sweet.

In December 2001, Little_Pikachu was made into an administrator – and has remained as such for over nine years. I remember I was very jealous about this, as my next desire was to be made an admin. I recall it was Orientation Day at school and I was in P.E playing Baseball, but all I could think of was her current promotion and how that made me feel.

Kevin was having server troubles or something and we were forced to become an EzBoard in about March-April 2002. The future of TPM was uncertain. Staff were quitting – kurai/H_G, for instance, stepped down as administrator. I think this was also when nick/blastoise_boy also quit being a TCG moderator – who was quite known to be kurai’s lapdog. The enthusiasm and enjoyment I got out of moderating was already fading away, and becoming an EZBoard was the final nail in the coffin, so I quit. I remember Suzie saying that if I ever wish to resume my position, then I should. Nearly eight years on, and I’m still waiting you lying bitch! "

[Blademaster]

tl;dr

Good work though.