My Time In MSN Groups

"They call us problem child/we spend our lives on trial/we walk the endless mile/we are the YOUTH GONE WILD!"  --"Youth Gone Wild" by Skid Row

     That was my battle anthem on the old MSN Groups which shut down in February of 2009.  I spent most of my early years of the internet there and would form the basis of what would become my internet "inner circle" of friends.  It was a humbling experience, knowing that I was a miniscule fish in an immense ocean of people that were just, like me, seeing what was out there.  It started with the time I spent on MSN Messenger (which I don't use anymore) and just morphed into me becoming one of the big fish in a bigger ocean called cyberspace.

     I made a few online "friends" on MSN Messenger.  There was this one named Shawnna from the state of Virginia that led me to her MSN Group called "Bitch Witch".  That's where I got my start at.  I was shy as all hell when it came to talking with people in there.  There were many boards/forums to get involved with and so very much to learn about posting pictures and other things.  So, I would learn how to be a member of a group (which at that time they were called MSN Communities) before trying to venture out onto my own.

     I would join other Communities as well.  One of which was called "Late Teens/Early Twenties".  I would become "friends" with the manager/creator of that group and she would show me more than what Shawnna did.  I would be a member of two other groups before launching my own.  Thank God I picked two pretty good ones, because I would have a graphics manager and a bullshit hunter for later in my Communities/Groups experience.  Their user names were Starmoon (Graphics) and PurpleJuliet (bullshit hunting).

     The first MSN Community I created was called "The New World Order of Web Communities".  Yeah, I know, long winded name, but it conveyed what I wanted the attitude to be for my first and subsequent groups.  I wanted to be the hottest group in MSN Communities 20s Category.  Much drama ensued in that first ever MSN Community and it wound up getting hacked into and destroyed after peaking at #26, which was first page.  That hacking made me hungry.

     I created a couple more here and there to keep what would be the core of my MSN Group going and would join others.  I would meet ShyGirl, SoonerGal and Pokey in a group called "20s Singles Anonymous".  I met Chromey and Rage in a group called Social District.  I would add others from other groups and build a pretty solid foundation of members that would lead the fifth group I would create to a height that I liked.

     The fifth group I created was called "The Kliq".  The title's connontation was exclusivity and that is what the group was.  It was exclusive to the most active members of all the other groups I had been a part of.  It had eye popping graphics, great forums and the best siggy maker in all of MSN Groups (which they were now being called).  The Kliq fought and scratched its way to #1, unseating Social District for the top spot, and then I took a well deserved vacation to offline myself for a bit.

     I would get a phone call from one of my management team.  "Drew, the group has been destroyed.  There is nothing left of it."  I ended my offline vacation and jumped back online to see what and who, if anything was salvagable.  There was a ton of drama and finger pointing, to which after it was all done, Essence of Fun was created.  Essence of Fun served two purposes.  First to keep the core of The Kliq together and second to serve as an outlet while I was constructing my opus behind everyone else's backs.

     My opus would last from September 4th, 2005 until November 16th, 2006.  It was fully ready by the time I sent the initial invite of fifty out and the graphics were more eye popping than any other MSN Group had ever had.  The group would consist of three co-founders and have a total of five managers and six assistant managers.  The Kliq was loud and proud.  This group had to be louder, prouder and more active than what The Kliq was.  This group was called simply "Youth Gone Wild" and would have at its height 256 total members.

     The three co-founders were myself, Shygirl and TinkerJo.  The other two managers were SoonerGal and Starmoon.  Kimmy_Pooh, Honey, ChicaRah, Jewels, Alyssa_Malfoy and GinnyAngels were the assistant managers of the group.  The rest of the active members would keep the group going loud, proud and very active.  We were a problem child for all other MSN Groups.  By the end of our first month, we had already hit Top 10 in the 20s Category.  What happened just two weeks after that would set the tone for the entire year of 2006 in the 20s category.

     November 17th, 2005 - The day that Youth Gone Wild hit #1.  We celebrated that whole week with a 1,000+ post week.  I was estatic.  Youth Gone Wild would stay at #1 for the next 11 months solid.  During management chats, I didn't ask what other groups out there were doing.  I would ask "How can we make ours better?"  That's all I ever asked, and we would deliver on it.  One of the suggestions was taken literally.  The suggestion would keep us at #1.  LET'S GET REAL.

     As one of the co-founders of Youth Gone Wild, I would let a bunch of drama slide before reining in whatever caused the drama to begin with.  If little sub-groups were formed and side were taken, I thoght that to be good for "business".  "Business" meaning keeping our #1 ranking for activity.  You can let a lot of little things go unchecked, but very few, if any, big things.  Something would bring the group crashing down eventually.  Until that time, I would enjoy the ride and let things unfold at their own pace.

     Looking back on Youth Gone Wild, the MSN Groups version, I have no regrets.  Youth Gone Wild lives on on Facebook.  I re-created it there for those who want to continue the ride there.  Somewhere, Youth Gone Wild will be in the back of someone's mind and they'll be like "Damn, I should have joined that group."  We were awesome then, and we're awesome still.  We've also all matured and settled down.  Those that want to get rowdy again can just listen for the call.

     Looking back on my experience in MSN Groups as a whole...I wouldn't trade it for the world.  The friends I have made are some of the coolest ever from all over the globe.  The memories I have hold a special place in my heart.  I am very thankful for the success I had as a manager.  I'm also thankful that other managers allowed me to be on their management team so I could learn and evolve as a manager myself.  So, regrets?  No.  Not a one.

Where I've Been...And Where I Want To Go...

"I started out by just wanting people's attention.  Now that I have everyone's attention, what do I have to say?"  --Madonna

     Seems like an interesting conundrum to be in, don't you think.  My reasons to get the internet to begin with back in 2001 were to keep connected to a family that was getting increasingly distant from each other, geographically speaking.  At this time, I had family that lived in Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Indiana and Illinois (mostly Illinois, but still).  I lived in Effingham, Illinois at the time and really couldn't go see anyone unless my parents swung through and picked me up.  Thus was my reason, initially for getting the internet.

     The internet at this time was very primordial and primitive.  For example, I had a notebook of urls and other stuff like that for favorite websites.  One of my earliest faves was the old www.wcwwrestling.com when Nitro was kicking RAW's butt in the ratings war.  About nine months into having the internet, I just decided to dive headlong into the whole experience just to "see what was out there" (as I told my therapist in Effingham).  Little did I know that what was out there would give me a series of semi-epiphanies that would change my life to some degree of relevance.

     I downloaded MSN Messenger to keep up with my family and chat with them since the geographic distance left it hard for me to go visit face to face.  I will tell anyone who cares that I am HORRIBLE over the phone.  When I would be typing, it became so much easier for me to put my thoughts into text.  I noticed a feature on MSN Messenger that was called simply "Directory".  "Hmmm...wonder what this is?"  What it was would make the world I lived in at that time explode to unmeasurable and infinite boundaries.  I had discovered all the users that had MSN Messenger.

     I made my first internet "friend" around March of 2002.  Her name was Memory and she lived in California.  She would be one of the underlying reasons that my girlfriend at the time and I would split up just six weeks later.  Another "friend" would lead me to almost lose my job and others came and went.  Around June of 2002, I would be introduced to MSN Groups, and that's another entry altogether.  I will say about MSN Groups that it's where I met roughly one fifth of my Facebook friends list at.

     MSN Groups led to a hot site for late teens and early twentysomethings called MySpace.  MySpace had a ton of bad press when I joined it in 2004.  I tried harder than hell to keep it from interfering in my life by attempting to keep the drama away from my page.  Little did I know that MySpace would lead me to dizzying heights doing the job I love doing now.  If it weren't for MySpace, there would be no Vision Of Punk, Inc.

     Just like with MSN Groups, I met more interesting people on MySpace.  I cross-branded my MSN Group (Youth Gone Wild) with a MySpace group (given the same name) and landed the MSN Group at the #1 Activity spot for ten solid months of the fourteen it was in existance.  MySpace helped me to create Vision Of Punk, Inc., which is for internet based models to have an outlet to promote themselves.  Both Youth Gone Wild and Vision Of Punk, Inc. will be separate entries here sometime in the future.

     In 2006, shortly after my 10-Year High School reunion, I started feeling this urge to get back to my roots.  "Who am I?"  "Have I lost who I am at the core because of the internet?"  "Can I keep up with the rest of my class?"  Facebook would replace MySpace as my preferred method of keeping connected.  I would find roughly half of Shelbyville (IL.) High School's Class of 1996, as well as everyone that I went to Elementary School with in Findlay, IL.  That made for a friends list of 80 right there combined with the roughly 35 that I brought over from MySpace to Faceboook that was in the MSN Group I had.  I found my roots and didn't let the other stuff interfere as much.

     My mom would say I live off the internet.  I'm no different than the settlers that came over from England in the 1700s.  I'm no different than the explorers that settled the West in the 1800s.  I'm no different than the men and women that would reach the heavens from 1900 to 1970.  There's a ton out there in cyberspace that I personally want to explore.  Weather my curiousity will be satiated remains to bee seen.  I do know that my thirst for knowledge never will be satiated, so I might as well look at the world from a safe place.

An Intro to My Life...

     So, this isn't going to be some fluff piece blog that I will feel compelled to write in everytime someone demands it.  I will make every effort to write in this blog once every other week to let people in on my life.  I've put myself out there for the last seven years, and I've never had an online blog like Blogger or anything else like it.  I did keep a MySpace Blog for almost two years before I got rid of it.

     I go by Falco Polaris on the internet.  Too many psychotic lunitics out there in cyberspace to give out my real name, but I'm really not too hard to find.  All one has to do is dig deep enough in cyberspace and they'll find out my real name.  I am original, deep and full of insight that might make you see the world in a different light than you might already see it in.

     My life hasn't been easy.  I am a diagnosed Schizoaffective, Depressive Type.  I also suffer from siezures.  I have a great support system and a strong sense of faith that I have been called by a higher power to give hope to those who search for it.  I have more support than I need and all the support I want in my life.  My Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, has seen me through my darkest hours and brought me into a light like no other.

     My family is the most important thing in my life.  I've never wanted for anything because of them.  My mom and dad have been there for me through everything and have never wavered in their support of my path in life.  Granted they've disagreed with the path I've taken from time to time, but they've let me make those mistakes.  I do have a sister who is married with three kids.  Her and I haven't seen eye to eye much either, but we do love each other.

     I have never been able to make friendships that easy.  I've relied on the internet to keep friendships I've had over the course of time and (cyber)space, never taking the time to savor any.  I guess that dates back to my adolescence, when I moved what seemed like every three or four months to a different address in a different town.  I'd loose touch and not want to try keeping in touch due to being busy in the new place.

     I have a son.  He is everything that I was when I was a child.  He's headstrong, stubborn and my Mini-Me.  Every time I see him, it's like looking in a mirror, because the similarities never cease to amaze me.  I love him with my heart and soul.  As much as friends and family are my past and present, my son is my future.  He is everything I've wanted and more than I deserve.

     Can I ask for anything else in life??  Yes, I can.  I'd love to hold a girl my age close to my mind, body, heart and soul.  Until I have that, I won't feel complete.  There have been a few take a chance since I got divorced in 2007.  None of them have been able to keep and hold my interest, though.  I'm just having too much fun being single and enjoying my life as a single, non-custodial father.  Should one come along to hold my interest, than I will be happy and rejoice.  She'll have to be everything I need and want and more than I deserve.

The following is where you can find Falco Polaris flying high at:

http://www.myspace.com/hollywoodandrewkunzeman

http://www.facebook.com/hollywoodandrewkunzeman

htttp://www.twitter.com/FalcoPolaris