Okay, I know I’ve answered this before somewhere on my blog but I cannot for the life of me find where and with new followers I may as take it on again.
I’d love to answer a question from you so fill in the survey or DM on twitter.
Hello Karandi! As a kind-of-new anime blogger (one month), I’d love to know how you started off as an anime blogger. I admire your writing style and your blog in general. Learning more about the origins of your blog would be pleasant (if it isn’t too much to ask). Thank you! ( ᐛ )
Anon
You know there are moments when you read something and it makes you feel really good but at the same time your whole face feels like it is on fire and you want to hide under a table? Maybe it is just me. However, this question made me feel really good about my blog while at the same time made me genuinely break out in a blush.
But you know, I should probably answer the actual question. As I said in the introduction, I know I’ve talked about why I started a blog and how I started previously but blogs and their communities are constantly changing and while there are a few readers who I know have been with me since nearly the beginning, there’s a lot of new readers who have come along, so revisiting this is probably a good idea from time to time.
The real hint is in the name ‘100 Word Anime’. At the time when I started the blog, I hadn’t been writing fiction for a long time because work was busy and I was getting frustrated with starting a project and then not being able to work on it and losing momentum and so I just kind of stopped. I’ve always written fiction for fun and going for a length of time without writing was making me even more frustrated. I was also trying to find people to discuss anime with and using the Curnchyroll forums, Reddit and other discussion boards and the like but found that wasn’t so much a conversation as a shout factory with everyone just trying to score points rather than converse.
Someone close to me suggested I start a blog to write about what I was watching and that maybe that would be a good way to meet people to talk about anime (they were so right but I don’t think they realised it at the time). The title came about because I was just going to write 100 words about what I just watched and that was my only real intention when I started the blog. You know, because I couldn’t use the excuse I was too tired. 100 words was an achievable target and it got me writing again.
Turns out writing is contagious and the ani-blogging community is so incredibly supportive. I seldom managed to only write 100 words and I soon branched into features and top 5 lists and so on as well as episode reviews. 3 and a half years later and I’m still finding it to be a joy to write about anime and certainly I’ve found a community to talk to about the shows I’m watching. I think what keeps it all going is just how much fun it is interacting with this community and I never seem to run out of stuff to write about.
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Obviously, my intentions for the blog grew over time and now I’d really love to make this my main focus. I’m not at a point where I can do that yet, but one day I’d love to say that I’m a blogger and not add that it is as a hobby. But for now I’ll thank the readers I have for taking the time to stop by and if I can open up a discussion or give others a place to talk about anime then I think the main goal of the blog is still being met.
Now I’m going to ask my readers to share their origin story if they write a blog. Of course if you want to ask me a question please DM me on Twitter or complete the survey.
Thank-you for reading 100 Word Anime.
Join the discussion in the comments.
Karandi James
I love your stories. They are always so inspiring.
This is the first time I read your origin story. Then again I’m pretty new to the community.
The reason why I started my blog. Well if I’m being honest, I was so TORN apart by the ending of Banana Fish I had to express my emotions. It dived a little into mental health and that is a topic that is near and dear to me so I really wanted a platform to talk to anime lovers and also people that they are awesome, they are loved, and don’t give up. Then, I stumbled across this awesome and supportive community and now I talk about anime all I want to! Or at least when I get back to reliable Wifi in America. 😅
Reliable wi-fi is kind of a must for running a blog. And yes, the community here is so supportive and it makes talking about anime so much fun.
I remember reading your origin story at one point in the past, but have pretty much forgotten all the details…
My own origin story is that I found some WordPress blogs and wanted to write like that. I generally point to Scott and you if I need to attribute a person that convinced me to switch to WordPress, but I did encounter other WP bloggers before that.
For the planned narrative, I (the version of me in the story) found a spellbook one day and was using it to explore the magic of anime and manga, hence the tagline.
Okay, now I feel like I actually need some kind of story only I’m completely lacking ideas.
I think I’ve read your blog origin story a while ago, so I know you’ve written it somewhere.
For me, it’s a rather simple one. An anime podcast that I used to listen to called Podtaku died and I decided that I needed to do something to fill the whole in the anime sphere. I didn’t know how to use video editing software or like my voice, so I started blogging. The rest is history.
Yeah, I know my origin is somewhere but I couldn’t for the life of me find the post where I would have written it and figured I have enough new readers that a revisit wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
My origin story? Cursed into the form of a talking cartoon fish by a half-mad deity known only as the Writer, the Infallible Fish has no idea who he is, or where he comes from, all he does know is that he has a burning urge to watch some animated stuff.
At least that’s what I came up with when I had a planned narrative for my blog. The real origin is that I’d been thinking about writing a blog for a little while, mostly to help with my writing and to build my confidence, but I didn’t know what to write about. Then I saw Frozen. I had issues with Frozen and I didn’t really have anywhere to talk about them, so that became my first review. Haven’t looked back since.
That’s a fantastic origin story.
It is interesting that once you start writing for a blog it is almost like a compulsion to keep going.
I can’t take full credit for the origin, I greatly inspired by the Unshaved Mouse, the story to his blog being that he was cursed into the form of an unshaved mouse by the immortal warlock Walt Disney because he didn’t like Beauty and the Beast. I gave up on the whole ‘reviews as part of an ongoing narrative’ fairly quickly though. I much prefer writing reviews as myself.
I love this style of blog pot. I might try something similar (animescience101)
Thanks for the answer! I’ve always been a huge sucker for origin stories so I just couldn’t hold back the urge to ask hehe.
Thanks for the question.