I’d like to present to you my self-made 1st birthday banner as a Teentalker.I woke up this morning to realize that tomorrow will be my first birthday as a Teentalker. I kept on realizing that time has gone so fast: it was just May 31 at around 11 am last year when I first caught a glimpse of Teentalk and signed up. I’ve also tried my luck of making new friends through joining the Total Girl board but it didn’t work because after a few posts I became inactive. The word “inactive” used to be my frequent status as a Talker when I was clueless about when to post a new topic (I soon learned that you have to reach 15 posts or the “sugar drops” status to make one), what to say on the featured topic, and how to introduce yourself to other Teentalkers who will be your future online buddies. Did you know that from June-October I rarely ever posted there? I had around 10 posts by October, but miraculously I raised my rank to “sugar drops” on December! It was because of Who’s Who, the place where you will make a thread to introduce yourself and find friends who have the same interests as you. I was a shy Teentalker before: once I posted in someone’s thread asking if we could be buddies, I would wait for her reply and never come back. I then thought that doing that won’t make you any true cyberfriends. You might be the subject when others talk about people who introduce then never return.
Summer vacation rolled around. All the blessings of being a Teentalker began to pour like falling rain. I kept on posting on Friendship and TV Talk. My rank reached up to jellybean before the end of March but by the time I had my 100th post I received my first boo. I’ve blogged about this around March, so check that month’s archive to read how sad I was. Beating out my sadness, I posted more on these two forums. Then there came the COPIED clan. I joined there and made lots of new friends. I even became their second founder! Although the clan is not as active as now, I became part of the Crazy Club. To tell you this, I loved it there! More friends were made and I was happy there. It was one of the first times I enjoyed chatting with cyberbuds where we could link exchange in blogs and add each other in our online accounts. As of now I enjoy posting in Who’s Who where I met more wonderful friends and learned a lot of lessons. And yesterday, I am officially a taffy! Being an active poster and a friendly person made me reach this far. So as my first Teentalk year has gone by, I am going to post 10 lessons that I’ve learned there.
1. Don’t judge a person by its username/avatar. Personal info is one way to hide our true identity, that’s why we make up creative usernames. Sometimes our username is “meangirl” but that doesn’t mean that person really is mean. Joining clans or making friends in Who’s Who is an opportunity to learn that we should not hate a person only because of his/her avatar or siggie. They might be your closest friends too!
2. Teentalk is a place not only to have fun but also to respect each other’s opinions. That’s the purpose of karma functions: yay a person if you like his/her opinion and boo if you disagree. Unfortunately, some booers do that for immature reasons.
3. Never, ever abuse one’s freedom. Similar to #2.
4. When you make friends in Who’s Who, always remember to drop by their thread and say hi. I’ve been doing that lately. My technique is to go to “Show replies to your posts” and drop by to the threads I’ve posted in. If before I’ll just say “Hello, friends?” and never come back, now I go to their threads everytime I log in to Teentalk.
5. It’s a place where you meet people who share with you the same interests. PBB fever, Samsters, J. Bros fans, Callalistas, Robilievers, fans galore! Be free to say in your interested topic, “I ♥ this!”
6. Give advice to teens who have problems. Lovelife, Homebound, Friendship, and You Go, Candy Girl! are places to seek and give advice. Time to reach out a helping hand!
7. Share some stories…but not the personal ones. Laugh and cry with the Teentalkers with your stories. Just don’t post the stories that you want to keep it to yourself.
8. Link exchanges are welcome! Long live tagging and bloghopping! That’s why lots of Teentalkers are posting their blogs, Friendsters, Multiply pages, and Deviantarts in their siggies or website icons. How about getting to know a Talker first, bloghop, and link exchanging? This will be the sure way to keep in touch.
9. What you are in the online world can reflect your real personality.
And most of all….10. HAVE FUN! Enjoy posting in each others’ threads, share the same interests, and enjoy!
