June 25, 2009
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One of the new (and not so improved) features on Xanga since I’ve been “gone” is the “True” badge. While surfing sites today I came across the quite intelligent and articulate Xangan, Lynnjynh9315, who was asking the question, “What exactly is a Xanga Celebrity?”:
Oh, this makes me chuckle.
I think I can speak from more experience than any other commenter here, considering I first signed up for Xanga on December 23, 2000. That makes 8½ years.
In those early days, you could, with some effort, actually visit every single individual Xanga site and user in existence. This built a wonderful sense of community– like a small school or town, it was actually possible for everyone to know everyone else. Now, of course, there’s millions of users (or sites, anyway) and the analogy is probably more like that of a very large high school. There’s going to be a popular “clique” and those individuals will make themselves ever so visible so that they gain even more popularity. Others will stay in their own groups but occasionally cowtow to the popular kids. Still others couldn’t care less and just stay in their own small circle of friends.
But even in those early days, there was “Featured Content” and really early on, you could actually see ranking lists by total eProps, total comments, etc. The Xangods decided that was creating too much competition and *gasp* drama so they dropped that. The “True” badge is a much more recent development and is generally resented by older Xangans, like myself, who feel they were the ones whose efforts in the early years built Xanga into a successful site– and this is how the Xanga team rewards us? By saying that the past doesn’t matter, what matters is how active you are starting now; and thereby someone who has been here eight days can already have a “True” badge whereas someone who has hung around for eight years may not.
The clever retort– and I don’t know who created it– is a badge of similiar size and style, but it reads “FALSE” upside down. I’ve got to get that.
The badge that should really carry weight– and so far as I can see, I’ll be the only comment here to display it– is the “LIFE” badge. But that’s just my humble opinion.
To finally answer the question, I think there’s no such thing as a “Xanga Celebrity” and that’s why you can’t find a clear-cut definition. It’s an artificial construct of the minds of some who would actually care about such a thing. I think that speaks for itself in regards to their priorities.
Comments (7)
Ah… I remember those old days of Xanga well. I came in April 01, so a few months behind you… lured into Xanga’s grasp by… Bianca? Wasn’t that the name?
I like the kid’s comments sometimes. A random kid… usually during the summer… dropping by with a “U R old” comment.
Xanga is a different world than it was, for certain.
Yep…. I am one of the “oldies” as well. I think I joined in Nov. 2000? I actually didn’t really notice all the badges until now. I mean, I guess I noticed them, but I never really thought about how you got one! LOL. Now I think you’re right–I definitely deserve a “true” badge!
I’ve been sad because a lot of my old Xanga friends are now gone or inactive.
@espoir - @warweasel - Hello xangarelics all (hail bianca). Yeah, I kinda wanted a true badge at first, and then I realized you need to have the runs to get one. Why is it less “true” to write quality, less often? I don’t know, and I don’t care.
A xanga celebrity is an interesting construct. I used to feel pretty good back in the day when I could get 20 something comments, sometimes more. I remember getting 70 eprops on a post once and I thought I was famous! It’s nice to have the encouragement, and it could indicate that you got something to work with, if you were to somehow manage greater exposure, but at the end of the day, that’s just not really a lot of people.
Nowadays people get more, especially if they get on the front page with their post about their 4th grade flirting skills (actually that one was mildly entertaining).
i got true without even trying. i’m an older xanganite than you
Member Since:
12/19/2000 . but also i guess i never stopped writing nor ever changed the name like prom did and you too.don’t comment or post as much as i used to, but never have stopped either.
i even remember some of your big posts jason; pepsi vs coke? boxers vs. thongs? lol.
I think it still works the same, only on a bigger scale ; you want to be a famous xanganite thiese days, post something about sex or pop culture, and then massively – but REALLY massively now – visit other active posters, prop and get propped in return. . . .
@loopdeloup - Uhhh like I would have ever resorted to such blatantly inane posts. Ahem… OK, but it was actually boxers vs. briefs. (I still haven’t tried thongs).
And looking back over that first month on the original site, it appears that in addition to such intellectual polls, I was most often writing about…
1) not blogging consistently
1) popularity contests among Xangan
Looks like some things never really change.
Andy– I think my top post was 50 eprops and 30 comments, or somewhere around that. I was pretty damn excited at the time. It was sometime in the summer of 2001, definitely before 9/11.
Jason!! Jason LIVES! It’s so nice to see you around here, and I’m glad that my badge tickled you
Sadly, I can’t claim credit, but – equally sadly – I can’t remember who created it. I did give credit in my ranty-mc-cross-athon post about the True malarkey (what a pile of dross THAT is) which John read – he even offered to call me to discuss it but it was like 3am here and I had more important things to do than explain how alienating a huge proportion of your most loyal customers was, y’know, dumb. I can see how much attention he paid, anyway 
So as long as they have the True crap, I shall retain this. But rest assured, I wasn’t the only one affronted: someone else, with far more authority to do so (having lived through it) associated the True badge with a yellow star.
I’m a relative newbie compared to you (Aug 2001) but I still reckon that closing in on eight years of having put up with vanishing posts, buggy comments, outages left, right and centre and the litany of other issues Xanga has had over the years makes me more true than some of the people I’ve seen flaunting the badge.
I miss those old days, too, where we could either pander to the cool kids or not, but we all KNEW each other. That was nice – it’s not like that quite so much anymore, but it’s great to see you back
How’s Maria??
True Badge? I must not have gotten that e-mail.