Welcome to Gaia! ::

Ok guys, I know I don't really go on most Avatar-related sites and stuff, but I went on dongbufeng and noticed something disturbing. . .

Almost no one was there.

Usually, like 10 people are always chatting in chat, and yet there was only one other person there.

It's not just Dongbufeng, either.

Capstara has been averaging less than 5 posts per day lately, down from about 8 posts per day back in May.

Also, under recent updates on fancition.net ratings K-M, only 6 out of 25 on the first page are Zutara fics. Most are Kataang.

What am I suggesting?

A super-mega-awesome Zutara contest, maybe? And discussion of the good ol' days? Yep. Or Maybe Plan a get together at the guild? Yep.

Here's my plan so far for a contest:
-We can officially start the contest in February (for the whole month, in honor of Avatar's 4 year anniversery)
-The main catagories could be fanart, fanvids, fanfics, and maybe icon/animation/profile layouts for various sites/banner/ect. making or something
-There should be a limit to 3 of each main catagory per person, with series/sequals/prequals/continuations counting as one entry.
-We should start writing fanfics/drawing fanart/making fanvids now!
-Voting should begin in November or so.
-We can have several catagories for fanfics: Old School Fanfics and Capture Fics (Season 1; i.e. Hunter and the Prey, Everything for a Price), Zuko Joins the Group Fanfics (All Seasons), Ba Sing Se Fics (Season 2; i.e. Dancing in the Dark), Alternate Ending fics (All seasons, for example, What if Katara had healed Zuko's scar? What if they had ended up together during the finale?), Post-Avatar Break Up fics (Mai and Zuko breaking up, Katara and Aang breaking up, and Katara ending up with Zuko), AU and Crossover Fics, Bluetara/Painted Blue/ or Zuko/Painted Lady (i.e. When the Mask Comes off), and Misc. (All seasons, i.e. Stormbenders, and other ones that I need to think up a catagory for) with subcatagories for each subcatagory, like Oneshot, multichapter, in progress and sorted by rating (K, K+, T, T+) I'm not sure if Gaia would allow it if we did M-rated fanfics and might ban us, espcially since there are under-18s in the guild.
-Two Main Catagories for Art, comics and non-comics. Each one with subcatargories. Comics: AU comics (i.e. The AU), Post-Avatar Comics (Revealing Destiny), Comedy Comics, usually involving interferance by Bryke or us, but anything shattering the 3rd wall is a good (Zutara Cave by sora-ko is a great example), Zuko Joins the Group Comics, And all the same ones as fanfics. Non-Comics based on the seasons, 1,2,3. All should have ratings (K, K+, T, T+)
-Three Main Fanvid Catagories, Music Videos, Episodic (like A Zutara Story) and Educational (i.e. Zutara Evidence for the Intellectual Dummy). Music based on music genre. All should be divided into four sub-catagories, Uses only fanart, Uses Still Screencaps, Uses actual video or uses some combo of the three. All videos should have ratings (K, K+, T, T+)
-Have people vote on which is best.
- Either host the contest here, or do a joint project with other major Zutara sites/Forums (i.e. DH Zutara Topic, the Zutara LJ) and tell major artists/fanfic writers/fanvid makers about it to help.

Again this is JUST AN IDEA. I want your opinions on whether or not this is a good idea. I think it needs a lot of tweaking, but I need your suggestions.

As for the get together:
-Get together = trying to get as many people as possiable on the guild at once.
-It should happen later, like in 2009, perhaps on an important day in Zutara history, like April 29, 2009 (Day The Waterbending Scroll first aired), October 7, 2009 (Day Bato of the Water Tribe first aired and Jun was introduced.) Dec 1st or 2nd, 2009 (Days CoD and Season 1 Finale first aired), May 26, 2009 (The Chase), July 17, 2009 (1 year anniversery of Southern Raiders) at a pre-established time (I suggest sometime between 5-8, though if if it's a weekday at 7 or 8 or a weekend at all, I can't make it.

Any other ideas welcome!

EDIT: Wait. . . can a mod please move this to the Contest Sub-Forum? (Sorry, I didn't notice it when I posted this. . .)

I noticed things have been getting a little less active lately, too, but that always happened during the episode droughts, so I wouldn't worry too much. Things are just a little quieter without the excitement of new moments and theories and whatnot. We'll never fully die. >D

Still, I think the get-together/epic contest is a good idea. =D I say either the anniversary of TSR, or the anniversary of CoD, since those were pretty epic moments in the history of Zutara.

Like I said before, I don't think I should organize the contest. I can help, but I'm very bad at stuff like that. School is so annoying.

Also, we should get other Zutarians to help us with the idea. Like if you guys have friends who are Zutarians, but don't have a Gaia or anything, ask them if they think it's a good idea. Like I said before, we should include Zutarians outside the guild.

@kagomehime369, I'd agree with you, except I've been lurking in this fandom since the summer of '05. Stuff always slows down a bit, but never this much. Part of it has to do with Avatar ending, and another thing is some of the important Avatar sites have stopped updating (ASN still hasn't added the screencaps, info about the Path of Zuko game, ect, Dongbufeng hasn't updated much either and people have stopped going on chat.)
February would be a nice time, since Avatar started in February and Valentine's Day is that month. But maybe we could do two contests? One general Avatar, non-shipping one in February with all the other Avatar guilds and another at TSR anniversary, since it's in the summer and people tend to be bored then.

A Zutara meetup at SDCC? Noooo.... (I can't go to SDCC until I'm like 17....) Is there a thread here for it?

Should I start setting up this contest somewhere? It's almost February, after all (Plus, I feel like I've been really neglecting this place lately xP).

Though, I'm a little confused on exactly what plan we agreed on. ^.^;; Is it a General ATLA contest in February, and then the Zutara specific one in the summer?

Also, have we decided on what we're narrowing categories down to? I think 3-5 would be good, but I'd like input form others.