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Welcome 343 Industries Community to a very special 2 year anniversary write-up that's totally not egotistical and self-centered at all because BZ came up with the idea and I agreed to it! This is the 343! Insider story of the now 2 year old member, Drizzy_Dan. 2 years ago on this very day entered a noob to the forum world. He was looking for more about Halo news and wanted to get in contact with people from 343 like BS Angel and others. So he Googled 343's website and naturally the first to come up was this one. Yes, he was looking for the official site but when he got here he could tell that this was not it and so he created a thread to introduce himself to the, very very small at the time, community here under his first username which can be found here. After being greeted by so many welcoming and high ranking members I had already felt this homey feeling like joining this site was something I should've done a long time in advance. After receiving some advice from someone near and dear to me on the site saying it's probably best I don't use my full name as my username, I changed it and became Drizzy_Dan. That someone if you're wondering was Absolute Dog and that's where my respect grew for him. He saw something in me as soon as I joined and became more active and would go out of his way to give me advice and was never harsh on me when it came to moderating even though my bio used to have curses in it when I first joined making me look like the perfect candidate for a ban. The avatar's always been there and has never changed along with the signature. I can count the amount of times I've changed my signature on one of my hands. How did the name Drizzy_Dan come to me? Well since I joined I thought being on Staff would be cool but I never thought I'd do it so I chose a name consisting of what I liked. That was rap, hip hop, and R&B, and my favorite artist who produces that type of music is none other than Drizzy more commonly known as Drake whom my avatar was already of. Drizzy_Dan just stuck and has almost been around for as long as I have. The active community back when I joined was small enough where everyone talked to everyone on the daily. All the same names were in the Shoutbox and forums. Some of the first people I talked to were big names on the site and not so big anymore like Quantum, Vitamin PWN, Itz Lilbeast, Absolute Dog, Spectral Jester, One, SuperIntendant, Mr. Biggles, Ms. Mystic, Archangel Tyrael, Bullet, ZB, Firen, ShadowMagnum, Kurt S-501, and adamj. A lot of these members I'm still friends with today. April 17, 2012 was when I made my first big contribution to this site besides being friendly. Biggles had made his MoM Wish to have a whole forum for Offbeat Items which is the one you see today. Being into multimedia journalism in my freshman year of school and having this need to want to know more about the members and bring something new to the site, the idea of Interviews with Stars of the Community popped into my head. And with ZB being my best friend on the site at the time, I made him my guinea pig. It was a success as most of you can see today and it continued to be weekly and became a passion of mine because they were enjoyable and I had the time. As the months passed my involvement grew on and off the site. I was attending Playdates, doing interviews, and staying active in the forums and in the Shoutbox. During the months of summer I was even part of the member group that chose the Top 15 List. On May 26th, 2012, a dream that I had been striving for but never thought possible when I joined was realized. I received a PM from a former Community Moderator known as One. He told me I'd been doing a great job and the Staff thought I'd make a great addition as the head of Promotions and Events and although I was nervous at first, I took the job of course which started my career on Staff. I became the head of Promotions and Events. From there on I was Drizzy_Dan. Fall of 2012 however I went on a short unannounced hiatus because of schoolwork and other things. Around the same time this year I came with a vengeance and took over Absolute Dog's spot of hosting weekly Playdates on the different Halo games. After a couple months of hosting and only getting a small group of members that I called my Regulars i.e. D-38 Boss, JL, Frankenzer, HaloGeek, Elite Snip3r, etc. the Playdates began to die and so did my interest in hosting them. Absolute Dog came to me with a request in this time period and offered me my second Staff job since I was back for good and promoted me to the News Group where he tasked me with the most important task I have today besides moderating the site I love so much. Absolute Dog had come up with the Weekly Site Wrapup and gave me full permission to include anything I found newsworthy in it and encouraged me to use sources for things when I didn't attend them to get a good analysis. And that is when I became Drizzy_Dan. The WSW is something I also love doing. After months of the Playdates and making the Wrapups, AD had a talk with me. We met on Skype and he gave me the rundown of what it was to be a Community Moderator on the site and that put everything into perspective for me. I always thought being a Moderator was something I'd never too because the workload is humongous but with a Moderating Team like ours, nothing is impossible. Absolute Dog made me a full time Community Moderator on the site after a couple of weeks of secret modding for training. June 18th, 2013 it became official and I've never been in a more proud position on this site. For now I am the Drizzy_Dan you see before you.. On your computer screen. Today I've come to know almost every member old and new and have made even more great friends. A good list would be people like BZ who came up with this idea to celebrate my joinday (a term which he coined), RedStarRocket, The Director, Zelda, Azaxx, Sparky, My Regulars, My Interviewees, The Moderating Team, the previous Moderating Team whom are Legendary Members now rightfully so, Choot 'em , DoctorB77, fzdw11, The entire Staff old and new, The New Bloods, SweatyBagels, Sikslik, Zaguroth, Caboose the Ace, SternuS, Skiys, Twinreaper, Insignia, TWAM.. Ugh there's too many to honestly count. But that's just a testament to how close knit this community really is because all the members reading this can probably say that they're all friends with those members listed above as well. Anyway I know this was a long and dragging read but I just want to say thank you to all the members, Staff, and Admin that make this place what it is today. We've lost good members and we've gained good members but one thing is for certain, and that is that this site has a very bright future. When I joined it was like a golden age on this site where things were always buzzing and now when I look at it: the Staff's been revamped, the members are trying hard to contribute and be active and friendly while staying vigilant and reporting things that they know are against the rules, members are striving for goals on this site, we have connections to other sites made, and good old members have come back to see how the site is doing and are here to stay. So I'd say it looks like another golden age is upon us and I'm glad to be apart of it as should all of you. 2 years ago today I joined WOO! And I hope to be here for many more! Thank you 343i Community Forum. HAIL TWAM