Happy New Year!! Let’s start this off by giving away free stuff!
It must have been the year I turned 21 that each day started by passing more and more quickly. I remember being 12 thinking I”d never be 16, then 18, then 21 and now I’m 4 months away from being 30. It means another year of growing BME has come and gone. It seems like the 2008 Awards were posted just a few days ago but it’s been a year. A whole year. We’ve seen so many ups and downs. This year marks the largest contribution by one person over the course of a year, which is also the largest contribution by one person during a year in the history of BME. There are also a couple faces here from last year that we couldn’t kick off the leader boards if we tried. Perk900, I’m talking to you, let’s see you get first place next year!! With this being the last day of 2009, I figured I’d kick it off right and present the 2009 Year End Contributor Awards!
You’ll also note that if you check the leader boards you’ll see different people listed in the top ten for image contributions than are listed below. Our 2nd and 3rd place winner is actually the same person so they’ve been combined and Jen gets disqualified and doesn’t get to win a contributor staff shirt because she already gets one for being staff! That moves everybody up one or two spots and that’s how we’ve come up with the list below.
If you are on the list, you’ll be contacted by me personally. If you don’t hear from me, check your spam or please email me with your address and shirt size to [email protected]. We will be sending out a very special surprise to the top contributor in each section!
I’m throwing in some BME trivia for you all to enjoy as well:
BME Facts:
Photos: 4,493,138
Experiences: 46,980
Videos: 7,942 (plus more that have been posted on Modblog!)
Posts on Modblog: 8,061
Comments on Modblog alone: 177,491
Average Daily Modblog readers; 112,387
Tattoo & Piercing Shops listed on 411.BME: 10,680 (not including the shops that are pending verification
Countries with users on BME: 70
Ask.BME answers: 1,083 (not including the previous version of the QOD)
Ask.BME comments: 2,870
There are tons of other things I haven’t included but I just wanted to show what we have all built together and thank you all again for contributing to BME and making the site what it is today.
TOP 10 IMAGE CONTRIBUTORS
1. 45,802 images
See the rest of this year’s top contributors after the break!
2. 15,488 images kokomi.3k |
3. 2,717 images Perk900 |
4. 1.014 images Alienboy |
5. 872 images UREA |
6. 626 images China Tattoo Portfolio |
7. 577images Allen Falkner |
8. 560 images LilFunky1 |
9. 559 images JOSEPH DOWNUNDER |
10. 473 images Thou_Art |
TOP 9 EXPERIENCE CONTRIBUTORS
1. 7 experiences  Devro |
2. 7 experiences  Larry666 |
3. 6 experiences (tie)  Bluestar |
3. 6 experiences (tie)  MissBrutal |
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4. 5 experiences (tie) hoboqueen
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4. 5 experiences (tie) ScarlettRose |
4. 5 experiences (tie)
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4. 5 experiences (tie) sevendaze |
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4. 5 experiences (tie)  Ycul
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Experience Reviewers:
I wanted to add in a special thank you to our reviewing volunteers who vote on experiences so they can be added to the site. Without them, Jen and I would be reading a lot of experiences and going cross eyed. Experience reviewers earn credits towards limited edition tshirts through out the year. The 25 linked are logged by experience reviews for all time, not broken down by year which is why they’re generally not included in the Year End Awards but I wanted to give them some extra recognition and say thank you again for the reviewing that you do. I appreciate it a lot.
EDITORIAL CONTRIBUTORS
Tiff Badhairdo |
Meg Barber |
Brian Decker |
Stephen DeToma |
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Warren Hiller |
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John Joyce |
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Lexci Million |
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Sean Philips |
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Lori St. Leone |
Steve Truitt |
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Since everyone works from home, I’m not able to give each and every one of them a huge hug and say thank you for all the help that they do behind the scenes in making BME such a great place, not to mention keeping it updated, the servers running properly and the members happy! If you can, drop them a line and say thanks! Without them, I’d probably go crazier than I already am!
BME STAFF
 Phil Barbosa Image processing, party planning, mustache rides |
 Mike Brum Server maintenance, TOS banhammer |
 Jen Savage Customer service, loud noises |
RETIRED BME STAFF
 Jordan Ginsberg Former Witty Guy who took amost two years of beatdowns courtesy of Modblog |
RooRaaah Crumbs |
 Tristan Henry-Wilson Designer Extroidinarre, whom we call upon from time to time! |
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Jonathon Marshall |
 Jason Former Admin |
 Shannon Larratt BME’s founder and former EIC |
I can’t thank everyone enough for continuing to support BME, not only the site itself but the community that it has fostered over the years. I look forward to a new year with new goals, obstacles and hopefully many many triumphs. The first one being the long overdue launch of the new Beta BME Galleries, then the rest of BME and finally the transition of IAM onto the new software. I’ll be able to start adding new features, aside from the ones already implemented in the new site, and BME can continue to grow while giving itself back to the community where it belongs. I can’t wait!
I also wanted to give a special thank you to the people who have contributed to BME’s Legal Defense Fund. To date we’ve raised $1,470.00, which certainly helps. As I’ve mentioned before any and cost recovered if we’re awarded attorney’s fees will be donated to BME’s Legal Defense Fund that I’ve started to help defend the body modification community at large.
And now what you’ve all been waiting for, this year’s award is the t-shirt below! I wanted to figure out how to make a shirt that said “I was a top contributor to BME and all I got was a bag of dicks!” but Alie K. came up with this great design! Check more of her work out at GoodTattoos.ca if you want to get tattooed by her or need someone to do design work. She’s come up with more than a few gems for BMEshop.
Rachel Larratt
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BME/News and Modblog highlight only a small fraction of what
Congratulations to Devro, this year’s top experience author, whose eleven experiences I had the pleasure of reviewing in 2009 – and to the eight runners-up. My thanks go, too, to the authors of all the 2,651 submissions I reviewed last year, and whose literary efforts kept me inspired, informed, enlightened, amused and occasionally bemused during the year. Look forward to lots more to come in 2010!
Awww, Meg. I miss her, she was one of my favorite people in Cincinnati until we both had to up and move.
damn, my last submission wasn’t counted for, and i thought that the top20 would get a reward.
guess i’ll try again for the 2010 reward.
Ha! The shirt is brilliant!!
over 45 thousand pictures in a year? that is so insane.
the shirt is awesome!!
I miss Jordan Ginsberg.
Congratulations to everyone mentioned. I have a comment though.
“Bonus gallery” people should be in a separate category. It seems a little unfair that a person can submit 45,000+ pictures of themselves (and I have to wonder if even the most hardcore fans want that many or can even look at that many), but a piercer that submits 1,000 different photos, who has obviously done a ton more work and contributed a ton more to the site doesn’t take the #1 spot.
I like her pictures, but I just think that anyone can send in 45,000 pictures of themselves. Someone who actually fills out all the galleries with different photos that are all interesting and valuable to the site deserves the award a lot more. I also have to wonder about whether a person who goes to a BBQ and submits 600 photos of the event that can’t possibly be of interest to anyone other than the people who were at the even really deserves to outrank them.
I think you should give some special recognition to Alienboy. To me he is the top contrbutor.
Bena: If your submissions didn’t get sent in and processed before the 20th then they weren’t counted. I don’t see you on the top 100 list though. 🙁
Master: It’s a little rude to say that one persons contributions are worth more than another. The year end contributor awards are based on the quantity of the submissions, not the quality and diversity. As everyone submits photos of themselves or other people, the fact that Kitano’s photos are of herself and not of clients does not lessen her submissions. Kitano has been a top contributor for years and continues to contribute as a dedicated member of the community. They are both getting the same tshirt regardless of their position on the ranking list. Perk900, who is the person you’re referencing has also been a dedicated member of the community and always appears on the top list year after year. If you’re saying that I should not honor those long time contributors because you feel someone in the fourth position should take their spots even though he’s only submitted half of what Perk has, that is your opinion. The year end awards aren’t going to be changed as this is how they’ve been for years.
Your argument was definitely not convincing enough to make me change a well established recognition process.
<3
Master:
I’m not worthy… I’m not worthy…
I for one highly respect artists who submit their work.
Me, i’ve always taken pictures, whether it be work that I have gotten, events that i’ve attended, procedures that was asked to document or body art performances.
But to discount my contributions because I am not an artist is just not fair.
Come on, I’m pretty awesome.
I will say that I have been on the leader board for contributions since 2003 and and happy to continue to contribute.
I’ve documented numerous BBQs, BMEfests, Suscons, The Scar Wars events, Tattoo Conventions, Birthday partys, and Bar Mitzvahs.
So, i’m not that bad, am I?
That’s not fair. I want my own little asian sex-slave I:(
I’m very thankful for events that are documented centrally – Brian, please continue to send in all those pictures!
Lori St. Leone is the greatest piercer in Australia.
Congrats to all 🙂
Agreed. Granted, I’m a bit biased because I adore Brian, but as long as BME continues to serve as both a community -and- an educational (etc.) resource someone should be out there documenting the fun times that were had and inspiring others to plan their own.
Congrats to all the year-end winners.
hehehehhehe BY FREAK UREA eheheh
Each and every single person up there deserves recognition. Personally though I believe every person to hold a BME membership, IAM membership, supports what BME/IAM is all about,etc deserves recognition. Because by supporting the entire scope of BMEZine is essentially what its all about. But that’s just me.
As for your statement Master, in regards to Kitano and even Brian (Perk900). Please be aware the same can be said for piercers as well. I personally know I was guilty in the past of taking multiple number of pictures of the same client/piercing and submitting them to BME. Afterall I felt I should photograph angle after angle to best display what I was putting up.
A piercer taking 10 shots of one piercing, is no different then a non-piercer taking multiple shots of themselves. Or someone who attends a number of events and documents them.
BME didn’t become the most extensive resource of written experiences and photographs by people holding back on the image/written submissions.
Hope everyone has a happy and progressive 2010!
48502 pix divided by 365 days in a year = 125.48 pix per day. Give the benefit of the doubt and say she sleeps 8 hours a day (which apparently she doesn’t) and thats about 8 pix per hour. Id say that was impressive if it wasn’t the same pictures over and over, so I kind of agree with master
However, brian definitely deserves his space up there because he pretty much documents all the bme events and its great to see all the iam/bme people in a regular atmosphere the way he does it, instead of just standing and showing off a piercing/tattoo.
awe modblo! xD
About what I contributed a photograph of Eva to more than 45,000 pieces, it was criticized by all of you.
I took a picture by my selfish judgment.
They would be included in the work which did not match a purpose of BME.
However, I still transmitted them.
I wanted to record one girl transformed herself into with body mods beautifully, passing.
It was only BME & IAM that I showed a photograph.
If there are a lot of members refusing it, I retire myself from BME.
I apologize to the member who felt my contribution unpleasantly, and I will become extinct from here.
I agree with master. we have seen every inch of kk. its getting old
I miss Shannon.
I STILL haven’t got my shirt!
me either san… me either.
I like the shirt… 😉