About KelpNet
This is the story of how KelpNet came to be.
Once upon a time there was a cheese. This cheese enjoyed being a cheese. It was a happy cheese. One day, the cheese met a mouse. The mouse was very hungry and wanted to eat the cheese. The cheese was scared and ran away. The mouse chased the cheese. The cheese ran and ran until it found a hole in the wall. The cheese jumped into the hole and escaped from the mouse, but the cheese would never guess what he would find on the other side.
He looked up at the big city in front of him. The cheese had only ever lived inside a small fridge before, and occasionally on the kitchen bench, so this was completely new to him. He looked up at a sign in front of him, which read "Welcome to Scratch!"
The cheese was confused, but he was also very curious. He walked into the city and looked around. There were lots of other people, but few cheeses. He noticed that everyone seemed to be working in market stands, solving weird kind of puzzles. He walked up to one of the stands and asked the person there what they were doing.
"I'm working on a platformer game!" the person said. "I need to make a sprite for my character, but I don't what it should look like..."
The cheese was even more confused. "What's a sprite?" he asked.
"You're new here aren't you?" the person said. "A sprite is basically the character or object that you control in a game. You can make it look like anything you want! ...but i don't know what to make mine..."
"Well how about a cheese!" the cheese said. "I mean, I am a cheese, and I think I look pretty good!"
The person thought for a moment. "That's a great idea! I can make a cheese sprite!"
"I have just one more question," the cheese said. "How are you making the game? I mean it looks to me like you're just putting a bunch of puzzle pieces together..."
"Ohhh, these are called blocks!" the person said. "They're basically little instructions that tell the sprite what to do. See, when I press the green flag putton over here, the project will begin!" The person pressed a green flag which was on the bench next to him, and out folded a screen. The cheese watched in amazement as a little cheese that looked just like him moved about.
"Incredible!" the cheese exclaimed. "Could I make a game too?"
"Of course!" the person said. "You can make anything you want! You just need to sign up for an account!"
The cheese was excited. "How do I do that?"
"Just go to the sign up page and fill out the form!" the person said. "It's really easy!"
The cheese thanked the person and walked off to a big tower in the distance that said "Sign up!". Out the front was a big line, which he joined. He watched as slowly everyone in front of him walked in, and then out holding a piece of paper. Eventually it was his turn.
"Hello! Can I please sign up for an account?" the cheese asked.
"Sure." the counter person said. "Take this. Fill it out. When you're done, come back and I'll give you everything you need."
The cheese took it and began to fill it out. The first question asked for his username. He wasn't quite sure what to do for this, so he just named it after himself. "Jamie" he wrote. But then, like magic, the paper started shaking, and the word "Jamie" was crossed out, and to the right of the input field it said "This username is already taken. Please choose another." The cheese was confused.
He decided to try another username. "JamieD" he wrote, but the same thing happened. He tried "JamieD123", but that was taken too. "How many accounts are their in this place?" he thought. He tried "JamieD132", and finally the paper didn't shake. The cheese was happy. He continued to answer the next questions, which were all pretty easy. When he finally finished, he joined the line infront of the sign up building again.
When his turn came, he handed the paper to the counter person. "Here you go!" he said.
"'k. Looks good. Now, take this badge, this box, and this market stand. Set up where you want." the counter person said.
Excitedly, the cheese headed back to where he met his friend earlier, and decided to set up his market next to theirs. Once he was done, he opened his box. Inside was a few sheets of paper, a bunch of puzzle piece blocks that looked like the ones he saw earlier, and a big green flag. He put the green flag on the table and his puzzle pieces in a pile next to it. He put down the paper on the able as well.
He looked at his badge. It said "New Scratcher" on it. Proudly, he put it on. "Now how do I start?" he asked his friend next door.
"First you should draw your first sprite." they said. "Use the paper, and their should be a pencil in the box too, to draw it. When you're done, you can write the name of your sprite on top, and it will seem to disappear. But don't worry, it's still stored in the projects memory."
The cheese did what his friend said, and drew a picture of himself. He wrote "Cheese" on top, and the sprite disappeared from the page. "Now what?" he asked.
"Now you need to code it!" they said. "First you should start with the 'When green flag clicked' block. This will make it so that when you press the green flag, your sprite will do something. You can find it in the events category." The cheese looked through the blocks and found the one his friend was talking about. He put it on the table.
"Now you need to add a block that will make your sprite move. You can find it in the motion category. There are lots of different blocks you can use to make your sprite move, but the one you want is the 'move 10 steps' block. This will make your sprite move 10 steps when you press the green flag." The cheese found the block and put it on the table.
"Now you can run your project!" his friend said. "Just press the green flag and your sprite will move!"
The cheese pressed the green flag, and out folded a screen. On it was an image of himself, and it moved to the right by a few steps. The cheese was amazed by what he had done.
"This is incredible!" he said. "Now I can make anything I want!"
And so for the next few years the cheese worked hard making games and projects. When he was done, he would take them and put them on a seperate stand where everyone could play them. At first he didn't get much views, but it slowly grew.
One day the cheese was feeling adventurous. He decided to go for a walk around the city. He discovered a user with a badge that said "New Scratcher" on it, which reminded him of when he first started. He walked up to the user and said "Hello! I see you're new here. Would you like some help?"
To his surprise, the user just didn't respond. They didn't even move. He looked at the name on their market stand. "Elaruu". He was confused, but decided to follow them anyway. He walked over to their public market stand and pressed the follow button before walking away.
The next day the cheese had completely forgoten about the user.
Six more months passed. The cheese began to wonder, who codes the best projects here? He looked around the city, checking everyones view count, before stumbling across one which was significantly higher than the rest. His name was "Griffpatch", and their were hundreds of users outside his public market stand. The cheese thought they were all their to play his games, and so he walked up to see what they were, but to his surprise, very few of them were.
In fact, almost all of them were just there to... talk! They were all standing around in a circle, talking about random things. The cheese was confused. "Why are they all just standing around?" he thought. "Shouldn't they be playing the game?" He decided to ask them what they were doing.
"We are griffpatchers." one said. "We just like to hang out over here. Because why not. It's fun I guess." The cheese was intrigued. "Can I join?" he asked.
"Sure!" they said. "Just come over here and stand in the circle with us." The cheese walked over and stood in the circle. He was happy to be part of something.
And from that day on, the cheese was a griffpatcher.
After another six months, the cheese woke up in the middle of the night. He had suddenly remembered something. He wasn't sure why, but a memory from a long time ago had somehow made it's way to the surface. "Elaruu". The cheese was very confused, and a bit scared. He had no idea what this was, but he felt like it was important. He decided to get out of bed and walk over to where elaruu's stand was.
He hadn't been there for over a year now, so he had no idea if it was still there. But when he got there, he was surprised to see that it was. But he was even more surprised when he noticed it was empty. No one was there. No projects were in their public display. The cheese began to feel more and more worried, so he quickly walked back to his own bed. Eventually he went back to sleep.
In the morning, the cheese just sat in bed thinking about elaruu. "Who were they?", "Why aren't they here anymore?", "What happened to them?". He had no idea. He decided to go back to their market stand and see if anyone was there. And there wasn't. The market stall looked very sad without anyone there making projects, so the cheese got an idea.
He was inspired by the griffpatchers. He wanted to make his own community. A community where everyone could be happy and talk together. He wanted to make it at elaruu.
So he walked over to griffpatch, and started setting up advertisements. He put up posters everywhere, saying "Come to elaruu!". But he soon got in trouble. Apparently, you weren't allowed to advertise more than once a day in the griffpatcher community. So he was forced to take down all but one of his ads.
He sadly walked back to elaruu, but to his surprise someone was there. They were a griffpatcher, and they were at elaruu. "Hi!" they said. "I saw your ad and decided to check it out. I think it's a great idea!" The cheese was happy. He had made his first friend at elaruu.
He continued to advertise once a day, and slowly, very slowly, more people began to show up. The cheese was very happy. There were many elaruu haters, but a few people were nice. They would come to elaruu and talk to the cheese.
After a few more months, elaruu decided to grow faster and faster, and so he started to advertise less and less. Even OG elaruu haters started to join. For the first time in his life, the cheese felt like he had accomplished something big. He had made a community. A community where everyone could be happy and talk together. He was very proud of himself.
After a few more months, however, disaster struck. A few users decided to participate in an activity that went against the guidelines of Scratch. They were quickly banned, but elaruu was forced to be shut down by the Scratch team. The cheese was devastated. He had worked so hard to make this community, and now it was gone.
After 26 long days of waiting, the Scratch team decided to open elaruu again. The cheese was so excited. Slowly people started to come back, and this time even more.
Elaruu continued to grow faster and faster. Soon it had over 10000 messages. And then 20000. By this point, elaruu had grown by 800 followers, and was becoming very popular. The cheese wished that elaruu would one day come back and see how famous they were.
On the 5th of February 2024, elaruu was the most popular it had ever been. People were conversing all through the day and night. Until suddenly the mass-reporters came. They were a group of people who wanted to destroy elaruu. They started reporting everyone, and soon the cheese was banned and elaruu's comments were closed. The cheese was devastated. He had worked so hard to make this community, and now it was gone.
The cheese was forced to leave Scratch. He left all his friends he had made over the past 5 years, and exited the city. He cried his way home, back to the fridge he had once lived in.
As he slowly opened the fridge door, their was a roar of excitement from the other foods in the fridge.
"The cheese is back!" they all shouted. "We thought you were gone forever!"
The cheese was happy to be home, but sad to be away from all his friends. He went to bed that night, and dreamed of the day he would be able to return to the city.
In the morning, the cheese decided he was not done. He would never give up on elaruu. He would do absolutely everything he could to bring the community back together.
He began sending emails to the Scratch team asking for elaruu to be reopened. He sent them every day, and eventually they replied. They said that they would never re-open elaruu, and that it was gone forever. The cheese was devastated, but he still did not give up.
A few more months passed, and then an idea struck him. He would make his own city. A city where everyone could be happy and talk together. He would call it Elaruu.
He wanted to make it just like Scratch, so that it would feel just like the original elaruu. So he got to work.
Using the skills he had learnt from Scratch, he began coding everyday and every night. He worked hard, and eventually he had made a website. It was just like Scratch, but it was even better. It had everything he wanted, and more.
He worked every day 'til he had almost finished the website. But by the end of all this, the Cheese realised he still wanted more
He had worked so hard and had almost finished, but he wanted to change it entirely. He realised that he no longer wanted to make a website that was just like Scratch, because he hated Scratch. He wanted to make his own social media platform
And so he did. He didn't entirely have to start again, he used most of the code he had already written, which is why you might notice the html stucture and layout of the pages is very similar to Scratch, but he still had to do a lot of work to restyle it.
The cheese had always been very fond of sea animals, and so he decided to make the theme of his new social media platform about his favourite sea animal, the kelp bass. He named it KelpNet, a community of kelp basses living in a kelp forest.
And this is it.
Welcome to KelpNet.
The end.
Based on a true story.