Absit Omen opened its digital doors to character bios in January 2009. The planning had been in the works since the previous October by the founding team: Alisha, Elle, Natalie, Natasha, Paz, and me (Sarah). We'd been writing together on another HP RPG that had gone quiet, and we wanted a new home. The vision was a collaborative role-playing community, were we could create a detailed, flexible canon world that encouraged everybody plotting together, knitting their ideas into a tapestry.

Before I go on, I want to thank everyone who's helped build this place: every writer who welcomed a newbie or invited a friend, everyone who brought a character to fill out our world, everyone diligently updating lists and tags and all the records that has helped us stay organized for all these years. Anyone of us who popped into chat even though they didn't have time to write, anyone who gave their time and patience as Curators, Aides, C-box moderators, web and wiki admins, graphic designers, and AO Ambassadors. Everybody who was able to help literally pay the bills to keep the lights on. Our social media maintainers and recruitment enthusiasts, and artists of all stripes!

Really, truly, what you all have done here is immense.

This site was built by 320 writers, creating 1,100 characters. You have written in 14,935 role-playing topics.

Many of us have made life-long friends here, visited each other across our countries and across the world. We've bestowed dozens of Dobby Swap presents! We've given the gift of reading hundreds of thousands of each others' words and giving just as many in kind.

In the last 10 years, members have gotten married, had children, graduated from high school, university, and grad school. We've been through life-changing hard times and endured personal tragedies.


We also want to remember BK who passed away in 2013. BK was a beloved friend of Alisha and joined us in 2010. BK designed the Auror badge, and wrote Auror Dean Brison. Alisha told us BK loved AO. Of course, BK was far more than her contributions to Absit Omen, and her death left a hole in the lives of her loved ones. We remember her.

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Some more fun facts:

• Other names considered for Absit Omen were Salvio Hexia, Serpensortia, Absit Prodigium, and Peskipiksi Pesternomi. Absit Omen was chosen because it felt nice and grim, was not taken, and had the word 'Omen' in it.
  
  
• Our most most-visited post of all time happens to be ... the BBCode Color list.  Go ahead, google 'BBC Colors' and see who the first hit is.
  
  
• Our most popular out-of-character thread is... Gimby Shimbles! Otherwise known as Give Me Your Best Shot, and brainchild of Tor. Tor, ye know not the monster you created. (Thank you!)
  
  
• Various talented artists here at AO created character stamps in 2009, and to this day many of us wear the stamps proudly on our profiles.
  
  
• For a brief moment in the fall of 2008, the phrase "absit omen" was spoken aloud in an episode of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, and AO was on the first page for google for a bit.
  
  
• In 10 years of writing a little over 4  years of RP time has passed. We do take our time.
  
  
• You can find the very oldest role-playing threads under the April 2008 tag
  
  
• Thread tags were introduced in Jan 2010, shortly followed by moving all our in-character lore/canon to a wiki. These have proven very useful, the wiki especially, in large part built by Cody, is a truly magical part of building AO.
  
  
• On site, we are on our 62nd Fortnight Flier! These fliers move the timeline forward, highlight new plots/characters/threads at Hogwarts and in the larger wizarding world, announce important site changes/news, and feature characters.
  
  
• The Daily Prophet and Other Papers have also been going strong since 2009, reporting on and furthering major plots
  
  
• Secret Santa started in December 2009 and became the Dobby Swap in December 2010, allowing virtual gifts to be exchanged member to member each winter.
  
  
• Anyone remember the old days of AIM chat and the AO cbox? Now we get the best of both worlds in our Discord channel
  
  
• When we started in 2008, the most recently released film was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Pottermore didn't open until 2011, after we were well under way. This means we have some pretty major branching of AO/HP canon that, ahem, I think is pretty cool.
  
  
• Absit Omen writers have used their experience here for job applications, and AO writer Pam even included us as part of her masters thesis!
  
  

REMEMBERING DAY

It all started with Remembering Day, which takes place every May to honor those fallen in the 1998 Battle of Hogwarts. Our plot first thickened on May 2, 2008, when Theodora Kingstreet, ex-Azzie, arranged the murders of an Auror and a Wizengamot Elder. Knox Greyfriar resigned as Headmaster at the end of the school year, and in the fall of 2009, Analiza Snark took his place.

In 2011, Greyfriar has returned as Headmaster! Unfortunately, Always-Azzie Kingstreet has very likely been stirring up new murders (and glitter!) from her cell.


THE TETRAWIZARD TOURNAMENT

Tetra-what? Four schools competing! Four worlds colliding! In September 2009, the Tetrawizard Tournament officially kicked off at Hogwarts, where champions from Salem, Durmstrang, Beauxbatons, and Hogwarts competed to win the tournament cup. Despite the mysteriously missing Headmistress as well as the romantic distraction of the Yule Ball, the four tasks continued on until May 2010, when (under mysterious circumstances…) Salem Witches Institute of Magic. Follow that entire plot here at the wiki.

(The plot itself concluded in September 2014, real-time! and was possibly the most massive, site-wide plot we’ve ever done, omg.)


OH NOOooo IT'S A SNAAAAKE

Watch where you step! A Runespoor first appeared in June 2008, crashing through Diagon Alley. In October 2008, a Runespoor venom explosion destroyed the Black Chimaera in Knockturn (but shh, the pub is back). In December 2008, Theodora Kingstreet directed Devlin Matthews to plant Runespoor eggs at St Mungo's. He got caught, however, and when other key players were sent to Azkaban for their involvement in the illegal trade, the runespoor ring calmed down in 2009.

Though rumblings continued throughout 2010, it wasn't until November 2011 that runespoors were sighted again, washed up on the Thames. Shortly after, Rafe Sellaphix was released from Azkaban, and in December 2011, his son, Fig, went on a moonlit adventure with Moira following a tip given to the Daily Prophet. They got more than they bargained for, running into a werewolf!


WEREWOLVES HOWLING

Ahem, lycanthropes! Some hate them, some sympathize, some just like to watch them fight. One of Snark's first decisions was to expel werewolf and Hufflepuff Olivia Foley before the start of the 2008 school year, and little did anyone know that would sow the seeds of SAWS, Students Against Werewolf Segregation. What started off simple grew more complicated when former Headmaster Greyfriar was attacked and turned in Hogsmeade in October 2008. In March, werewolf attacks surged, introducing a new breed of werewolf. Dugan Macduff, one such direwolf, terrorized and targeted the Ministry in April 2009 until his capture in June 2009.

Direwolves were spotted again in November 2011! In December, a vampire, a werewolf hunter, and an Auror trainee walked into a trap set by Cinaed Tawse. Meanwhile, Hufflepuff Zeta Pepper looks into reinstating SAWS following the trial of young werewolf Greer Grant.


DEMENTORS DEMENTING

Banned from Azkaban, feared and shunned, the number of dementors and dementor attacks suddenly shot up in March 2010 as the creatures sought new sources of sustenance. In response, Hogwarts readied its defenses, Aurors rallied, and Department Heads went so far as to capture a dementor for study. The attacks continued for over a year, until April 2011, when Lawrence Musgrave surrendered. Activity quieted for several months that summer, leading wixes to hope the threat was over.

In August 2011, Dementors surged again, this time south from Keswick. They hunted not people but pentrals, the disembodied souls of the dead who had been captured and kept by Lorelei Hunt. Currently, St. Mungo's is treating dementor victims, with the help of prisoner Musgrave, and Level Nine has found a way to make the pentrals rest in peace, permanently.



I could not have possibly predicted what AO has become, or all the people I have come to call friends, or all the shenanigans we've gotten up to. So it's hard to guess what we'll do next. I hope to meet new people and new characters, and nerd out on better technology to make writing easier. But mostly, hoping to keep having fun and do my best to help everyone else have fun as well.

Happy AOversary from Elle, Kit, Nuri, and Sarah