[About XDA developers] KidCarter93:
While I'm here, I'll post my story. By the way, I have already shared parts of it in a previous post in here but this is a more revised and refined version :)

Before I start though, I just wanna say a huge thank you to everyone who has participated in this thread so far. It's been great reading through this thread and seeing everyone's journey to XDA and to learn their journey throughout XDA aswell.

Before XDA

My first smartphone was the Sony Ericsson Xperia X8 and, at that point, I just used to use my phone as a phone. So the standard usage like texts, phonecalls, games etc.

Not long after me getting it I noticed that my mate bbeanss also had an X8. There was something strange though. His looked nothing like mine did, at least in terms of what was on the phone. After showing me, I soon noticed that whatever he had done had totally transformed his phone into something much better. A true smartphone.

I asked him how we done it and he said that he said that he'd rooted it and installed a custom ROM. Obviously I had no idea what he was talking about so I asked him how I could do it. He said a site called XDA will help you learn it but you're better off just using custom launchers.

I got into the myriad of launchers and realised just how much could be changed and it was all so easy to do it.

The XDA Experience

Once I'd been using launchers for a bit and finally staying with my current setup, I decided to check out XDA and see exactly what this website was all about.

After reading loads first (because I didn't want anything to mess up), I ended up rooting my X8 and installing a ROM onto it. After flashing through quite a few different ROM/kernel combinations I was hooked to it.

I spent a few more months simply lurking around the site learning as much as I could. I then got my Sony Xperia S and figured a new phone would be the ideal opportunity to create an account here and get to make the most of XDA rather than just lurking.

I spent the first month here just sticking to my device forum but then I started to explore different areas and I finally popped up in Off Topic.

Even though Off Topic might just look like a load of nonsense, there's a really good crowd over there and there's surprisingly more development talk happening over there than there is in a lot of development threads.

I don't spend much time over there these days but that's purely because I've got less time to hangout with the others, which is a shame at times.

After the Xperia S i moved onto the Samsung Galaxy S2 and this brought yet another world into my knowledge. Tons and tons of Samsung specific information. A hell of a lot more choice in terms of ROMs/kernels/mods/tweaks etc. and this was brilliant because it further helped me learn more about Android and how it can be further manipulated by using different bases and even different OS's being installed over the top. It was actually with the S2 that I truly started contributing to this site. My mentality was "I've learnt a ton of information since I've been here and new users could always benefit from me explaining things to help them" so I started doing just that.

I was creating a couple of basic guides and mainly helping throughout development threads and in the Q&A section.

It was while I had the S2 that I reached the requirements to become a recognized contributor so I applied and got accepted. I've learnt so much more, while having the title, than I ever thought I would've done.

I've recently started getting really interested in theming so that's the next thing I'd like to tackle. All I'm currently doing regarding very slight theming is learning the basics of UCCW and then I can start learning a lot more from that point onwards.

Now, up to this moment in time, I have a Nexus 7 and HTC One and am still doing my best to help out in those forums as much as I used to in the S2 forum.

Looking to the future

The future is actually looking bright (without trying to sound to cliché), especially because I'll be getting a laptop soon so I'll soon be able to trying start theming and developing with the knowledge that I've learnt so far and what I'll continue to learn.

So within a few months, you could be seeing theming and possibly even ROMs from me if you have a device that I do ;)

While learning to do all of that, I still hope to be able to help out those who need it in the mean time. After all, if it wasn't for XDA I wouldn't know any of this stuff so it's only right that I return the favour in any way that I can.

That's my journey finished but before I stop rambling in this post, I'd just like to say that my time on XDA has always been great and a pleasure. A huge thank you to all the moderators and admins who have helped this site get to 5,000,000 members and kept things running as smoothly as possible along the way.

James