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The Delaware Anime Society
Matilda Madden, Club President (and South Chapter Leader)
Joey Green and Nathan Smith, North Chapter VP's
Annie Dzus, PA (Kanameiji Chapter) President
http://www.delawareanimesociety.com

01. Please briefly describe your club.
We're Delaware's most active anime club with chapters in North DE, South DE and our new PA branch in West Chester PA, our Kanameijis. We meet every week in Dover, Wilmington or West Chester for 4-6 hours to watch anime, play video games and engage in various other activities related to the anime fandom. The Delaware Anime Society is for those with an interest in Japanese anime, costuming, manga, music and pop culture to meet with like-minded people. We welcome anime fans of all ages, and we have many activities such as raffles, trips, mini cons, video gaming, monthly meetings, merchandise, movie outings, streaming anime radio, oekaki and more. We put on our first convention in October 2004 and are gearing up for our second, Zentrancon, in October 2005. Despite having three chapters across Delaware and PA, we are a very close-knit group. Events are either organized through the yahoo mailing lists or the LiveJournal, or via phone/face to face interaction. The chapter leaders (aside from being good friends to start) work closely with one another and collaborate on ideas and new events. Additionally a lot of our members go to more than just their chapter's meets each month, and we all gather for the larger special events like the mini-cons, dinners, and trips. Members also get together for non anime events such as concerts put on by members' local bands, movies, dinners, or just hanging out in general.

02. How did the club form?
The club was originally founded in late 2002 as a purely web-based chatting group on yahoo. In 2004, we started having meetings at a cafe in downtown Wilmington, then meetings were moved to a gaming store and internet cafe in Claymont, DE. During this time we had our first club election when the original president expressed wishes to step down because she no longer lived in DE herself. Additionally we decided to add another chapter to the main group so as to be more accessible to the members living in Dover and below. The leaders felt a name change was in order and it was agreed to change the original name to the Delaware Anime Society, DAS for short. In 2005, our Pennsylvania affiliates requested to become the third chapter of the DAS, the DAS Kanameijis.

3. When did the club start?
The web based chat group started in late 2002, and the meetings started in 2004. The first face to face meeting under the new club name was in August of 2004.

04. How many members did the club start with?
The club started with 50 or 60 people.

05. How many members are in your club now?
Currently we have at least 187 people in our club.

06. What are the most common challenges you face with your club?
One thing we strive to do consistently is to make sure that all our chapters are equally involved in special events, group get-togethers and just the meetings themselves. While we as leaders have a say in how the meetings are run, we also strongly support the idea that the club is only as good as its members and everyone should have a voice. Therefore we always encourage our members to give their opinions on what is shown, how the meetings are run and what types of activities they'd like the club to be involved with. Networking with other clubs, businesses and community groups in the surrounding areas is also a priority which requires a lot of work and organization to cross distribute flyers and participate in multi-group events.

07. Other than watching anime, what other activities happens during a club meeting?
Every DAS meeting starts off with a rousing round of DDR or other video games, followed by anime, music videos, raffles, merchandise sales, bake sales, dinners, trips, and other group events. There is a weekly radio stream hosted three times a week by either of our two talented DJs, which garners many faithful club and non club listeners. The content of the radio shows varies from anime, jpop, Asian music, video game music and other genres plus amusing commentaries by the DJs themselves who hang out in a special AIM chatroom for requests and socializing. We also have a quarterly club newsletter, which serves to keep members in all chapters updated on all club goings on and it showcases the artwork of our many talented artists. Members also get together for non anime events such as state fairs, concerts put on by members' local bands, movies, dinners, or just hanging out in general. Our goal is to not only build friendships within the anime fandom but to also foster friendships and good times overall- as a more complete social club experience.

08. Please describe the purpose of having officers for your club.
Officers serve many purposes for our club. Its impossible to lead a large group alone (especially with three different chapters in different states), and the presidents and vice presidents work together to enforce club policy, schedule events, hold the raffles and keep everything fair and democratic. Also if one leader can't make a meeting, the vice president can host in his/her place.

09. How do you handle promotion of your anime club?
We distribute flyers, business cards, do link and flyer exchanges with other clubs and businesses, and place ads in newspapers and convention programs for our promotion. Also word of mouth is an excellent way to get noticed.

10. What advice would you give to a new anime club?
Rome wasn't built in a day, and nothing good is ever easy or comes without much hard work and sacrifice. A club is only as good as its members and if you can build upon a tightly knit group of friends to expand into a successful club, I think that's the best way to do it. It is up to the leaders of the club to promote a mature, friendly, and easy going atmosphere where members don't feel pressured to give more than they can, yet still feel truly valued for participating. Look out for the best interests of your club but still keep it honest and you will go far.

Interested in viewing new titles from FUNimation?

Operation Anime is a DVD request program for anime clubs to provide their members with screenings of our latest titles. Once your club application has been accepted, you may log in to your account and begin requesting DVDs for your club. All we ask for in return is survey feedback so that we can serve you better.

> Click here for program details 
> Click here to register your club! 

Operation Anime surveys can now be taken online!

Save paper and postage by having your members complete the online version of the survey. Here is the link.

Please do not mail or fax your surveys, as all the data will be collected from the online results. If you would like you can print a PDF copy of the survey, fill it out, and then scan the surveys and email them to operationanime@funimation.com with the subject line of 'Completed Operation Anime Survey'. Here is the PDF.

Four new DVDs to choose from:

Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood: Part 1 Disc 1
Initial D - Stage 4: Part 1 Disc 1
Slayers Revolution: Disc 1
Vandread: Disc 1

Operation Anime does not support conventions, only matters dealing with anime clubs. If you are seeking support from FUNimation Entertainment for your convention, please email conventions@funimation.com.