Necessary Disclaimer - Join Me and Citizens Required are two seperate 'projects', and whilst Danny invited those that had Joined him through Join Me to join his Country too, he has yet to use Citizens Required as a forum to recruit further 'Joinees'. Therefore, there is not too much on this site to promote Join Me - that's what the external links are for.
Danny Explains What Join Me Is About[]
Join Me is best summed up by Danny Wallace, on his main site, here.
Citizens Required Wiki Explains What Join Me Is About[]
In brief, Join Me is a movement started by Danny a few years before his plans to start to his country, simply because he was bored. On an impulse (and inspired by a similar project attempted by a relative who had recently died), Danny put a classified advertisement in Loot magazine, asking readers to "Join me. Send one passport-sized photograph to...", but without giving any further details.
Danny states he had no plans as to what he would do when the photos came in, although he was curious as to whether he could reach and better the total number of joinees sought by his great uncle Gallus. "It was a piece of whimsy. A silly half-project. But thanks to a huge and diverse group of perfect strangers, it became something much bigger. I'm still trying to work out how."
The Join Me movement soon took shape, and now has over approximately 10,000 members (known individually as Joinees or collectively as The Karma Army). Its primary tenet is that followers should perform Random Acts of Kindness, preferably to a stranger, every Friday (known as a Good Friday). As of December 2003, a trial period of Happy Mondays began, where a Joinee is encouraged to go that little bit further to treat themselves.
Joinees regularly meet-up at JOIN MEets [sic], which are basically an excuse to exchange stories, have a laugh and get drunk.
In 2003, Danny wrote the book Join Me about how he started the 'cult'. The popular quote is that "it's not a cult, it's a collective", because Danny didn't want to encourage the wrong ideas -- however, he has begrudgingly admitted that it is, hence the book's cover blurb: The true story of a man who started a cult by accident."
In the book there's a passage where Danny suggests it better to:
1. Find your purpose 2. Spread the word 3. Recruit your members
rather than:
1. Recruit your members 2. Spread the word 3. Find your purpose
In many ways, Citizens Required and How To Start Your Own Country show the naturally progression from that line of thought.
External links[]
- The Join Me Wiki - the sister site to the Citizens Required Wiki
- Join me and be good on Friday - article in Melbourne's The Age
- Join Me - the official Join Me site
- Join Me Forum - the main Join Me forum
- Karma Army - the alternative Join Me site
- An extract from 'Join Me'
