Amino (application)

In 2012, Wang and Anderson came up with the idea for a convention-like community while attending an anime convention in Boston, Massachusetts.[1] Later that year, they would release two apps revolving around K-pop and photography that allowed fans of those subjects to chat freely.

In 2014, Amino was officially released, and the K-pop and photography apps previously released became the first Amino communities. In July 2014, Anderson and Wang launched the parent company of Amino Apps, Narvii, and received $1.7 million dollars in seed funding.[3]

The Amino app grew quickly, with 47 communities being launched in the first year.[4] Fandoms had migrated from websites like Facebook and Reddit to Amino, partly because of the app's mobile-native experience.

Before 2016, when a user wanted to join a new Amino, they had to download another app for the Amino they wanted to join. In 2016, Amino Apps launched a centralized portal that hosted every Amino community in one app, meaning users no longer had to download multiple apps.[5]

In the same year, ACM, an app that allowed users to create their own communities, was launched. This resulted in the number of communities on Amino skyrocketing to over 2.5 million.[6]

The main feature of Amino is communities dedicated to a certain topic that users can join. Users can also chat with other members of a community in three ways, text, voice, or screening room, which allows users to watch videos together while voice chatting.[7] Other features include polls, blog posts, image posts, wiki entries, stories, and quizzes. In some rare cases, posts that are very well-made and have been noticed by a community’s administration will end up receiving a Feature, making it appear on the wiki’s front page along with other featured content.[8]

In 2019, Amino introduced six original short-form animated series, labeled "Amino Originals," produced by independent artists from across the internet.[9][10] ATJ's "Little Red," a re-imagining of Little Red Riding Hood, premiered on November 15th, 2019.[11] "Little Red" was joined by five other shows in late December. Sophie Feher's "The Reef," a comedy featuring an aspiring marine biologist meeting a merman, premiered on December 27th alongside "Princely," an LGBT fairy tale created by Matt Bruneau-Richardson of Tiny Siren Animation.[12][13][14] "Spaced Out," an alien abduction comedy by Michael Jae, and YouTuber Alex Clark's "Wyndvania II" premiered on December 28th.[15][16] Mysie Pereira's fairy tale "Turned to Stone" and Marcin Pawlowski's "Stranded" premiered on December 29th, 2019.[17][18]

On each community, there are two types of staff members, these being ‘Leader’ and ‘Curator.’ Leaders are the highest rank, having access to all features on the community such as being able to edit themes, feature content, punish members, and many more. Curators on the other hand, have less perks, and mainly focus on managing the community when Leaders aren’t around. Curators are usually the ones who feature posts, or post important announcements for users to see.[19]

Amino received $1.7 million dollars in seed funding in July 2014. In September 2015, Amino received $6.5 million in Series A funding. In Series B and C funding, Amino received $19.2 million and $45 million, respectively. Amino has raised a total of $72.4 million dollars over those four funding rounds. Amino Apps is also partnered with All Ages of Geek.[20]

Users who manage popular communities which get noticed by Narvii Inc. were capable of receiving a separate application for their community only, however this has changed and all activity now takes place in the Amino app.