This is a topic I have been thinking a lot about… With all the discussion facilitated by people like Charles Haycock and Jensen Kimmet about how yo-yo’ing should not be so competition oriented, and about having fun, it got me thinking… If everyone is trying to conform to the same goal of “winning,” then what makes people stand out? I want everyone reading this to just think about what they do/can do to set them apart from the community. It doesn’t necessarily have to be tangible, I am just curious, and I want to see what people think of!
I’ll have to think on this a bit but I’m curious to see what people will say! 
I just enjoy playing. Not trying to be unique. As long as I’m having fun with it I’ll keep playing. When I stop having fun I’ll move on.
I’m a competer not a collector idk😂
I just throw to relax, but I did enter in an upcoming contest just for fun (why not). The one thing I truly enjoy that doesn’t necessarily makes me unique but the community as a whole is: you can walk up to a random thrower start up a seamless conversation (at least in my experience). Before this I was involved in the car scene which I still am but the interaction is not the same as thrower to thrower. One of my other reasons to go to a contest, is to meet more throwers face to face. Basically anyone can talk to anyone regardless of skill or style of play
***side note my skill level is much lower than many of you
-bbdave-
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I think Bbdave captured a lot of what I feel (so, I’m not unique). I throw yoyo to relax and have fun. When I enter contests, my freestyle tends to be tricks I like, not necessarily tricks that are competition oriented, or even advanced. I also like fixed axle, but, that doesn’t make me unique as it is growing in popularity, which is great for yoyo in general. The more options people have, the more likely they are to find something that speaks to them.
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If you TRY to be unique as a yo-yo player, then your playing is already based on a gaining idea, just like if you’re trying to win contests or acquire sponsors or accumulate praise. Which is not unique at all. If you can just play the way you like and let it complement your life without worrying if what you’re doing is similar enough OR distinct enough from what you see out in the scene, then your yo-yoing will be your own. Which is about the best that can be said of anybody.
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I yo-yo while watching episodes of Walker Texas Ranger (I have all of the seasons on DVD).
Ed, I love you. That embodies how I like to feel about yoyoing. It doesn’t always happen, but it’s definitely a great, if not the best way to think. Thank you for being an inspiration to us all! You’re amazing!
I don’t make yoyos, I make the things that make yoyos better. I invented the rocket widget. A bullet proof nda protects me and mine from disclosure. But I’ve always been more into the math like Capt Yo and Kyle and Shawn. I can badly throw in both 1a and 5a styles. Patent pending, all rights reserved. Copyright 2017 American Made YoYo. Man I’ve been at this one project for YEARS.
I have a question for you. How did you come by the idea that ‘everybody is trying to conform to the same goal of winning’?
… Over 95 percent of ‘all’ people that throw or have ever thrown a yoyo, have never entered any type of Yoyo Competition at any level… ever.
And only a very small percentage of Yoyo throwers Worldwide, ever aspire to Compete.
So; who is ‘everyone’?
To answer part of your question; no one is Unique in the yoyo world on purpose. You cant make yourself ‘unique’. You may be… but it is not realistic to identify ‘yourself as unique’.
So that question is invalid. I am Unique because I … < Nah; not happening.
Others have to decide you are ‘unique’. < No one on this Forum can state, ‘I am unique’. Just doesnt work that way.
… For example; lets say I claim to be Unique. I have been around for 18 years. I have been cutting up yoyos for that long. I have over 1000 yoyos. I have a machine shop in my Garage. I have designed yoyos but I have never designed a yoyo for sale directly from me. I have never charged anybody a single penny for modding a yoyo. And I even pay for return shipping. I still am not much higher on the trick ladder as Spirit Bomb or so. I still love yoyos and messing with them. I have never competed at any level. Not even against blind worms. I have fun throwing for at least a few minutes every day of the year; pretty much. I never get tired of yoyos. But I never had a single thought about conforming to any winning mentality; ever.
I give yoyos away. Sometimes I buy yoyos from the BST; simply because I sense the seller really needs the money and not because I need the yoyo.
But what I do does not actually make me Unique.
It just means I am kinda Crazy, hahahahahaha.
There ‘are’ Unique people though… Ed; who obviously answered in this thread already; is Unique.
He is Unique because he is all Positive about anything yoyo related. He will go out of his way to help anybody he runs into with some kind of yoyo problem. He is a School Teacher and perpetually spreads the world of yo to others. He is a Real Karate Expert and actually uses his mental training and advanced abilities to ‘focus’ in his Fixed Axle adventures. Ed has more fun with wood than a Village of Termites. Ed can do Fixed axle tricks that astound other fixed axle players. He never tells anybody he is good. Because he can show them better than he can tell them.
Ed is a Benchmark for ‘Unique’.
The point being that ‘others’ have to conclude if somebody is indeed Unique. You cant really point the finger at yourself.
At least that is my theory.
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I am like others in that I throw for fun. Also, I throw to help improve my hand/eye coordination (at my age you have to work at it).
Now to being unique, of course I am. Maybe that is because I am the only one I know of.
Yoyoing has become a part of me, one of the things that if you walked through my brain like you browse a department store (or Amazon, for all you internet types) you would find a section titled “yoyo life”.
This isn’t unique, but it does mean that up going has changed me to some extent, because if you took that fictional department away, there would be something else there.
Is this unique? It isn’t, but this is not what matters. Uniqueness is great, but its a state of being not an act. Therefore, simply striving to be unique is in itself unoriginal.
I like to have fun yoyoing, preferably with others every so often, and really, this is what will get people into this hobby. Not trying to be unique and special, but having fun.
Doc, I don’t recommend competing against blind worms. In my experience, they aren’t good winners and, while they don’t even face your direction, they still taunt you. 
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There can be only one. 
Yoyodoc and jhb8426… your comments are always entertaining… and of course they are both unique
-bbdave-
Awesome reply! You might not want to say that you are unique, but you are undoubtedly a very good person! A few comments on your reply… In my post, I said what makes you unique in the yo-yo community. Someone who has picked up a yo-yo a few times, but does not actively practice and does not participate in the community is not a member of the yo-yo community. I was making a generalization in the statement that “everyone” aspires to win. What I was getting at here was that, if you are putting a good amount (1+ hour(s) per day) of time into yo-yo, you are probably going to compete. Although you are undoubtedly a fissure within the yo-yo community (Yoyodoc), you do not spend a lot of time practicing. This is totally fine, but you are not the group of people I was referring to in those who aspire to win. Of course, there are outliers, like Ed (bless his soul), and some other fixie warriors, who put in the time, but do not compete. However, to the best of my knowledge, if you are putting in a lot of time to yo-yo’ing, unless you are a “celebrity” in the community, you will aspire to compete, and therefore win. This is because there are very few outlets for your tricks apart from social media, meetings, and competitions. Things like the trick contest held by YYE are what I believe should be more abundant. In this post, I was less asking what makes people the “one and only,” but instead what people’s great strengths are. For example, Eric R. is amazing at string injections. Thanks again for your insightful reply! I hope this cleared things up.
What are you doing here when you could be throwing?!
Welll… I like to think I’m the best looking member of the yoyo communit 8)
That is understandable, as your signature is “why eat when you can buy a yo-yo instead?”
What are you doing here when you could be throwing?!
I can type with my voice using Siri