Skateboarding is an action sport which involves riding and performing tricks using a skateboard. Skateboarding can be a recreational activity, an art form, a job, or a method of transportation. Skateboarding has been shaped and influenced by many skateboarders throughout the years. A 2002 report found that there were 18.5 million skateboarders in the world. 85 percent of skateboarders polled who had used a board in the last year were under the age of 18, and 74 percent were male.

Skateboarding was first started in the 1950s, when all across California surfers got the idea of trying to surf the streets. No one really knows who made the first board -- instead, it seems that several people came up with similar ideas at the same time. Several people have claimed to have invented the skateboard first, but nothing can be proved, and skateboarding remains a strange spontaneous creation. These first skateboarders started with wooden boxes or boards with roller skate wheels slapped on the bottom. Like you might imagine, a lot of people got hurt in skate boarding's early years! It was a sport just being born and discovered, so anything went. The boxes turned into planks, and eventually companies were producing decks of pressed layers of wood -- similar to the skateboard decks of today. During this time, skateboarding was seen as something to do for fun after surfing.

In 1963, skateboarding was at a peak of popularity, and companies like Jack's, Hobie and Makaha started holding skateboarding competitions. At this time, skateboarding was mostly either downhill slalom or freestyle. Torger Johnson, Woody Woodward and Danny Berer were some well known skateboarders at this time, but what they did looked almost completely different from what skateboarding looks like today! Their style of skateboarding, called "freestyle", is more like dancing ballet or ice skating with a skateboard.

What first drew you to skateboarding? And what keeps driving you?

Rodney Mullen - Skating first appealed to me because of the type of people that did it, plus the fact it wasn't organized or coached. There was no "perfect swing" to master; everybody did things their own way, and every way seemed "right." There was nobody telling me that I wasn't good enough, or that I should be more like the other guy, or that I had to beat the other guy... Even at contests, skaters didn't seem to be competing against each other; everybody just did their own thing, together. What drives me is pretty simple: I love skateboarding. It helps me be me; it's how I feel free.

When no one is filming, what’s your skating like?

Rodney Mullen - Embarrassing. I just cruise around and build on movements that seem to offer promise for what's next for me, or just simple motions that feel good depending on the spot. I'm not that interested in repeating hard stuff that doesn't point to something new; I try to keep my eye on what's weak about my skating. Plenty of that to work with... I almost always skate alone, in the middle of the night-- no cameras and stuff. It's my time.

I think the main influence is that if everyone does it then people feel they have to do it and then they end up liking it quite a lot and they skate by peer pressure and again end up liking it

The Melbourne Shuffle (also known as Rocking or simply The Shuffle) is a rave and club dance that originated in the late 1980s in the underground rave music scene in Melbourne, Australia. The basic movements in the dance are a fast heel-and-toe action with a style suitable for various types of electronic music. Some variants incorporate arm movements. People who dance the shuffle are often referred to as rockers, due in part to the popularity of shuffling to rock music in the early 1990s.

Shuffling originated from 'Stomping', which in turn originated from previous historical Celtic dances. Stomping originally incorporated tap and traditional ballet -style foot shuffling. The clog and sword dance can easily be matched to some earlier experimental rave and club dance moves that evolved into Stomping.

In the late '80s, the Melbourne Shuffle began to emerge as a distinct dance, incorporating more hand movement than its predecessor, Stomping. Break beat and techno music was gradually replaced with the more hardcode forms of rave music, such as hard trance. When b-boys started attending Shuffling dance events, they brought in their own set of hip hop dance moves, for example, the running man and gliding. Ever since these hip hop influences became predominant, the Melbourne Shuffle has also been practiced outside of raves (a characteristic of hip hop dance culture).Where the Melbourne Shuffle was originally danced, the places were not considered to be named 'raves', but rather 'dance parties'.

A number of videos documenting the style during this era exist as the style increased in popularity. There are many variations of this dance but the main heel-to-toe movement remained the key motion, giving it the name "the Melbourne Shuffle". Notably arm-movements are much more prevalent than in later renditions of the dance.

Ii think the main influences would be peers and the pop band lmfao for there song everyday I'm shuffling. And when you shuffle and put it to music it looks cool as well

A longboard generally can be as short or as long as the rider desires; the most popular range is about 36 to 60 inches. As well as being usually longer than a trick deck skateboard longboards may also be equipped with larger, softer wheels which afford a smoother ride. However, there are many different uses for longboards, as shown below. Since longboards use softer bushings than a typical tech skateboard, carving is generally easier. Some trucks use springs instead of bushings, such as Seismic trucks or Original trucks. Original trucks also feature a wave-cam mechanism to control the lean and turn of the truck. The truck can usually be slightly wider than the board but this is not always the case.

The most basic use of a longboard is travel. Commuter designs take many different shapes, including long, wide cruisers as well as shorter hybrid type boards. Their trucks are designed to be loose to allow for sharper turns. It is useful to have a kicktail on a commuting longboard in order to corner on sidewalks and to lift the front of the board when riding off curbs. Also, one may prefer a shorter board, around 24"-35" for commuting, as well as medium sized wheels (65mm-75mm) which help commuters manoeuvre bumps, cracks and other minor surface obstacles.

Longboarding, also referred to as "sidewalk surfing", is an offshoot of street skating that combines surfing and skateboarding. It originated in Hawaii around the late 1950's and was further developed as a sport on the West Coast of the United States, primarily in California in the 1970's. Surfers were seeking a similar ride in the streets when the waves were flat. By the 1990's, a resurgence in board sports such as skateboarding and snowboarding was seen, and the "board culture" grew significantly.

They would imitate the moves of surfing a wave by skimming their hands across the ground, carving quickly, changing their positioning on the board and trying to keep everything flowing. Longboarding or Skateboarding wasn’t what it was originally called. It was actually called Sidewalk Surfing. It wasn’t until 1959 when longboarding/skateboarding hit the market place. Skateboards were sold all over the place, toy stores, convenient stores, etc. Makaha, was the first professional board distributor. Gordan and Smith made the first fiberglass boards, more popularly they were also known as G&S. But, of course, these things were very dangerous at this time in our history.

I think some of the main influences would be peers and just the thrill and rush of it speeding down hills. Another reason people ride them is cause there cheaper then cars