Thursday 14 August 2003

Pic of the day: My character. I actually did look a bit like that when I was a kid, and so did two of my brothers. I sure don't look that way now!

Gaia Online

I have no idea why the name. I can guess that someone knew Gaia was a name for Earth and meant it to be cute-speak for "online world". It has certainly nothing to do with Greek mythology (more like geek mythology) and nothing with the "Gaia - The Living Planet" theory. Although it is lively enough. A more descriptive name would be "Chibi Dress-Up Forum". I spent almost every free minute there, not even playing Morrowind or my other computer games.

Here is how it works. At the core, this is another site devoted to Japanese cultural export: Manga, anime, J-pop. Unlike the commercial sites selling such things, this is a "community site" providing services for its users through the help of other users, and offsetting its cost through selling advertising space. Therefore, they want lots of people to stay on the site for a long time. They achieve this through dress-up dolls.

More exactly, you create an "avatar" when you first log on. This is a picture of a young teen drawn in the manga style, with big eyes, small nose, large head and exaggerated hair styles. You choose from several different styles and colors, each feature independently. I made a boy that looked a bit like me when I was small. Others are more imaginative, it seems. You then enter the city in your grey underwear, although there is a mended grey shirt and trousers in your backpack. Yes, your image is visible on each page, and on all your posts in the many forums (fora?).

Conveniently there is a shop where you can buy better clothes for your avatar, quite a selection too. You don't pay with your credit card, either ... you pay with imaginary gold coins. You get one for each forum page you read (well, each you click actually ... you don't have to read it all) and more if you post. If you are caught spamming (like posting just "asdfgh") you lose 50 gold. You can also get more gold from voting in polls and voting on art, writing reviews of art and links, and quite a bit of gold from submitting art or links. Generally, the more work goes into one type of activity, the more gold. You spend the gold on clothes and accessories for your avatar.

That's it, basically. There are some "gold diggers", but most people are nice. Most people are also young. High school students seem to be particularly plentiful, which makes sense: They have plenty of time on their hands, and many manga and anime series are aimed at this age group. They are of course not as widely informed as adults (at least bright adults) and so they can easily misunderstand things ... Like one of them who confused Christianity with the role playing game In Nomine, which also has angels and demons.

But generally it's a bunch of bright and energetic people. And let's face it, it is hard to be unfriendly when you are represented by a cute dress-up doll...