What Challenges Must Sansar Overcome to Succeed as a Virtual World Fashion Platform?

Longtime NWN reader Chic Aeon raised some smart points last week on the challenges that Linden Lab will need to overcome, in order to grow Sansar into a successful virtual world fashion platform. And while you may not agree with them, they're worth discussing -- and hopefully, will encourage other content creators to describe additional challenges too:

High Complexity of User-Created Fashion

IF they figured out a way to import from Marvelous Designer and keep the "avatar complexity settings" low, then great, as lots of folks that make clothes like MD. HOWEVER, Marvelous Designer is the number one "issue" on the SL Forums for uploading problems for mesh clothes. The problem is almost always the very HIGH COMPLEXITY of the garment. It certainly may ("may") be possible to keep that complexity low, but since Sansar is going to be user- generated content, we are going to have to assume that the same issues from hobbiest designers will flow over into that platform. I don't see how this is going to help what seems to be the number one complaint with Sansar -- the half hour load times. Again, not my area of expertise, just what I see on the forums, so perhaps someone with more knowledge can reply here.

Responding to reports that Sansar clothing still needs to be adjusted after being put on an avatar, Chic brought up another challenge:

Need for Sansar avatar body files to design fashion for

The only way to get a rigged mesh wearable to fit "correctly" is to have the garment RIGGED TO THAT BODY, which also means that the designer has to have the body available to rig in their 3D program... So unless Sansar wants to integrate the Sansar body into the Marvelous Designer software, I don't see how this problem will disappear. Of course creative designers "might" make alternative bodies for Sansar, like they have in Second Life. Then the story repeats there as it did here. Cloud Party gave out the mesh body file... IF [Sansar does] give out the bodies that clothes are being made for, then it is up to the designers to do their work. It is HARD work and not fun from my perspective. So anyone willing to do that for the new platform deserves a few kudos and claps.

Chic prefaces her points by saying she's not actively developing in Sansar, so perhaps they've been addressed (now or in the roadmap). Then again, even if that's the case, what other challenges loom?

Comments

[Pulsar]

Marvellous Designer is also 50 US $ / month and a tool not really meant for the masses. You may remember those slogans: "Sansar democratizes social VR", and comparisons to WordPress, which "opened online publishing to the masses with a simple creation tool". Now imagine if you are going to get a pro software for 50$ / month to publish something for WordPress (and the result has even issues). As for creation tools, an importer for MD is an extra, at most, that may target a few pro and semi-pro designers. I doubt it would attract the crowds or people looking for a simple and inexpensive tools for their creative hobby (that sometimes becomes a job, not everyone started as professionals).

As for Sansas promoted as a fashion platform, the way clothes work is interesting, but in the current state it's a fashion for inexpressive mannequins that move around like robots. Not so exciting. Maybe in future it would be better, but now it sounds like they put the cart before the horse.

[seph]

Allow adult content.

So far, Sansar is repeating the mistake of Cloud Party and Blue Mars by believing the masses are going to buy into sweater-clad tours of NASA museums as a primary form of content.

A lot of Second Life users want dance clubs where raunchiness to the level of nudity isn't a TOS violation, likewise roleplay sims that can be as mature as the source material they're based on, and so on.

Adults want to be adults, not third graders on field trips.

Sweaters and jeans are cool and they certainly sell, but a ton of SL fashion is more adult- or roleplay-oriented. It makes little sense for Sansar to do a video on brand owners like Blueberry when a good chunk of that store's more popular offerings are strictly forbidden from the platform. Even if you'd argue that lingerie is currently allowed, the anatomically correct mesh body Maitreya which most people buy Blueberry's items for isn't allowed in Sansar. The type of roleplay and social experiences such products would be used in aren't allowed in Sansar. It's silly.

Fashion, like experiences won't go anywhere if the best use case remains sterile museums and sweaters.

Hopefully they'll start adding maturity filters to experiences and marketplace content in Sansar to open up adult content for those that wanted, and then maybe fashion can go somewhere.

[Susan]

A couple points from the article. 1. Sansar is giving out their avatar bodies. 2. Making clothing brought in from Marvelous Designer fit (no poke-throughs) means just clicking one button. I look at the pictures posted and wonder if they were put there to deliberately make Sansar look bad?

[Clara Seller]

What does Buford, Wyoming have to do to compete with Paris and New York as the fashion capitals of the world?

It's a whole lot more than just successfully managing to put on a dress.

Even SL inherited it's fashion legacy from another place and time. It's hanging on for dear life, but its real impact has been whittled down by the dying culture it serves. Fashion is for the living and the streets. The rest is just merchandising and documenting it's journey to get there.

[everyone wishs i was dead]

Sounds to me like too many people are trying to envision Sansar as Second Life 2.0 when they stated a 1000 times they are meant for different markets.

I agree with Susan it looks like a smear campaign.

[Clara Seller]

People envision Sansar incorrectly? There is no need to "envision" it when it's flattened in the middle of the road. We've tried it and watched all of the PR.

At this point, if people aren't getting what it's about, maybe that's the fault of the people building it or promoting it. Insinuating there is some conspiratorial Sansar smear campaign sounds pretty desperate in the face of the obvious. It looks like Sansar is about being dead and that is the market who is embracing it.

[Ryan Schultz]

Wagner has rather deliberately picked the examples of what clothing looks like BEFORE pressing the Simulate Cloth button. In that same blogpost are images of what the dresses are SUPPOSED to look like. I only included that image to show people how things *might* look if they forgot to press the Simulate Cloth button, a typical newbie mistake.

As has been said before, you only have to press one button (Simulate CLoth) to get a Marvelous-Designer-created garment to fit properly. That's a great improvement over having to fiddle with alphas to get an SL garment to look good. Also, you can adjust the garment by tugging on it with your mouse, to adjust the sleeves, the collar, etc. to your taste and your style.

[TheaninePete]

"The only way to get a rigged mesh wearable to fit "correctly" is to have the garment RIGGED TO THAT BODY, which also means that the designer has to have the body available to rig in their 3D program... "

This is 100% objectively false. You do not need a 3D rigged body, in fact you don't even have to ever touch a 3D modeling program to make clothing for Sansar. The MD integration makes that possible. That's the whole point. They just opened up the world of virtual fashion design to the common person who can't or doesn't have time to learn a complex 3D modeling program.

[irihapeti]

what Ryan and Pete said

and this what Ryan said: "[in Sansar] you can adjust the garment by tugging on it with your mouse, to adjust the sleeves, the collar, etc."

we can't do this in SL. It's the number one thing wanted by everyone in SL who cares about clothing. More people care about their appearance/clothing than any other one thing

[NorthernKiara]

I didn't think I'd be interested in designing clothing but since giving Marvelous Designer (MD) a test run (free 90 day trial for Sansar members) I am having a lot of fun with it. MD has a AV within it to create clothing on and a special export to Sansar; is user friendly and not that hard to learn with the help of a few instruction videos. The price is even pretty reasonable for the hobbyist. It makes creating clothing for Sansar pretty easy really. There are few kinks to work through still but all-in-all I am feeling a bit more encouraged as a creative playing and experimenting within Sansar.