New World Notes

Is VRChat Already Too Late to Roll Out Its Creator Economy?

VRChat recently announced in-world monetization options for creators, and I've been wondering since then whether it's too little, too late. The founders' extreme caution around a creator economy is totally understandable, but the virtual world already has about 4-6 million monthly active users (by my estimate), making its population about the size of Los Angeles. And there are easily 1000+ VRChat creators already monetizing on third party sites like Patreon, YouTube, Gumroad, and so on.

The other challenge: VRChat is primarily played on Steam and through the Quest, both of which take a 30% cut. As compared, for example, to Patreon, which only takes a 5-12% commission; top YouTubers usually get into direct sponsorship deals, and pay YouTube zero percent in commissions. So creators already established on those platforms have more incentive to encourage fans to support them that way, and not through in-app payments.

All that said, I reached out to some top VRChat creators for their take on monetization:

Reimajo, who created the imperssive Roller Coaster Tycoon-type sim in VRChat (watch below), actually thinks it could be a better option than Patreon:

Watch: Powerful Tribute to VRChat -- and the True Metaverse Ideal

 

This is a pretty powerful tribute to the VRChat community and the creativity they've wrought on the platform thus far -- and as created and narrated by Raergur, the video expresses the essential appeal of the Metaverse ideal too:

Built by and for the community, by real people. This is the real Metaverse. I've met so many beautiful souls people I never would have met otherwise, now lifetime friends I deeply and genuinely love.

Inside, you meet the most diverse people from around the world, but yet can interact with them as if they're right there in the room with you... We all come from vastly different lives. And this diversity gives fruit to such amazing experiences.

It's a place where any idea can be made and shared. We get to escape into the world people dreamt about in their mind, explore them and get lost in the stories people want to tell. We get to touch the cathedrals people have built in their minds.

Profoundly put (and visualized). Somewhat surprisingly, Raergur was not an active virtual world explorer before VRChat, he tells me, and first came across it through various meme videos on YouTube. But he's now a deep denizen of VRChat, where he created an avatar inspired by his interest in werewolves, while forming fast friendships through the power of immersion:

Watch: VRChat Teases Official Android Mobile App Built on Quest 2 Version

VRChat's latest developer update quietly includes details on its long-awaited mobile-app coming soon (watch above):

To start, VRChat on Android Mobile will only be available to VRChat Plus users. We want to get you a build ASAP to try out and start working with, while also allowing us time to refine the UI and UX before a full public launch. This also allows us to get your feedback about the app so you can help us track down issues and annoyances.

We plan to launch VRChat on Android Mobile to VRChat Plus users within 3-4 months. This timing could change! It depends entirely on how the development process goes.

This is pretty huge. VRChat has trailed behind Rec Room in terms of user numbers because the former is VR/PC only, whereas Rec Room has also been on mobile and consoles for years.

There's also a painful irony here, at least for Meta, which has struggled to gain user traction with Horizon Worlds while getting outpaced by VRChat and Rec Room:

Despite Widespread Tech Layoffs, Metaverse Platforms Currently Have 800+ Job Openings

With news that Microsoft is shutting down its VR metaverse platform AltspaceVR, along with widespread layoffs across most of the major tech companies, you might assume the Metaverse as an industry is also feeling the string.

Not so much.

On a quick tally of leading metaverse platforms in terms of active users, along with promising metaverse startups I've written about recently, I'm seeing nearly 800 current job openings at minimum. (And by the way, Microsoft and Minecraft developer Mojang still currently have 6 Minecraft-related job openings.) 

Here's links to these job openings available as of today, January 24, 2023:

Roblox, the market leader among metaverse platforms in terms of users, currently has 194 job openings.

Epic Games, developer of Fortnite/Fortnite Creative, currently has 368 job openings.

Rec Room, the most popular metaverse platform among Quest 2 users, currently has 45 job openings.

VRChat, the best next gen metaverse platform, currently has 19 job openings.

Naver Z, developer of mobile metaverse platform Zepeto, currently has 14 job openings.

Lockwood Publishing, the game studio behind Avakin Life, currently has 7 job openings.

Garena, the creator of Freefire, a Fortnite-like metaverse platform that's huge in Asia/South America, currently has 54 job openings.

There's also at least 150 job openings in promising startups featured by New World Notes, including:

VRChat Groups Launches in Open Beta; IBM/SL Vet Andrew Sempere Helping With System Design!

This is actually more of a milestone for VRChat than the Sony body trackers I mentioned earlier this week, and that was also huge -- VRChat just launched a group function in open beta:

Groups is a huge system that we think is going to change VRChat forever. Most of the features we’ve mentioned today will be released in the first, groundwork stage of Groups. Others will be released – along with polishing dictated by your feedback – in the weeks following the launch of Groups. We want to push these updates out relatively quickly, as we’d like to get Groups up and running as fast as possible.

While this group feature has long been in development by the startup, it's notable that a Second Life veteran is helping with its progress: Andrew Sempere, recently hired as VRChat's Senior Systems Designer, who was a key member of IBM's Second Life team back in the day.

While VRC and SL's group systems are very different (watch the video above), they share some commonalities with the thought of Nobel-winning economist Elinor Ostrom and her theory of collective action:

Watch: VRChat Partners With Sony On New Mobile-Based Motion Capture Product

This announcement from VRChat is impressive for many reasons:

Mocopi is supported in VRChat! We teamed up with Sony to integrate their mobile motion capture solution, on both PCVR and Quest!

Watch Mocopi in action above. It's a much more user-friendly way of doing motion capture, and relatively affordable at $358:

Visit in VRChat: 5 Impressive Worlds Inspired by Levels from Final Fantasy VII, Dark Souls, Legend of Zelda, Sonic the Hedgehog & Team Fortress 2

As a fun way of exploring VRChat and checking out the creative power of the platform this weekend, here's five VRChat worlds inspired on famous video game environments. (The above of course is City 17 from the Half-Life franchise, though it's currently defunct.)

Here's five more recommended and documented by Bradlee101, one of my favorite VRChat explorers on VRChat, based on spaces from Final Fantasy VII, Dark Souls, Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Team Fortress 2:

WATCH: This Impressive Machinima With Amazing Fight Scenes Was Shot Entirely in VRChat -- With One Actor Playing All the Fighters!

As teased back in August, here's S.Y.N.C., a short feature movie shot entirely in VRChat. Written, directed, edited, and performed by "Legend50210" (let's call him Legend for short), it's a fun sci-fi actioner with slick production values and impressive fight choreography -- even more impressive, when you realize Legend plays all the characters.

"The loops are recorded animations of myself," as he explained over the Summer. "The FreezeFrame mod had a 'Sync' button at the time and it allowed me to line up all animations from the start when I started a new clone."

In other words, he recorded the fight moves wearing different avatars in a full-body VR rig, then synced them together in post-production. What's really amazing to me is that the fight choreography is so fluid and seemingly full contact. That wasn't easy, says Legend:

WATCH: VRChat Not Only Has Avatars With Legs -- The Community Has Full-Body, Group Workout Sessions! UPDATE: It Was Founded in 2020 During the Pandemic as a Gym Alternative

my litmus test for "is your VR metaverse app even remotely as good as vrchat" is "are furries holding actual exercise classes in it" pic.twitter.com/Pd2mFPbr0k

— Aura🥨🥨🥨 (@MOOMANiBE) October 11, 2022

Update, 10/19: VR Fitness & Biking founder Aigey just sent me background on the founding of his workout group in VRChat during the pandemic peak and continues thriving by giving people an alternate to RL gyms:

[W]e started right as isolation started due to COVID-19 specifically, our group was founded initially because I used to go to the local gym but couldn't anymore but still wanted a gym-like experience but no one was allowed to go to the gym due to social distancing restrictions at the time here in Kentucky.

Our official start up... began officially in October of 2020 and have been running strong ever since. First because no one had access to gyms but then people found the idea to be fantastic due to the accessibility and freedom to 'be as you want to be' in a workout class from the safety of your own home as well as freedom from judgement that comes with going to an actual gym location, which has helped increase the popularity without us really advertising our groups existence. All of our growth so far has come without us advertising the group at all.

Original post below:

Carmack: Quest 2 Price Was Raised Because Free Metaverse Platforms VRChat & Rec Room Are More Popular Than Quest's Premium Games

Update, October 17: Carmack later acknowledged that Rec Room and VRChat do make money for Meta via 30% commissions on in-app payments. However, as most free-to-play multiplayer games/worlds monetize at under 10% (usually much less), it's still likely the case that the vast majority of Rec Room/VRChat players on Quest aren't paying Meta anything through those platforms.

I noted yesterday that the Quest 2 attach rate seems pretty small based on Meta's reported revenue numbers, but the rest of that story -- and the explanation for why the Quest 2's retail price was recently raised -- comes from senior Quest advisor John Carmack himself, in his Connect 2022 keynote.  

Basically, he says, Quest 2 owners are not buying enough premium content and instead, are using their headset for free-to-play metaverse platforms VRChat and Rec Room.

"When you have some of the most popular apps on Quest are free apps, VRChat and Rec Room, that we get no revenue from at all, and while they are sitting there at the top of our ranking list in many cases, there's there's not a lot of internal push for that," as he puts it. (Watch above at about 41 minutes in.)

This is a pretty jaw-dropping revelation. Meta developed the Quest 2 and the Quest app store to grow the market for its metaverse platform. But instead, Quest 2 owners are going in droves to VRChat and Rec Room -- leading metaverse platform competitors.  (Rec Room alone, as I recently reported, had 3 million active VR users, most of them on Quest.)

In fairness to Carmack, he adds that he's completely supportive of that happening. Full context of the quote below, and thanks to the eagle eyes of VR devs Derek Johnson and Kim Baumann Larsen for catching this point that I originally missed!