IMVU, Inc. (Instant Messaging Virtual Universe) is an online social entertainment website, founded in 2004, in which members use 3D avatars to meet, chat, create, and play games. IMVU has over 50 million registered users, 10 million unique visitors per month and three million monthly active users.
IMVU access is free. Free memberships allow users to register a "Guest_" avatar name, make use of the chat service, purchase virtual content, and create a personal homepage. IMVU contains its own economy with a currency system based on IMVU "credits" and "promotional credits."
Users can customize their homepages, set up public and private rooms, create, participate in user groups, peer review on virtual products waiting to be submitted into the IMVU catalog and participate in the Community forums and play games.
Buying a name removes "Guest_" from the avatar name and removes non-IMVU advertising, also enables options such as becoming a content creator and accessing additional forum sections. Some features require further payment such as access pass to adult material and the VIP to receive a monthly credit allowance as well as free virtual products.
Members who bought VIP and had Guest_ removed from their name become "Content Creators" and can create and sell virtual products. IMVU software Create Mode located in the 3D client itself is used in creating and submitting new virtual products.
A member must have enough credits in the account for "derivation" and submission fees in order to become a content creator. Credits can be purchased online using actual currency either directly from IMVU or from third party resellers.
Content creators may use programs such as 3D Max, Sketchup, or Blender to create IMVU's 3D assets. Content creators may leave their products as "derivable," so other creators can add on to the original and turn it into a brand new product to sell in the 3D catalog.
IMVU uses its own proprietary Cal3D format consisted of .xcf (eXperimental Computing Facility) sub-formats. Creators earn "developer tokens," which are earned when a user purchases an item with "promo credits," also known as "predits."
One developer token is technically worth ten credits. Developer tokens can be used while submitting an item on sale or to buy advertising called a "Shout Out," which buys the purchaser a certain number of placements in the scrolling ads that appears on the top of all IMVU pages.
IMVU has the world’s largest virtual goods catalog of more than 10 million items created by its own members. Creators can sell their products by listing them in the online IMVU product catalog.
Credits may not be transferred back from IMVU to actual currency but can be sold to registered resellers who will purchase them for real-world currency. The credits are used by members to purchase virtual items like fashion pieces (hair, clothes, skins and accessories), pets, furniture and 3D scenes such as homes, clubs and open landscapes.
Explore this virtual world. Sign up IMVU.
