CyberTown

Cybertown
280px
Homepage	www.cybertown.com
Platform	Blaxxun
Owner	IVN
Founders	Hawk & SFX
Membership Status	Free (as of 31 July 2011)
City Mayor	LadySilverSplash
Deputy Mayor	GreatGodBal
Colonies	Sci-fi Entertainment Games Virtual Worlds Cyberhood Inner Realms The Campus 9th Dimension Adventure Hi-Tek

CyberTown (CT) (formerly ColonyCity) is a free (as of 31 July 2011), family friendly, online community that has declined to a virtual ghost town over the last few years. There are places (chat rooms) available either through a 2D or 3D chat environment. Users are able to have jobs within the community, thus gain virtual money called CC's (CityCash) that can be used to buy 3D homes and items. Each user is allowed a free 2D home and can locate it within any of a number of colonies subdivided into neighborhoods and blocks. The cost is $5.00 per month or $49.99 a year. While still cheaper than the popular Second Life it cannot compare or compete with it nor any subscription based virtual experience.

As of September 2011 the game's player base has dwindled.

The history of this site has been discussed in detail by Nadeshda Kaneva as an illustration of the social dynamics that emerge in online communities ^[1]

Screenshot of Cybertown's Plaza in a web browser

Engine

The Cybertown trademark image are the 3D worlds that it has. The 3D worlds run on the VRML markup language, which is easy to design and modify. It uses The Blaxxun Community Platform coupled with the Blaxxun Contact VRML Viewer control, to interact in 3D worlds to make it more complete and capable of having a society structure by adding social interaction between users.

History

Colony City was started in 1997 as a showcase project of Blaxxun interactive of Munich, Germany. Colony City made use of the VRML (Virtual Reality Modeling Language), a standard for displaying 3D content, including virtual worlds and avatars, on the Web. These VRML files became shared virtual worlds using Blaxxun's award-winning multi-user server technology, enabling people from all over the world to meet and interact in rich-media environments in real-time on the Web.

Colony City Society Elements:

• Jobs
• Currency
• Home Ownership
• Purchasable Items
• Security
• Rank Hierarchy

Before the merge of ColonyCity and CyberTown, ColonyCity had a massive unemployment problem which neared 90% of users unemployed, making the main purpose people came to ColonyCity was to interact with the other users. Those that were employed were most likely part of the development team or were the first people to arrive.

Midway through 1999, ColonyCity merged with CyberTown which dramatically increased the users to a few thousand. At the time CyberTown was mainly a portal site with categories of links, however ColonyCity was able to use the ideas from the categories to make 3D worlds and expand CyberTown. To allow this influx of citizens to have homes in CyberTown, new "colonies" (places to live) had to be created. This created a huge demand for jobs which in turn created a more dynamic economy and gave new objectives for people.

After the merge CyberTown expanded at a fast rate in terms of new worlds being opened and new users joining on. At this point CyberTown had a little for everyone. There were those who were just passing by, those than didn't want to do anything else but chat, and those who wanted the responsibility of volunteering and holding a job positions with numerous places for advancement. The expansion has since died down and no new 3D worlds have been created.

It had expanded so far that promises made were never followed up on. Eventually the society broke down to the point where many public arguments and finger pointing was placed on city-wide message boards. Most of the arguments were based on agism, both real age and time since joining. Also the City Council, the highest authority of CyberTown, was accused of improper management and censoring of the citizens, leading into a civil war of sorts.

In 2002 Blaxxun interactive sold CyberTown to Integrated Virtual Networks who charge users a fee for membership. IVN has not done anything to improve Cybertown since the purchase (despite promising a quick Silhouette implementation when they took the reins).

As of 2010, due in part to the membership fee, CyberTown just could not keep the membership it once had before its sale in 2002, the average number of users online hovers around 5 when numbers over 500 online at any given time were not uncommon.

Economics

Citizens are able to hold jobs within the city, earning a daily wage in CityCash (CC's). Citizens can use CC's to purchase upgraded 3D homes and 3D objects. Citizens can also create their own 3D objects via VRML and sell them in the city's Mall for profit. This has created a plethora of diverse and rare items that can be sold secondhand either out of a citizen's backpack (inventory), in the Flea Market, or in the Black Market.

A major problem behind the economic of Cybertown was staggering inflation. There was no taxation system put into place to subtract from the wages to keep things in check. and so people realised that the "regulars" could afford more. So they made objects for the mall, purchased them for a paltary sum before anyone else could, and then sold them exclusively at inflated and ridiculous prices. But for many newcomers, the mall was regularly bare of "good" items, and the flea market was far too expensive.

Places in Cybertown

The Plaza 

The Plaza is the first place a user is taken once logging in. It links to other places, and thus is akin to a real city plaza.

ePlex 

The ePlex is an entertainment center. It features games such as bowling and video poker, an art gallery, streaming video and music, and even a dance club named The Black Sun.

The Clubs 

The Clubs are clubs created by CyberTown users based upon interests. Persons with a specific amount of EXP can create a club, anyone can join one.

The Flea Market

The Flea Market is a central place for people to sell items that they own.

The Black Market

The Black Market is akin to the Flea Market, except visitors are not allowed to view the chat.

Technology

Cybertown's various places exist as chat rooms. Users have the option of chatting in either 2D or 3D mode. The 2D chat is a Java applet, and the 3D chat runs off of the Blaxxun plugin. CyberTown has not been updated in several years, the technology is outdated. Other virtual experience sites have surpassed CyberTown, such as Second Life, There.com, and now with the introduction of two new players which are Vivaty and Google's Lively. Google started Lively in July 2008 and used it as a 3D experiment, the experiment was completed in December 2008 and Lively was cancelled.

References

1. ^ Kaneva, N. "Narrative power in Online Game worlds" p.56-73 in Williams, J. P., & Smith, J. H., eds. (2007). The players' realm: studies on the culture of video games and gaming. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Co. ISBN 9780786428328

External links

• CyberTown
• Blaxxun (NOT working)
• Integrated Virtual Networks