Woops! Just two quick notes: at 5:09 I accidentally forgot to replace the credit text, that should be Wild Greenhaven by Enverex. Also, at 34:56, that world is Bathhouse Utopia - The Tranquil Sanctuary by Fionna.
I gave VRChat a shot for the first time last weekend. In my very first public lobby, someone called me a retard simply for existing, some dickhead with a klansman avatar ran around the lobby screaming racial slurs, and then my game crashed after fifteen minutes of exposure, looping the same five seconds of squeakers talking to one another incomprehensibly. I felt like I finally found my way back home.
This actually had me in tears. I'm 33 years old, and while my computer time wasn't nearly as much as yours, I do remember the Old Internet. It really was a much more interesting place back then. If you didn't already know your destination of where you wanted to click, your possibilities were endless and mysterious.
I also 33 and...fuck. This era of early internet was really cool. I got my first 256 kb "fast" internet in 2005 when I was 15 years old kid and that was so cool . Those forums...old school rgs, rts games, forums and different wier websites. Also era of lan parties in computer clubs... That nostalgia of that era is so hard. I can only cry.
As an older zoomer, I started getting involved with the internet in the twilight years of its “golden age.” And here I am ten years later, watching internet documentarians such as Whang! And Wavywebsurf nostalgically talking about all the crazy crap that went on back then. I wish I could’ve experienced it.
It was Golden... Almost like the randomness of a dream that somehow makes sense while your in it. Not just any dream, the kind that sticks with you for years to come and you think "Yeah, I'd like to redream that dream." and a bit of your soul longs for it like a lover gone to war, you wonder if it'll ever come back. I've tried to describe that time, words won't ever compare to living it so, only the few can relate. It was another world, very random, magical, horrific, and just so amazing. To compare what was with what is, I physically feel my heart drop, rip, leak some blood, and cry. All before my eyes even begin to mist on the outside. Sorry for the rant ^^; I just felt this comment so damn hard.
@@slayerficated yesss i still remember allll of the virtual games i used to play! I still have my sheet of usernames and passwords for my olld accounts
A funny observation. "Snow Crash" describes Hiro's VR glasses as having 2K resolution per eye and refresh rate of 72Hz. The only real VR headset I found that uses 72Hz is Oculus Quest 2, and it is also one of the very few with 2K resolution per eye. And now it is called "Meta Quest 2", and the same company is set to build something they call "Metaverse".
This was a really good video. The way you speak and organize the content is very relaxing, you properly credited everything in the video, know what you're talking about and clearly express passion... Thank you for this, this was a pleasure.
I've had a lot of conversations like this with old buddies from the aol/everquest/old internet days. WoW really did feel like a DMZ era between old and new. It's kind of insane to me because at the time, every web 2.0 thing was something we all LOVED and saw it as a natural progression. But somehow once it all got combined, consolidated, and monetized and the end result has felt so soulless and corporate.
I am so glad to have this sort of thing back after the death of the old internet. The true freedom and creativity is so absolutely wonderful. Every time I see someone calling for more moderation, censorship, or any other restrictions that are all too common in the sanitized, corporatized modern internet it honestly turns my stomach. Most of them probably don't even know the irreparable harm such things will inflict on the platform and when this does inevitably come to pass, many will be like the me before finding VRChat, longing for the freedom and creativity that they once enjoyed.
This video is fantastic. I've forwarded it to some friends of mine over in dev and 3d modeling chats. I made the house at 10:34. Around the time you made this video, I finally learned how to rig and 3d model my own avatar, do all the weight painting, visemes, and learn enough unity to get all that working in VRChat with full body tracking. I think, socially, the pandemic has caused me to become reclusive much like my high school years. It's given me a unique bit of time to explore new areas of creativity, learning C#, Udon#, Python, etc, just to continue to pursue making environments for people to explore, and potentially learn some applicable skills for other jobs. You managed to encapsulate perfectly so many of the feelings I've been having over the past several years in areas that include not just the evolving state of the internet, but in the design of completely offline video games. Large companies and advertising firms know what can get people hooked. With the early stages of the Internet, when no one really knew what to make of it, VC's backed hosting companies like tripod, angelfire, geocities, and people just made random websites expressing their true personal interests. Nowadays, once the companies have figured out what works through this sorta... genetic algorithm thing, the websites that remained have become super polished, and the users of that website are using it because they're been sufficiently advertised to, and are using it mostly because they're addicted to some gamified element of it (likes, comments, subscriptions, retweets, followers) that pits them up against everyone else with these metrics. It's this sort of implicit agreement where the house always wins, in a sense. In these environments, once anyone gets too creative, too innovative, and falls out of line with the expectations of the company, they can, for no reason, quash that individual, without ever having to explain themselves. That was made apparent in this very comment I'm writing, which got entirely deleted from your channel by UA-cam without warning! This is the second time I'm writing this thing! I think what we're looking at with VRChat is yet another frontier, at the fringe of mainstream. Large corporations and VC firms are backing it because they don't know what to do with it yet to make it turn a profit, so they're just kinda having a hands-off approach to see what the people make of it. For now, I think we can basically ride the backs of these VC's to be as creative as we like. Some people will eventually discover some ways to turn this creative fun into something with a profit margin, and the companies will then absorb up this frontier and pave it over with whatever methods prove to be mainstream and efficient to keep the platform running. Some of the creative types will likely then get sucked into this corporate environment and allow the frontier to leave them behind. The rest of us, the incessantly creative types, will have to move onto something else. I have no idea what that will be, but I think it will continue to have these elements of chaos to them. I think we are attracted to the chaos of trying to get new technology to work. Where things break down is where we get to see people's true personalities, what they're truly interested in, and not just what caters to their addictions. I think what we can take away from Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash is that the oppressive corporate dystopia reality that existed in Hiro's "RL" became the Internet we see today. It could be that the creative escape from corporate overlords is something that will forever happen in tech, and VC's will ironically be funding the way.
i feel like.. tumblr hasn't been a total failure. sure, it's fallen from the highest echelon of social media by popularity, but it's still the pit that a lot of internet culture grows in. it's still up and running, and all of that. they've actually been trying to figure out how to monitize it well, i think.
tumblr recently released 15th anniversary merchandise, and started offering a paid subscription to remove ads.. either things are going to be ok, or this is one of the last hurrah's.. we'll have to see
I hope tumblr can stay up. People clown on it, but it's one of the few places that won't ban or mute you for anything not "kid friendly" aside from porn (RIP to the porn side of tumblr). It's got its own culture, and is full of genuinely funny people.
What Verizon did is like.. changing the salinity in a salt water tank and then going “how did the fish die?” Also it’s all man-butts now. What’s with that? XD
I didn’t grow up with the “old internet,” so I don’t have the same nostalgia for it that you do. But I still enjoyed listening to you talk about it! I guess I never really saw VR Chat in this light. I might have to look into it now.
You said what I've been describing as "the wild west creative community" And comeon dude... Vrchat isn't all just anime people, it's also full of FURRIES :-3 We tend to hide outside of public worlds.
I found your channel (thanks to that algorithm highlighting you on someone else's extremely professional review of new VR gear lol, the irony), and your content and essays are fantastic. Thank you for walking me through your thoughts in such a well thought out and comprehensive way, its been fantastic!
One more interesting note about having your own website back then-- cloud services weren't a thing yet. I had my own website partly to save flash movies and images I liked.
This was a trip, and I enjoyed it a ton. I love that you keep your past experiences to heart. A lot of the games you talked about, I never even knew they existed, and i'm a millennial myself. I used to just stick with my xbox and playstation and went on random adventures on the internet, and never cared where it would take me. I was also a curious boy, and still am. I have a lot of my own special moments from the past that I wish I could re-live as well as me trying to re-live, but it's just never the same as the first time. But hey, i'm glad I got to see the whole video. I knew you were wayyyyyy more than just a cool dude I headbang and dance with in GrooVr to hard-hitting and passionate music.
This video is perfect! Thank you for taking the time to make this it really helped me understand VRCHAT more. I hope that VRCHAT can stay in the magical form you have described!
Man, I can feel and see the effort u put into this video, I really applaud you. Seeing that u dont even have 1k subs shows that ur one of the many people I have found which are kinda swept under the rug till someone finds it. I really hope this video of yours makes it pop out
I feel that early platforms like the old web and vrchat thrive on creativity because they are made purely out of passion and artistic will, then later as they become monetized they become maintained by necessaity rather than passion. People see it as a way to survive by monetizing content rather than a way to express their creativity for no other reason than to create. Thank you for making this video discussing a topic I feel is important. I was born in 97 so I missed the web as you knew it, but I felt some of the magic that was there. I feel that I was really lucky that most of my first exposure to the internet was Scratch - an online block-based programming tool that let its users draw 2D sprites and create whatever they wanted. It was an education tool-turned-art program by its community, I saw so much art and animation and games made in it for no other reason than because someone wanted to, and I've always carried that inspiration with me. I hope that we can keep this spirit alive in VRChat for as long as possible. Future generations deserve to feel that freedom and inspiration as we've been able to.
that was literally the first thought I had when I jumped into my Index and loaded up VRchat lmfao, it just felt like a mix between the old internet and counter-strike/gmod custom maps. A bit broader than VRchat, but I also really love how almost everyone has voice chat on in any VR game. It really feels like a place again to socialize and experience weird random stuff, it's just people having fun and wanting to socialize while at it. I don't know the last time I even had a conversation in a multiplayer game. The games keep dismantling lobbies and no one ever has Voice Chat on but in VR all of that is different. I forgot how much I missed this wonderful space where everything goes and you just forget the real world for a couple of moments, but not because you want to unwind but because you just have so much fun.
You're so right about the way we experience the other internet. My nieces and young kids I've met always thought that "being on UA-cam" means I'm a celebrity or something. It's odd
I just started watching through your back catalog and as someone who has worked with Activeworlds as a performance space, I was over the moon to see you give it such a deep dive here, oh my god.
Great video! Really encapsulates a lot of my own feelings on why VRChat is so amazing. It’s really overwhelming and I haven’t really made friends yet, but the whole experience is just incredible. One day I was feeling sad and wanted to stare out the window on a rainy day, so I went on VRChat and did that. What a powerful thing this game is.
You eloquently and humorously laid out exactly what I love about VRchat. I've been saying it since the first time I played, just couldn't put it in such a way as to explain exactly *why* i felt that way. Thanks for sending me here lefty
Oh damn, didn't even know you were relatively new to VRC as well. Watching your videos I always got the impression that you spent time in VRC for a long time already.
The Amount of sheer freedom in Vrchat is staggering. I've seen things and talked to people I never would have met my entire life and that honestly is incredible to think about. I have roughly 4,000 hours and have been playing since early 2017 when the playerbase was about 250 or so. From the get go it felt like a giant family almost we all knew eachother, it was crazy. It has grown into almost feeling like another world full of others you can meet. I've seen two deaf people fully communicate in vr. Ive spoken to someone in Japan who spoke no english but I had a translater to translate for me. Its staggering the possibilities that come with VR. The future looks bright for it all and I hope others can experience the awe of seeing and the feeling of actually being there. Its wild! Thank you for the well put together documentary!
wow I can't believe this man literally took ALL the words from my mouth relating to VRC legit was thinking of working on a video that's pretty much this without the super good backstory & perspective looking forward to whatever you make next!
I came here from VRChat's reddit and kind of expected a video about well VRChat. What I got I didn't expect but it helped me understand why someone could enjoy VRChat that much. I've been on the internet for quite a long time creating my own websites and just browsing the sites. I was more of a IRC person so active worlds or worlds chat is something I totally missed. I've been trying to figure out what I myself like about VRChat for a long time but I couldn't really grasp it. Pretty much everything on the internet is making me feel bad since it's reflecting the society, consumerism and whatnot. I'm tired of being told what to do, what products to buy and what to like. VRChat gave me freedom which I can't find in the real world but only after watching your video I finally understand why. Good job on your video, looking forward to your next one. (note that I don't normally watch youtube videos)
Just as a sidenote from a VR-outside, it is really heartwarming to see how much more expressive you become once you use your VRchat avatar. It may be in part due to your arm gestures being easier to see due to the different body proportions, but I don't think it's just that. Either way, esapecially from Chapter 3 onwards it really drives home the point that virtual worlds are truly meaningful to you as you just seem to communicate in such an immersed and natural manner. I keep bouncing around the idea of building a SlimeVR set of full body sensors and you only make it look so much more appealing. Also, the rage expressed towards your English Degree was hilarious.
I was thinking "Huh I was pretty young in the period Straszfilms is talking about, I probably don't remember the early internet that much" and then 18:55 happened and I got VIVID flashbacks to browsing Sailor Moon fansites for hours at a time
I absolutely love your long form video essays. As someone who grew up with the birth of the internet and lived through those early days, and went on to build a career around web design and development, I loved the look back in time to what it used to be, to what it is today, and how VRChat harkens back to some of that original ethos. You make a lot of fantastic points. Thanks for putting this together :)
i have a similar nostalgic and ongoing fondness for second life. the one thing it will forever have over VRc, it the joy of building and modifying and customizing your avatar in world. and under the sleek surface, there's still a lot of the anarchic spirit of early 2000s internet.
Because it is so community driven, I think it would make sense for VR chat to do patreon or equivalent. This would give them even more incentive to listen to the community and still be able to make money for their investors.
The feeling is probably just that you can be free do whatever you want, not be judged aslong as you're not beinge rude and be everything you want having fun as something or someone you're not are being able to escape the regular 'inprisonment' of your daily life being able to talk to people who do not neccessairly share the same ideology but still not be rejected because it's simply the community and they know not to judge how you look like or how you are because the games community is simply split in so many ways that it's regular to be so unusual compared to real life. It's a perfect place because it's like the way of life, chaotic and boundless which real life isn't even close to, you're not permited to do stuff, you need to do certain stuff at a certain time, you are on a constant schedule removing your freedom and bringing order to the chaotic way of life creating a lot of stress. In VR chat there is none of that, it's chaotic freedom where you can do whatever you want without constant perfection and limitation. It's just the origin on life
Absolutely had to comment on this. I know I'm late, but youtube decided I'm here now so welp, here we go lol. First off, VRChat is absolutely amazing, it isn't for me but you're entirely right that it gets the creative spirit of the old internet. It is a miracle of sorts that something of this sort was ever birthed this side of the millennia. Secondly, the issue is that corporations are playing it safe, providing what we all want, but that snuffs out any ounce of creativity that could exist. It's not exactly the wrong choice (especially when you consider investors), but it really is a shame that we're left with nothing but safe content. It's like being provided air, yes we all need it but it's so common we already have it. For anyone who wants something special, something creative, well that's outside of the standard and so that isn't "safe". To give us, as humans, what we ask for universally, they have to remove the truly "human" aspect from whatever it is we receive. It's a dilemma, and not one I really have a good answer for. For now, it's nice to see any mainstream app outside of the normal mold.
I think the old internet stills exists, it has never died, it's just not on the spotlight anymore. I know these websites exist, I just have to find them, and I know how to, but I just don't want to try and find them right now. I got other things to do. It's difficult to find though because you have to ask around and avoid the many sites that are just imitating another site, trying to be big, or are focused on pushing a movement. This video reminded me a lot to when I was using REDACTED, they were good times. It's the first website I really cared about
UA-cam deleted my original comment, annoying. The funny thing though is that the comment was a lot longer and it was deleted because I made an edit that said "I should probably make this shorter, not sure though. I said a lot of things that are unnecessary" There was also a reply from BreezeFox that said "we didn't do this to ourselves" I believe we did. We asked for search engines, and relevant results, and it led us to this. Websites can manipulate search engines to move them to the top and get more clicks, they don't have to pay the search engine to make it happen. We also asked to grow our business through the internet and advertise ourselves, this is what happened. Sure, maybe you didn't ask for this, but if you were a business owner then you would ask for it. I know the artists and animators at Newgrounds were asking for it. The big problem is that no one knew that this meant losing so much on the internet. We didn't ask to lose this magic, but the things we asked has led us to this.
The unfortunate pitfall of monetization is not the fact that the platform would take a cut, that is normal and it helps the thing you like to survive. The issue is that the moment VR Chat starts taking a cut o the on app sales, they take responsibility for the content and the suddenly the freedom is gone. Suddenly there is copyright, legality and all the other crap.
When I played Hypnospace Outlaw, it unearthed memories of pre-2004 internet that I forgot were there. It sparked a huge bout of nostalgia for a graphical chat client (Unichat) that randomly shut down in 2003, completely wiping from existence this entire social space I'd grown attached to over a few years. This is the first I'm hearing about VRChat, and it seems like my first real opportunity in 20 years to recapture that experience. I expect to have a ton of sensations that I legitimately haven't felt in decades.
this video has stirred my heart. in this point where I am hurting and gave VRC a try, that for the first time I've really gotten to break the shackles of gender identity that I got to put cracks in back in 2004 when friends on the internet told me it was cute when I was more effeminate and I liked that idea. trying to find worlds and get suggestions on what to explore and do began to truly fill me with wonder at a time where i am dealing with likely some of the biggest stressors of myu life save for when my body begins failing me much in the same way that is happening to my father right now. I come here now as it looks like Easy Anti-Cheat is here to stay, to eliminate solutions to problems that community had long since solved for themselves, to bring that sort of order as... things begin to change. That's been my first two weeks of VRChat.
Wow, thanks for putting in words of what i was missing from the early 2000s internet but couldnt point my finger on. Great video, looks like I should take a look at vrc :)
How can this Video only have like 8k views? You're seriously underrated and lm glad that l got the chance to watch this. You did an amazing job! And l really wanna try vr-chat now haha
Why the old Internet was more interesting : the difference between a zoomed in view of a single car on a tiny road vs a zoomed out view of a busy intersection
Saw your video on gender and identity first and took a look at what else you had. Both that video and this one have made me a lot more eager to try VR Chat. :)
Straszfilms: I have been binge watching your series on VR for a while liking it got a question for you how do you do your real life room and your avatar in the same video is it video editing or is it live streaming.... I would really like to do the same thing in 2023 with my avatars in the future please help
2002 zoomer here Yes. I at least on some level remember finding sites for video games and all that sort of stuff and personal websites. I think around 2008-9. But it was as you say in that period of changing.
I was barely old enough to experience the old internet, and yet I never really did. In fact most old internet, video game etc. stuff thjat's nostalgic for people my age isn't for me, because I got on the internet fairly late, and for a long time after I did I used it for only extremely specific things and spent most of the rest of my time reading, drawing, listening to music and even when I did get on the computer most of the time it was only for a couple of things. By the time I really started to use the internet more generally, social media was already a thing and was starting to take over, though I did stick to forums a lot more than one might have expected of me given the time period. I wish I had experienced the old internet properly. I wish I could use VRChat more to experience something like it, in a similar spirit, but I just don't have a great home situation to be doing that. Maybe someday. I hope it isn't gone before I get the chance, like what happened before. I'll be really sad if I ruin this for myself again.
Chapter 3: Dang kids, get off my lawn! Not complaining. Nostalgic as heck. Great presentation of a truly horrific looking (literally) era of the internet.
Excellent job, very well done! I had loaded VRChat into my Original Oculus Quest (1). However, I could never get the hang of VRC, too much to read, too many menu screens. I stuck with AltspaceVR. Now that Microsoft has Closed Down AltspaceVR, many of us have moved over to VRChat. This time VRC is working for me. I have lots of people whom I trust to help me get used to the menus and controls. In a very short amount of time I have grown to like VRChat. You are correct that it has the feel of the raw internet back in the day. Thank you again for your VERY WELL DONE video essays on VRChat.
Anyone remember what Meez was? It was a mid 2010's chatroom where you made characters and and worlds, rooms to go to. Active Worlds sounds like an older Meez (or IMVU and the like)
I struggle with school and I'm glad the internet is what it is today (I'm 23, an old zoomer). I also use UA-cam as a second search engine to learn stuff from. Personally I was able to grow up with the internet in a way where I quickly learned how to traverse it pretty safely over time. I feel like I know my way around it. I mostly know how to avoid the negatives. I'm glad it's a platform that allows us to create an electronic any form of business on. After I'm done with uni in May, I'm planning on polishing my 3D skill by making stuff for VRChat. Character and environments. But I very much so agree with your video. Personally, I'm just not that attached to the nostalgia of the old internet.
I tried going back in VR chat and from the ~3 years from when I first went in and enjoyed it's not the same chat. They do have most popular filters, and ect. They just have a nod to the old internet now with 'random' witch isn't random.
I really miss forums. Not the big ones either. The odd and scattered groups of a few dozen people just hacking up their own space. The horrid color schemes, the weird jokes, the signature banners - god the signature banners. I think I've still got one lying around I should see if I can find it.
I tried VR chat years ago on a Quest 1, it had performance issues, confusing interface, aggro people, meme screaming children and I couldn't find an avatar that I wanted to use... I hated it! Now I've gone back on the Quest 2 and I adore it, I've found some good people, got myself a handful of avatars that I like (including a custom one) and discovered some amazing places. I know that the creative freedom era of of VR can't last forever and the corporate walls have already started to slowly close in but I want to enjoy it before it changes too drastically.
Millennial here.. Last site that I feel still had a tint of the "old internet" vibe was tumblr before it sold itself and banned nsfw stuff.. Ofcoz you stayed on the site, but clicking on names of stuff being reblogged would lead you to discover new dashboards and new interests etc. It felt close to those old web-rings and you curranted a feed pretty close to void of "only sponsored posts" that twitter has turned into..
OMG, that Black Sun creation in AW :O (yes, I read Snow Crash =D ) Edit: do note that Cyberpunk 2077 is ALSO a critique, but taken with literal interpretation by the game developers as well. Since the title is based on the 1988 tabletop RPG world of Cyberpunk 2013, it still has roots in both First Wave Cyberpunk and later renditions. Funnily enough, Mike Pondsmith never read Neuromancer when he made the TTRPG. It's why it's so different than what you would expect in some cases, when you go back reading 2013 and 2020. Of course, any visual media loses something in translation. CP2077 is, just like many modern takes, a more in your face one. But yeah... the genre is not in its prime anymore. And despite all that I still love the videogame. Because it harkens back to First Wave and other early cyberpunk media.
The old internet may have been cool, but it was way too hard for someone like me to navigate. I'm glad it changed now. I don't feel like I have to be a computer expert to use it.
I feel very lucky and happy that I adopted VR in it's current Wild West stage it's going to be said when big corporations finally get their claws into it and it turns into the same mess every other gaming and media platform has devolved into but for now we get to enjoy the golden years while we can. Enjoy free cyberspace while it lasts.
Ima just say it. Even CG5 jumped on the Uganda Knuckles (the weird short "do you know da wae?" knucks) hype. That little guy is amazing. I once heard of someone who dressed up like him in public dancing to that very same CG5 song.
I used to believe VRChat was the metaverse, until I found the pure freedom of expression and creativity available in Neos VR, you can do things there VRChat users can only dream about!
@@blindey Ok, to list a few things: a personal inventory of objects that you have made/cloned from worlds where you can spawn objects that other people can pick up and play with, you can build worlds inside of the game it's self, there is a text chat system built right it to your friends list that you can send voice recordings through as well, it is super simple to set up new attachments on to your avatar and modify it on the fly with snap points. ( like hats, and other things like that) almost everything is completely customizable, even to the font, color and size of your name plate (the thing with your name floating above your head), the in game scripting system is basically super udon, there are a lot of things I am forgetting here, but the only thing that VRChat has that Neos doesn't have is a large player base
This video has aged well, VRChat found a monetization method that fits in well. Subscription service that isn't a requirement but just sprinkles a few extras that people may want for a fair price.
very surprised to only see two comments in here about tumblr, which is still thriving in 2023. while even now as we're getting unwanted updates to try wear the flayed skin of twitter, there is still no algorythm on tumblr. stuff on your feed is put there mostly by the people you follow, you have to learn how to curate a feed - a skill that has been very lost on newer platforms. The way i can scroll through deep political posts and shit posts and breath taking art all one after another is amazing to me. I can still make my own blog html custom! there are some structural changes that will hopefully be for the better soon, and who knows mb one day it'll be able to properly reopen the doors to nsfw content that ppl seem to only think of tumblr for on another note, wild vrchat premium started two months or so after this video came out. doesnt sound like it changed things awfully which really gives me hope ngl!
Woops! Just two quick notes: at 5:09 I accidentally forgot to replace the credit text, that should be Wild Greenhaven by Enverex. Also, at 34:56, that world is Bathhouse Utopia - The Tranquil Sanctuary by Fionna.
I gave VRChat a shot for the first time last weekend. In my very first public lobby, someone called me a retard simply for existing, some dickhead with a klansman avatar ran around the lobby screaming racial slurs, and then my game crashed after fifteen minutes of exposure, looping the same five seconds of squeakers talking to one another incomprehensibly.
I felt like I finally found my way back home.
way back home... as in away from vr chat?
@@debonairrose They mean early 2000s internet basically.
@@debonairrose It was a less civilized age, but also less Big Brother bs.
Public worlds lol
This actually had me in tears. I'm 33 years old, and while my computer time wasn't nearly as much as yours, I do remember the Old Internet. It really was a much more interesting place back then. If you didn't already know your destination of where you wanted to click, your possibilities were endless and mysterious.
I also 33 and...fuck. This era of early internet was really cool. I got my first 256 kb "fast" internet in 2005 when I was 15 years old kid and that was so cool . Those forums...old school rgs, rts games, forums and different wier websites. Also era of lan parties in computer clubs... That nostalgia of that era is so hard. I can only cry.
As an older zoomer, I started getting involved with the internet in the twilight years of its “golden age.” And here I am ten years later, watching internet documentarians such as Whang! And Wavywebsurf nostalgically talking about all the crazy crap that went on back then. I wish I could’ve experienced it.
Relate hard to this
It was Golden... Almost like the randomness of a dream that somehow makes sense while your in it. Not just any dream, the kind that sticks with you for years to come and you think "Yeah, I'd like to redream that dream." and a bit of your soul longs for it like a lover gone to war, you wonder if it'll ever come back.
I've tried to describe that time, words won't ever compare to living it so, only the few can relate. It was another world, very random, magical, horrific, and just so amazing.
To compare what was with what is, I physically feel my heart drop, rip, leak some blood, and cry. All before my eyes even begin to mist on the outside.
Sorry for the rant ^^; I just felt this comment so damn hard.
@@edenmarble8048 it's called nostalgia
Older zoomer gang RISE UP
@@slayerficated yesss i still remember allll of the virtual games i used to play! I still have my sheet of usernames and passwords for my olld accounts
I found this google searching "VR chat seems very early internet" so we're on the same wavelength there.
A funny observation. "Snow Crash" describes Hiro's VR glasses as having 2K resolution per eye and refresh rate of 72Hz. The only real VR headset I found that uses 72Hz is Oculus Quest 2, and it is also one of the very few with 2K resolution per eye. And now it is called "Meta Quest 2", and the same company is set to build something they call "Metaverse".
This was a really good video. The way you speak and organize the content is very relaxing, you properly credited everything in the video, know what you're talking about and clearly express passion... Thank you for this, this was a pleasure.
I've had a lot of conversations like this with old buddies from the aol/everquest/old internet days. WoW really did feel like a DMZ era between old and new. It's kind of insane to me because at the time, every web 2.0 thing was something we all LOVED and saw it as a natural progression. But somehow once it all got combined, consolidated, and monetized and the end result has felt so soulless and corporate.
I am so glad to have this sort of thing back after the death of the old internet. The true freedom and creativity is so absolutely wonderful.
Every time I see someone calling for more moderation, censorship, or any other restrictions that are all too common in the sanitized, corporatized modern internet it honestly turns my stomach.
Most of them probably don't even know the irreparable harm such things will inflict on the platform and when this does inevitably come to pass, many will be like the me before finding VRChat, longing for the freedom and creativity that they once enjoyed.
This video is fantastic. I've forwarded it to some friends of mine over in dev and 3d modeling chats. I made the house at 10:34. Around the time you made this video, I finally learned how to rig and 3d model my own avatar, do all the weight painting, visemes, and learn enough unity to get all that working in VRChat with full body tracking. I think, socially, the pandemic has caused me to become reclusive much like my high school years. It's given me a unique bit of time to explore new areas of creativity, learning C#, Udon#, Python, etc, just to continue to pursue making environments for people to explore, and potentially learn some applicable skills for other jobs.
You managed to encapsulate perfectly so many of the feelings I've been having over the past several years in areas that include not just the evolving state of the internet, but in the design of completely offline video games. Large companies and advertising firms know what can get people hooked. With the early stages of the Internet, when no one really knew what to make of it, VC's backed hosting companies like tripod, angelfire, geocities, and people just made random websites expressing their true personal interests. Nowadays, once the companies have figured out what works through this sorta... genetic algorithm thing, the websites that remained have become super polished, and the users of that website are using it because they're been sufficiently advertised to, and are using it mostly because they're addicted to some gamified element of it (likes, comments, subscriptions, retweets, followers) that pits them up against everyone else with these metrics. It's this sort of implicit agreement where the house always wins, in a sense. In these environments, once anyone gets too creative, too innovative, and falls out of line with the expectations of the company, they can, for no reason, quash that individual, without ever having to explain themselves. That was made apparent in this very comment I'm writing, which got entirely deleted from your channel by UA-cam without warning! This is the second time I'm writing this thing!
I think what we're looking at with VRChat is yet another frontier, at the fringe of mainstream. Large corporations and VC firms are backing it because they don't know what to do with it yet to make it turn a profit, so they're just kinda having a hands-off approach to see what the people make of it. For now, I think we can basically ride the backs of these VC's to be as creative as we like. Some people will eventually discover some ways to turn this creative fun into something with a profit margin, and the companies will then absorb up this frontier and pave it over with whatever methods prove to be mainstream and efficient to keep the platform running. Some of the creative types will likely then get sucked into this corporate environment and allow the frontier to leave them behind.
The rest of us, the incessantly creative types, will have to move onto something else. I have no idea what that will be, but I think it will continue to have these elements of chaos to them. I think we are attracted to the chaos of trying to get new technology to work. Where things break down is where we get to see people's true personalities, what they're truly interested in, and not just what caters to their addictions.
I think what we can take away from Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash is that the oppressive corporate dystopia reality that existed in Hiro's "RL" became the Internet we see today. It could be that the creative escape from corporate overlords is something that will forever happen in tech, and VC's will ironically be funding the way.
excuse me, i am stealing your comment, and saving it on my hard disk. thank you
Thank you for typing this out. You feel like family 💜
i feel like.. tumblr hasn't been a total failure. sure, it's fallen from the highest echelon of social media by popularity, but it's still the pit that a lot of internet culture grows in. it's still up and running, and all of that. they've actually been trying to figure out how to monitize it well, i think.
tumblr recently released 15th anniversary merchandise, and started offering a paid subscription to remove ads.. either things are going to be ok, or this is one of the last hurrah's.. we'll have to see
-SHHHHHHH. don't reveal the secret,- tumblr is totally dead and failed guys nothing to see there nope nothing whatsoever
I hope tumblr can stay up. People clown on it, but it's one of the few places that won't ban or mute you for anything not "kid friendly" aside from porn (RIP to the porn side of tumblr). It's got its own culture, and is full of genuinely funny people.
The fact it fell is proof of its failure. The best platform sadly is 4chan.
What Verizon did is like.. changing the salinity in a salt water tank and then going “how did the fish die?”
Also it’s all man-butts now. What’s with that? XD
I didn’t grow up with the “old internet,” so I don’t have the same nostalgia for it that you do. But I still enjoyed listening to you talk about it! I guess I never really saw VR Chat in this light. I might have to look into it now.
You said what I've been describing as "the wild west creative community"
And comeon dude... Vrchat isn't all just anime people, it's also full of FURRIES :-3
We tend to hide outside of public worlds.
This is true
Those furries better stay away from public worlds, can you imagine the teasing?
Im one that likes to jump into random public instances and try to talk to random people.
you better
@@olivermarie8319 we do
I found your channel (thanks to that algorithm highlighting you on someone else's extremely professional review of new VR gear lol, the irony), and your content and essays are fantastic. Thank you for walking me through your thoughts in such a well thought out and comprehensive way, its been fantastic!
One more interesting note about having your own website back then-- cloud services weren't a thing yet. I had my own website partly to save flash movies and images I liked.
This was a trip, and I enjoyed it a ton. I love that you keep your past experiences to heart. A lot of the games you talked about, I never even knew they existed, and i'm a millennial myself. I used to just stick with my xbox and playstation and went on random adventures on the internet, and never cared where it would take me. I was also a curious boy, and still am. I have a lot of my own special moments from the past that I wish I could re-live as well as me trying to re-live, but it's just never the same as the first time. But hey, i'm glad I got to see the whole video. I knew you were wayyyyyy more than just a cool dude I headbang and dance with in GrooVr to hard-hitting and passionate music.
This video is perfect! Thank you for taking the time to make this it really helped me understand VRCHAT more. I hope that VRCHAT can stay in the magical form you have described!
Man, I can feel and see the effort u put into this video, I really applaud you. Seeing that u dont even have 1k subs shows that ur one of the many people I have found which are kinda swept under the rug till someone finds it. I really hope this video of yours makes it pop out
I feel that early platforms like the old web and vrchat thrive on creativity because they are made purely out of passion and artistic will, then later as they become monetized they become maintained by necessaity rather than passion. People see it as a way to survive by monetizing content rather than a way to express their creativity for no other reason than to create.
Thank you for making this video discussing a topic I feel is important. I was born in 97 so I missed the web as you knew it, but I felt some of the magic that was there. I feel that I was really lucky that most of my first exposure to the internet was Scratch - an online block-based programming tool that let its users draw 2D sprites and create whatever they wanted. It was an education tool-turned-art program by its community, I saw so much art and animation and games made in it for no other reason than because someone wanted to, and I've always carried that inspiration with me. I hope that we can keep this spirit alive in VRChat for as long as possible. Future generations deserve to feel that freedom and inspiration as we've been able to.
that was literally the first thought I had when I jumped into my Index and loaded up VRchat lmfao, it just felt like a mix between the old internet and counter-strike/gmod custom maps. A bit broader than VRchat, but I also really love how almost everyone has voice chat on in any VR game. It really feels like a place again to socialize and experience weird random stuff, it's just people having fun and wanting to socialize while at it. I don't know the last time I even had a conversation in a multiplayer game. The games keep dismantling lobbies and no one ever has Voice Chat on but in VR all of that is different. I forgot how much I missed this wonderful space where everything goes and you just forget the real world for a couple of moments, but not because you want to unwind but because you just have so much fun.
You're so right about the way we experience the other internet. My nieces and young kids I've met always thought that "being on UA-cam" means I'm a celebrity or something. It's odd
I just started watching through your back catalog and as someone who has worked with Activeworlds as a performance space, I was over the moon to see you give it such a deep dive here, oh my god.
Great video! Really encapsulates a lot of my own feelings on why VRChat is so amazing. It’s really overwhelming and I haven’t really made friends yet, but the whole experience is just incredible.
One day I was feeling sad and wanted to stare out the window on a rainy day, so I went on VRChat and did that. What a powerful thing this game is.
Thanks! It's honestly just a matter of time until you find a social circle in VRChat. It honestly just... happens.
You eloquently and humorously laid out exactly what I love about VRchat. I've been saying it since the first time I played, just couldn't put it in such a way as to explain exactly *why* i felt that way. Thanks for sending me here lefty
Oh damn, didn't even know you were relatively new to VRC as well. Watching your videos I always got the impression that you spent time in VRC for a long time already.
The Amount of sheer freedom in Vrchat is staggering. I've seen things and talked to people I never would have met my entire life and that honestly is incredible to think about. I have roughly 4,000 hours and have been playing since early 2017 when the playerbase was about 250 or so. From the get go it felt like a giant family almost we all knew eachother, it was crazy. It has grown into almost feeling like another world full of others you can meet. I've seen two deaf people fully communicate in vr. Ive spoken to someone in Japan who spoke no english but I had a translater to translate for me. Its staggering the possibilities that come with VR. The future looks bright for it all and I hope others can experience the awe of seeing and the feeling of actually being there. Its wild! Thank you for the well put together documentary!
This video is very good, as a veteran internet user who started chatting on the world wide web in 1994 I cant argue with a word you have said.
wow I can't believe this man literally took ALL the words from my mouth relating to VRC
legit was thinking of working on a video that's pretty much this without the super good backstory & perspective
looking forward to whatever you make next!
I came here from VRChat's reddit and kind of expected a video about well VRChat. What I got I didn't expect but it helped me understand why someone could enjoy VRChat that much. I've been on the internet for quite a long time creating my own websites and just browsing the sites. I was more of a IRC person so active worlds or worlds chat is something I totally missed.
I've been trying to figure out what I myself like about VRChat for a long time but I couldn't really grasp it. Pretty much everything on the internet is making me feel bad since it's reflecting the society, consumerism and whatnot. I'm tired of being told what to do, what products to buy and what to like. VRChat gave me freedom which I can't find in the real world but only after watching your video I finally understand why.
Good job on your video, looking forward to your next one. (note that I don't normally watch youtube videos)
Just as a sidenote from a VR-outside, it is really heartwarming to see how much more expressive you become once you use your VRchat avatar. It may be in part due to your arm gestures being easier to see due to the different body proportions, but I don't think it's just that. Either way, esapecially from Chapter 3 onwards it really drives home the point that virtual worlds are truly meaningful to you as you just seem to communicate in such an immersed and natural manner. I keep bouncing around the idea of building a SlimeVR set of full body sensors and you only make it look so much more appealing.
Also, the rage expressed towards your English Degree was hilarious.
VRChat sure is magical!
12:52 "GO AWAY ENGLISH DEGREE" absolutely got me lmfao, had to actually pause because I was laughing too hard
I was thinking "Huh I was pretty young in the period Straszfilms is talking about, I probably don't remember the early internet that much" and then 18:55 happened and I got VIVID flashbacks to browsing Sailor Moon fansites for hours at a time
I absolutely love your long form video essays. As someone who grew up with the birth of the internet and lived through those early days, and went on to build a career around web design and development, I loved the look back in time to what it used to be, to what it is today, and how VRChat harkens back to some of that original ethos. You make a lot of fantastic points. Thanks for putting this together :)
That transition from IRL body to VRL body was smoooooth ! nice haha
i have a similar nostalgic and ongoing fondness for second life. the one thing it will forever have over VRc, it the joy of building and modifying and customizing your avatar in world. and under the sleek surface, there's still a lot of the anarchic spirit of early 2000s internet.
I really like your videos and you have a calming cadence. You are now trapped within my subscriptions. FOREVER.
The guy that makes the dna avatars is called MR_EM, he's a really cool guy! We talk about avatar making from time to time.
Thank you so much! I'll add that to the description. I saw him months ago and forgot to write down his name!
Because it is so community driven, I think it would make sense for VR chat to do patreon or equivalent. This would give them even more incentive to listen to the community and still be able to make money for their investors.
The feeling is probably just that you can be free do whatever you want, not be judged aslong as you're not beinge rude and be everything you want having fun as something or someone you're not are being able to escape the regular 'inprisonment' of your daily life being able to talk to people who do not neccessairly share the same ideology but still not be rejected because it's simply the community and they know not to judge how you look like or how you are because the games community is simply split in so many ways that it's regular to be so unusual compared to real life. It's a perfect place because it's like the way of life, chaotic and boundless which real life isn't even close to, you're not permited to do stuff, you need to do certain stuff at a certain time, you are on a constant schedule removing your freedom and bringing order to the chaotic way of life creating a lot of stress. In VR chat there is none of that, it's chaotic freedom where you can do whatever you want without constant perfection and limitation. It's just the origin on life
Absolutely had to comment on this. I know I'm late, but youtube decided I'm here now so welp, here we go lol. First off, VRChat is absolutely amazing, it isn't for me but you're entirely right that it gets the creative spirit of the old internet. It is a miracle of sorts that something of this sort was ever birthed this side of the millennia. Secondly, the issue is that corporations are playing it safe, providing what we all want, but that snuffs out any ounce of creativity that could exist. It's not exactly the wrong choice (especially when you consider investors), but it really is a shame that we're left with nothing but safe content. It's like being provided air, yes we all need it but it's so common we already have it. For anyone who wants something special, something creative, well that's outside of the standard and so that isn't "safe". To give us, as humans, what we ask for universally, they have to remove the truly "human" aspect from whatever it is we receive. It's a dilemma, and not one I really have a good answer for. For now, it's nice to see any mainstream app outside of the normal mold.
I think the old internet stills exists, it has never died, it's just not on the spotlight anymore. I know these websites exist, I just have to find them, and I know how to, but I just don't want to try and find them right now. I got other things to do. It's difficult to find though because you have to ask around and avoid the many sites that are just imitating another site, trying to be big, or are focused on pushing a movement.
This video reminded me a lot to when I was using REDACTED, they were good times. It's the first website I really cared about
UA-cam deleted my original comment, annoying. The funny thing though is that the comment was a lot longer and it was deleted because I made an edit that said "I should probably make this shorter, not sure though. I said a lot of things that are unnecessary"
There was also a reply from BreezeFox that said "we didn't do this to ourselves"
I believe we did. We asked for search engines, and relevant results, and it led us to this. Websites can manipulate search engines to move them to the top and get more clicks, they don't have to pay the search engine to make it happen. We also asked to grow our business through the internet and advertise ourselves, this is what happened. Sure, maybe you didn't ask for this, but if you were a business owner then you would ask for it. I know the artists and animators at Newgrounds were asking for it.
The big problem is that no one knew that this meant losing so much on the internet. We didn't ask to lose this magic, but the things we asked has led us to this.
VRChat is just that futurama episode where they go on the internet.
The unfortunate pitfall of monetization is not the fact that the platform would take a cut, that is normal and it helps the thing you like to survive. The issue is that the moment VR Chat starts taking a cut o the on app sales, they take responsibility for the content and the suddenly the freedom is gone. Suddenly there is copyright, legality and all the other crap.
When I played Hypnospace Outlaw, it unearthed memories of pre-2004 internet that I forgot were there. It sparked a huge bout of nostalgia for a graphical chat client (Unichat) that randomly shut down in 2003, completely wiping from existence this entire social space I'd grown attached to over a few years. This is the first I'm hearing about VRChat, and it seems like my first real opportunity in 20 years to recapture that experience. I expect to have a ton of sensations that I legitimately haven't felt in decades.
this video has stirred my heart. in this point where I am hurting and gave VRC a try, that for the first time I've really gotten to break the shackles of gender identity that I got to put cracks in back in 2004 when friends on the internet told me it was cute when I was more effeminate and I liked that idea. trying to find worlds and get suggestions on what to explore and do began to truly fill me with wonder at a time where i am dealing with likely some of the biggest stressors of myu life save for when my body begins failing me much in the same way that is happening to my father right now.
I come here now as it looks like Easy Anti-Cheat is here to stay, to eliminate solutions to problems that community had long since solved for themselves, to bring that sort of order as... things begin to change. That's been my first two weeks of VRChat.
Wow, thanks for putting in words of what i was missing from the early 2000s internet but couldnt point my finger on.
Great video, looks like I should take a look at vrc :)
great video, we should send this video to the VRchat founders just so they understand what makes their platform so unique compared to everything else
How can this Video only have like 8k views? You're seriously underrated and lm glad that l got the chance to watch this. You did an amazing job! And l really wanna try vr-chat now haha
Why the old Internet was more interesting : the difference between a zoomed in view of a single car on a tiny road vs a zoomed out view of a busy intersection
You summarized my thoughts on the old internet in an excellent way.Maybe I need to really try VR chat then
Saw your video on gender and identity first and took a look at what else you had. Both that video and this one have made me a lot more eager to try VR Chat. :)
Everyone who wishes to be enlightened needs to take a "hot second" and watch this video.
That's the greatest 1 minute intro I've ever seen
nice video bro ... greats from argentina
"Do I look like the kinda person that goes to a rave?" asks the UA-camr, looking exactly like the kinda person that goes to a rave. :)
amazing User created rooms keep bring me back to vr chat.
You are so on topic and current feeling as I watch a year late.
Damn, actually mistook the Snow Crash quote at the start for a quote on VR chat until it was referenced later...
Straszfilms: I have been binge watching your series on VR for a while liking it got a question for you how do you do your real life room and your avatar in the same video is it video editing or is it live streaming.... I would really like to do the same thing in 2023 with my avatars in the future please help
This needs more views!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You put it into words perfectly
2002 zoomer here
Yes.
I at least on some level remember finding sites for video games and all that sort of stuff and personal websites.
I think around 2008-9.
But it was as you say in that period of changing.
I was barely old enough to experience the old internet, and yet I never really did. In fact most old internet, video game etc. stuff thjat's nostalgic for people my age isn't for me, because I got on the internet fairly late, and for a long time after I did I used it for only extremely specific things and spent most of the rest of my time reading, drawing, listening to music and even when I did get on the computer most of the time it was only for a couple of things. By the time I really started to use the internet more generally, social media was already a thing and was starting to take over, though I did stick to forums a lot more than one might have expected of me given the time period.
I wish I had experienced the old internet properly. I wish I could use VRChat more to experience something like it, in a similar spirit, but I just don't have a great home situation to be doing that. Maybe someday. I hope it isn't gone before I get the chance, like what happened before. I'll be really sad if I ruin this for myself again.
Chapter 3: Dang kids, get off my lawn!
Not complaining. Nostalgic as heck. Great presentation of a truly horrific looking (literally) era of the internet.
Excellent job, very well done! I had loaded VRChat into my Original Oculus Quest (1). However, I could never get the hang of VRC, too much to read, too many menu screens. I stuck with AltspaceVR. Now that Microsoft has Closed Down AltspaceVR, many of us have moved over to VRChat. This time VRC is working for me. I have lots of people whom I trust to help me get used to the menus and controls. In a very short amount of time I have grown to like VRChat. You are correct that it has the feel of the raw internet back in the day. Thank you again for your VERY WELL DONE video essays on VRChat.
Holy crap, web rings, I had completely forgot about those! I used to love finding a subject and finding the web rings for it.
Anyone remember what Meez was? It was a mid 2010's chatroom where you made characters and and worlds, rooms to go to. Active Worlds sounds like an older Meez (or IMVU and the like)
Great video! Hope to meet you in VRChat someday! - some guy in his 30s too
you're making quite a strong argument for VR chat ^^ and for your community XD it really got to me XD
I struggle with school and I'm glad the internet is what it is today (I'm 23, an old zoomer). I also use UA-cam as a second search engine to learn stuff from. Personally I was able to grow up with the internet in a way where I quickly learned how to traverse it pretty safely over time. I feel like I know my way around it. I mostly know how to avoid the negatives. I'm glad it's a platform that allows us to create an electronic any form of business on.
After I'm done with uni in May, I'm planning on polishing my 3D skill by making stuff for VRChat. Character and environments.
But I very much so agree with your video. Personally, I'm just not that attached to the nostalgia of the old internet.
3:32 The Metaverse...
I tried going back in VR chat and from the ~3 years from when I first went in and enjoyed it's not the same chat. They do have most popular filters, and ect. They just have a nod to the old internet now with 'random' witch isn't random.
I never thought I would hear GreyhoundVRC again after watching all those tutorials years ago.
I really miss forums. Not the big ones either. The odd and scattered groups of a few dozen people just hacking up their own space.
The horrid color schemes, the weird jokes, the signature banners - god the signature banners. I think I've still got one lying around I should see if I can find it.
I tried VR chat years ago on a Quest 1, it had performance issues, confusing interface, aggro people, meme screaming children and I couldn't find an avatar that I wanted to use... I hated it!
Now I've gone back on the Quest 2 and I adore it, I've found some good people, got myself a handful of avatars that I like (including a custom one) and discovered some amazing places.
I know that the creative freedom era of of VR can't last forever and the corporate walls have already started to slowly close in but I want to enjoy it before it changes too drastically.
Millennial here..
Last site that I feel still had a tint of the "old internet" vibe was tumblr before it sold itself and banned nsfw stuff.. Ofcoz you stayed on the site, but clicking on names of stuff being reblogged would lead you to discover new dashboards and new interests etc. It felt close to those old web-rings and you curranted a feed pretty close to void of "only sponsored posts" that twitter has turned into..
OMG, that Black Sun creation in AW :O (yes, I read Snow Crash =D )
Edit: do note that Cyberpunk 2077 is ALSO a critique, but taken with literal interpretation by the game developers as well. Since the title is based on the 1988 tabletop RPG world of Cyberpunk 2013, it still has roots in both First Wave Cyberpunk and later renditions. Funnily enough, Mike Pondsmith never read Neuromancer when he made the TTRPG. It's why it's so different than what you would expect in some cases, when you go back reading 2013 and 2020.
Of course, any visual media loses something in translation. CP2077 is, just like many modern takes, a more in your face one. But yeah... the genre is not in its prime anymore. And despite all that I still love the videogame. Because it harkens back to First Wave and other early cyberpunk media.
moar pl0x
Guess his SR don't look at the icon
The detail of the book marks in 18:36
Check out the world called Organism and the related Epilogue 1 and 2
I completely agree with everything you have said in this video!
37:50 neosvr we see you
I'm from the future! I'm sure you already know this but the Facebook "metaverse" blew up and it makes me happy
It's sounds little odd now, when you hear "for anyone not familiar with metaverse concept..."
The old internet may have been cool, but it was way too hard for someone like me to navigate. I'm glad it changed now. I don't feel like I have to be a computer expert to use it.
I feel very lucky and happy that I adopted VR in it's current Wild West stage it's going to be said when big corporations finally get their claws into it and it turns into the same mess every other gaming and media platform has devolved into but for now we get to enjoy the golden years while we can. Enjoy free cyberspace while it lasts.
Wow, the way the internet changed is so much like the way UA-cam has over the years.
Ima just say it.
Even CG5 jumped on the Uganda Knuckles (the weird short "do you know da wae?" knucks) hype. That little guy is amazing. I once heard of someone who dressed up like him in public dancing to that very same CG5 song.
I used to believe VRChat was the metaverse, until I found the pure freedom of expression and creativity available in Neos VR, you can do things there VRChat users can only dream about!
Such as?
@@blindey Ok, to list a few things: a personal inventory of objects that you have made/cloned from worlds where you can spawn objects that other people can pick up and play with, you can build worlds inside of the game it's self, there is a text chat system built right it to your friends list that you can send voice recordings through as well, it is super simple to set up new attachments on to your avatar and modify it on the fly with snap points. ( like hats, and other things like that) almost everything is completely customizable, even to the font, color and size of your name plate (the thing with your name floating above your head), the in game scripting system is basically super udon, there are a lot of things I am forgetting here, but the only thing that VRChat has that Neos doesn't have is a large player base
I just added a week to my life span
I guess this is kinda what Gmod was for me. Especially the PAC3 addon.
Great video
This video has aged well, VRChat found a monetization method that fits in well. Subscription service that isn't a requirement but just sprinkles a few extras that people may want for a fair price.
yeah old internet...
sure miss those days
very surprised to only see two comments in here about tumblr, which is still thriving in 2023. while even now as we're getting unwanted updates to try wear the flayed skin of twitter, there is still no algorythm on tumblr. stuff on your feed is put there mostly by the people you follow, you have to learn how to curate a feed - a skill that has been very lost on newer platforms. The way i can scroll through deep political posts and shit posts and breath taking art all one after another is amazing to me. I can still make my own blog html custom!
there are some structural changes that will hopefully be for the better soon, and who knows mb one day it'll be able to properly reopen the doors to nsfw content that ppl seem to only think of tumblr for
on another note, wild vrchat premium started two months or so after this video came out. doesnt sound like it changed things awfully which really gives me hope ngl!
Can you share the artist/song you use in the beginning? Great video!
Colin Root - Blackout
I don't understand why your subscriber count isn't higher
also RIP geocities and irc
I made this exact statement in 2018. Vrchat is like irc in ‘96
Still a proprietary silo that'll disappear once the startup goes under.