Kenneth Sean Carson is a fashion doll and fictional character invented by Elliot Handler and introduced by American toy company Mattel in 1961 as the counterpart of Barbie, who was introduced two years earlier. Ken was named after Kenneth Handler, son of Barbie creator/inventor Ruth Handler, just as Barbie was named after her daughter. Ken Handler died in 1994 of a brain tumor.
Habbo is an online community and virtual world aimed at teens and young adults. It is owned and operated by Sulake, a Finnish company. Founded in 2000, Habbo has expanded to nine online communities, with users from more than 150 countries. Since August 2012, more than 273 million avatars have been registered with an average of 600,000 visitors per month.
Gaia Online is an English-language, anime-themed social networking and forums-based website with Chibi-style animations. It was founded as go-gaia on February 18, 2003, by Derek Liu, Long Vo, Josh Gainsbrugh, and the name was changed to GaiaOnline.com in 2004 by its owner, Gaia Interactive. Gaia originally began as an anime linklist and eventually developed a small community, but following a statement by founder Derek Liu, the website moved towards social gaming and eventually became forum-based.
Dress-up is a children's game in which costumes or clothing are put on a person or on a doll, for role-playing or aesthetics purposes. In the UK the game is called dressing up. In the mid-1990s, dress-up games also became a video game genre in which customizing a virtual character's appearance is the primary focus.
The Palace is a computer program to access graphical chat room servers, called palaces, in which users may interact with one another using graphical avatars overlaid on a graphical backdrop. The software concept was originally created by Jim Bumgardner and produced by Time Warner in 1994, and was first opened to the public in November 1995.
Piczo was a social networking and blogging website for teens. It was founded in 2003 by Jim Conning in San Francisco, California. Early investors included Catamount, Sierra Ventures, U.S. Venture Partners, and Mangrove Capital Partners.
WeeWorld was an online game and messaging website, originally created in 2002 with a company that was based in Glasgow, Scotland, with a few offices in London and Boston, as well as other cities in the USA. The company had created WeeWorld.com, formally known as a social networking site, to which was mostly geared towards teens and tweens. The website is also known for its brand of instant messaging and chat-based avatars, known as “WeeMees”, Which was also released on a variety of digital platforms and services. There were approximately 180 million WeeMees created worldwide, but the site was unexpectedly shut down, as of 11 May 2017. From then on, there has not been anymore information from WeeWorld or the company itself. It is said that the company could no longer profit off of WeeWorld, and the only option left was to sell it to the new owners, who had then decided to shut it down.
BarbieGirls.com was an online virtual world created by Mattel, based on the Barbie brand. It opened on April 24, 2007 and eventually closed on June 1, 2011. International versions of the site closed on April 30, 2011. Mattel also released a line of MP3 players that looked like avatars from the website, these devices came with a free VIP membership for the site.
Avatars United was a web community for avatars of online games and virtual worlds. It was launched in March 2008 by Sweden-based Enemy Unknown and closed in October 2010. It was owned by Linden Lab, which announced its closure on September 23, 2010.
Facebook Credits was a virtual currency that enabled people to purchase items in games and non-gaming applications on the Facebook Platform. One U.S. dollar was the equivalent of 10 Facebook Credits. Facebook Credits were available in 15 currencies including U.S. dollars, pound sterling, euros, and Danish kroner. Facebook was hoping eventually to expand Credits into a micropayment system open to any Facebook application, whether a game or a media company application. Facebook deprecated Credits in favour of users' local currencies.
Fantage was a MMORPG involving a virtual world containing a range of online games and activities, developed by Fantage Inc. The game featured a customizable cartoon avatar, called a "Fantagian", that users can customize with items ranging from hair to clothing and accessories. Fantage was released to the general public on March 17, 2008, and had since expanded into a large online community— the game had over 16 million registered users by January 2012 and over 30 million by December 2014.
Smeet is a browser-based virtual world video game developed in Berlin, Germany. Smeet is a browser based 3D social massively multiplayer online game. The game was developed by Smeet Communications GmbH.
Barbie is video game for the Commodore 64 published by Epyx in 1984. It allows players to participate in the life of the famous fashion doll of the same name.
Woozworld is a virtual gaming community and social network service founded in 2009 and headquartered in Montreal, Quebec. Woozworld allows users to connect with each other through customizable profiles and interactive activities.
Digital Fashion is the visual representation of clothing built using computer technologies and 3D software. This industry is on the rise due to ethical awareness and uses of digital fashion technology such as artificial intelligence to create products with complex social and technical software.
Barbie Fashion Designer is a dress-up computer game developed by Digital Domain and published by Mattel Media for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS in 1996. The game allows players to design clothing and style outfits. Players can then print off their designs and create clothing for their real-world Barbie dolls. Barbie Fashion Designer was the first commercially successful video game made for girls. After its success, many other girl games would be made, leading to the girls' games movement.
VRChat is an online virtual world platform created by Graham Gaylor and Jesse Joudrey and operated by VRChat, Inc. The platform allows users to interact with others with user-created 3D avatars and worlds. VRChat is designed primarily for use with virtual reality headsets, such as the Oculus Rift and Oculus Quest series, SteamVR headsets, and Windows Mixed Reality, but is also usable without VR in a "desktop" mode designed for either a mouse and keyboard or gamepad.
Barbie Storymaker is a 1997 movie-making kit video game by Mattel Media, within the Barbie franchise.
Horizon Worlds is a free virtual reality, online video game with an integrated game creation system developed and published by Meta Platforms. On this multi-player virtual platform, players move and interact with each other in various worlds that host events, games, and social activities. The game works on Oculus Rift S and Meta Quest 2 headsets.
Adventures with Barbie: Ocean Discovery is a 1997 video game developed by Gorilla Systems Corporation and published by Vivendi Universal Interactive Publishing for Windows. The Game Boy Color version is titled Barbie: Ocean Discovery.
