industry internet social networking founded february 18 2003 ; 13 years ago 2003 02 18 1 2 founder derek liu long vo josh gainsbrugh headquarters san jose california u.s. key people gary schofield ceo jason loia coo 3 number of employees 90 95 citation needed website gaiaonline.com gaia online is an english language anime themed social networking and forums based website . it was founded as go gaia on february 18 2003 1 2 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 2 but following a statement by founder derek liu username lanzer the website moved towards social gaming and 4 eventually became forum based . 5 6 in 2007 over a million posts were made daily 5 and 7 million unique users visited each month 7 with over 26 million total registered users . gaia also won the 2007 webware 100 award in the community category . 8 in january 2011 the company won the mashable best user experience award for 2010 . 9 contents 1 avatars 2 forums 3 economy 3.1 currency 3.2 autocash 3.3 market 3.4 notable items 3.4.1 monthly collectibles 3.4.2 evolving items 3.4.3 chance items random item generators 3.5 gaia houses 3.6 gaia cars 3.7 gaia aquarium 3.8 arenas 3.9 sponsor quests 3.10 achievements 4 games 4.1 zomg 4.2 smashblox 5 virtual worlds 5.1 towns 5.2 sponsored worlds 6 see also 7 references 8 external links avatars edit members of gaia online known as gaians receive a customizable avatar when they sign up . users have the ability to customize their avatar in many ways including skin tone eye style and color hair style and color gender race e.g. human vampire elf and attire . numerous clothing items and accessories for avatars can be purchased from a range of npc run stores using the site currencies gaia gold and gaia cash . avatars appear next to posts in the forums and profile comments the post itself encapsulated in a speech bubble and in gaia towns and other environments the avatar appears as a movable character that can travel from place to place interacting with the environment catching bugs shaking trees digging for buried treasure collecting trash and flowers etc. and other users . forums edit forums are the public message boards . there is a large variety of forums in which users can post such as forums for general discussion news topics regarding the gaia community and npc story lines casual conversation and lifestyle discussions various types of role play general entertainment featured games on gaia and artist discussions . there are also forums for users to buy and sell items as well as a forum for user run businesses e.g. art commissions and thread bumping services . users may make threads in almost every forum as long as they follow each forum s guidelines . users also have the option to add polls to their thread . posting and replying to threads as well as voting in polls yields gold . economy edit currency edit the currency used in gaia is known as gaia gold commonly referred to as gold . gold is regularly distributed to users as they browse around the website post in the forums play games and participate in other various events and contests ; the site also rewards users every day with random gold or items from the daily chance . in july 2007 gaia released another virtual currency called gaia cash which can be purchased with real money ; 1 usd is equivalent to 100 gaia cash . gaia cash can be bought through cell phone payments or directly from gaia itself . 10 paying gaia users generally spend about 30 usd per month to purchase gaia cash which is then used to buy virtual things such as evolving chance collectible and limited edition items . 11 autocash edit on september 13 2010 gaia announced the introduction of autocash . 12 autocash is an optional feature where gaiaonline members can sign up to buy gaia cash on a reoccurring monthly schedule . the current cost per month for the feature is 10 ; users are given a generous amount clarification needed of content for the monthly fee . autocash can be charged to a credit card or debit card and members may also pay for the feature using a paypal account . the service can be canceled at any time ; staying past three months offers users the bonus of receiving items specifically designed and made for those that continue to use the autocash feature . the benefits of using autocash include market edit sales within the gaian market can be divided into four areas gold shops cash shops trade and marketplace . gold shops items from these stores can be bought with gold or gaia cash most users purchase with gold and can range from regular store items to upmarket items . these are various npc run stores which sell a variety of items such as avatar clothing and accessories furniture for gaia houses and parts for gaia cars . items found in the shops can also be sold back to the shop for 50 % of the shop price . cash shops items from these stores can be purchased with gaia cash only . the majority of gaia cash sales are from la victoire an npc run store that only accepts gaia cash . it specializes in high end items such as evolving items random item generators and monthly collectibles . most items from la victoire are continuously rotated in and out of the store . other cash only stores include phin phang gaia aquarium items and back alley bargains power up items for gaia s mmorpg zomg . trade users can trade items and gold with other users . a majority of these trades are settled in the gaia exchange forum and its sub forums . marketplace the marketplace is a separate area of the site for users to buy and sell items . rather than self auctioning an item through a thread in the exchange forum users can either put their item up for immediate sale with a buy now price or leave their item for auction with a starting bid price . users can have up to 10 items for sale at once until getting the tycoon achievement . after that users can sell 20 items at once and each item can be listed for a maximum of 14 days . the cost of this convenience is a 5 % tax on all gold earned from sales . recently however the site s virtual economy is experiencing hyperinflation after the introduction of more gold into circulation . 13 notable items edit monthly collectibles edit monthly collectibles previously known as donation items also referred to as mcs are special items that can be bought with real money meant to support gaia s maintenance and costs . established in june 2003 after users of gaia online petitioned for a donation system in an attempt to increase site revenue for every us 2.50 a user gives to the site 5 he or she receives an item known as a sealed envelope in his or her inventory . sealed envelopes go on sale the first day of every month and are released on the 15th of each month . during august and september 2008 the envelopes were unsealed on the 8th but on october 2 2008 it was decided that the release date should be returned to the fifteenth . the sealed envelope disappears from the user s inventory and is replaced by a thank you letter for the current paid month for example a thank you letter for august 2004 represents a payment made in that month of that year . users are then able to open these virtual letters to choose one of two or three limited edition items to be granted into their inventory from each letter . these items were known as donation items until potential legal problems prompted the name change . 14 monthly collectible items and the thank you letter items they are found in are specific to the month that they were released in for example the items found in the thank you letter for april 2006 can only be found in that letter and one could only purchase that letter in april 2006 . letters can be purchased over the phone with a text message from a mobile phone via paypal credit card traditional mail or with gaia cash through the cash shop la victoire . envelopes and letters can be later bought and sold through user trades or through marketplace . evolving items edit evolving items commonly abbreviated to eis are items which change or evolve over time . items begin with one set of item poses but with each new evolution a different set of poses become available instead . additionally with each subsequent evolution a re release of the item becomes available at the cash shop as a next generation release . when the item has fully evolved all previous poses become available for the item . times between evolutions are different for each ei and can be anywhere between a few weeks to a few months . recent additions of rapid evolving items evolve twice a week . new evolution updates are noted in regular site announcements as evolving item reports present by the npc dr. singh . all eis are available from the cash shop la victoire and can be later sold through trading or in the marketplace . eis are removed from the cash shop sometime after their final evolution becomes available . chance items random item generators edit with chance items referred to as cis previously known as random item generators or rigs users play a chance mini game and the item they are granted depends on their success with completing the game when they decide to stop playing and collect an item or their failure to complete the game . games will vary depending on the rig some may require users to choose a correct response while some are simply a choice between continuing the game or stopping and collecting an item . rigs are available from the cash shop la victoire and are eventually rotated out of the shop . gaia houses edit users are able to own their own gaia house situated in gaia towns . houses are available in three different styles round square and long . to purchase a house is free ; however future changes to the style of the house costs 500 gold and after that 10 000 for the largest style . users are also able to relocate their home to a different town postcode at a cost of 1000 gold . a range of decorative furniture items can be bought from the npc run store the faktori such as include floor and wall tiles tables chairs lamps among others . rare housing items can be found in enchanted wooden trunks and enchanted golden trunks randomly found floating across site pages . gaia cars edit on june 18 2007 15 gaia online and scion announced a partnership that allowed users to create a virtual scion with customizable wheels decals fog lights tail lights and spoilers . 16 17 other car choices available were the fictional possum and musculero . the scion tc scion xd ufo and kiki car which is available only with cash 18 were later released bringing the total to seven possible cars to choose from . users can own up to 3 cars which are stored in their garage . parts and decals for cars such as paint color and antenna ornaments as well as car bases can be purchased from the npc run store sam s body and parts . cars are used as part of the rally game available on