Gaia Online is an anime-themed social networking and forums-based website. It was founded in 2003 as Go-Gaia.com, but 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 (username "Lanzer"), the website moved towards social gaming, and eventually became a forum-based website. Today, over a million posts are made daily and it is visited by 7 million unique users each month. Gaia also won the 2007 Webware 100 award in the Community category.
Users of the site, known as Gaians, create a customizable avatar and a customizable virtual home for which they can purchase items using the virtual currency called gold, sometimes called gaia gold, which is given to users after playing games, posting inside the forums, and certain other events or contests.
There is a full-fledged Gaia Market. Market is divided into four parts - Shops, Trade, Marketplace, and Gaia Cash Shop.
* Shops: There are various shops where NPCs sell different items for avatars, house, cars, etc. These shops are of all types, upmarket as well as economy. A player can buy items using Gaia Gold or Gaia Cash. Items found in the shops can also be sold back to the shop for 50% of the shop price.
* Trade: Users can trade items and gold with other users.
* Marketplace: Users can have up to 10 items for sale at once. The cost of this convenience is a 2% tax on all gold earned from sales, a feature implemented with the recent remake of the Marketplace.
* Cash Shop: Also known as "La Victoire," it is the most recent addition to Gaia's economy and sells items for Gaia Cash (which itself is bought with real money). It includes high end items and special "evolving items" that change over time with the "evolving item reports".
Gaia Online currently offers eleven Flash games: Fishing, Towns, Word Bump, Jigsaw, Slots, Cinemas, Cards, Rally, Pinball, and Electric Love Faktori. These games comprise of 10% to 15% of total site activity. The newest game is Electric Love Faktori. Users can win different items or gold. In Gaia Fishing users fish on the banks of various lakes and may catch anything from different species of fish to garbage. These can be exchanged for fish-shaped hats or accessories. Accessories may be made out of recycled garbage. These items can also be sold on the marketplace or back to the fishing store. The gold received is based on the rarity of the fish or item.
