As originally posted on FA
1) Why Sell to IMVU?
IMVU’s offer and their genuine desire to leave Fur Affinity as a completely independent group is what convinced me that this was the right thing to do. They offered us a budget and financial assistance to improve the site, while still leaving us independently run.
2) How does this affect me?
It does not. FA is run independently of IMVU, and will continue to be a furry site RUN by furries. The only difference you will see is IMVU will add some unobtrusive third party ads and, with their financial help, the site will improve. You get a better site in the end.
3) What are the details of the agreement?
Business documents like terms of sale are not shared publicly and this is not an exception to that standard. It falls under under NDA (Non Disclosure Agreement). In addition, there has been talk about IMVU being a publicly traded company – it is not.
IMVU (and their board) are well aware of our content and what we host, and are fine with the site as-is.
4) What does IMVU get out of this?
They get to use our site for advertising from their third-party partners who are interested in engaged users like ours who share a common interest – art. In addition, IMVU has a rather large furry segment which benefits from FA, and likewise, FA members can benefit from IMVU’s offerings.
5) Who is the site admin now?
Dragoneer, and he has been given complete independence and authority by IMVU to run the site as he sees fit, and has been given budget to make the improvements the site has sorely needed. He works for IMVU, and is tasked with improving the the site full time.
6) What about our content? Does IMVU now own rights to it?
No. IMVU does not own, have any rights, take commission from etc for any of your art shared/sold here. It is business as usual, and there are no changes planned in regards to that. You will not be required to sell your content as part of IMVU’s catalog, nor will IMVU have access to use your content as they see fit. Some quotes about “Section 9” of a document have been floating around but that section does not exist.
7) Do we have new content policies?
No. IMVU’s [Terms of Service and content policies do not apply to content shared/sold on our site. There is not going to be any banning of content/users. FA’s site policies that are currently in place will continue to be applicable. While there are minor changes (mostly clarifications) to the AUP coming next week, IMVU has not suggested, nor requested, any changes be implemented to the site other than some upcoming advertising changes. It is our goal to integrate the ads in a non-obtrusive way (like our current ads).
And on that note: all existing advertising will be honored, and will be kept as-is.
8) Have you given IMVU our information? Do they have access?
No, and the sharing of FA user data/personal information is NOT part of our agreement and thus will not be happening in the future. FA data is FA data, and will not be shared with IMVU or used for marketing purposes.
9) Are you going to have paid accounts/subscriptions etc?
We have no plans to introduced paid account/subscriptions. If that were to happen in the future it would be site’s the decision, and one which would have to be thought over very carefully. However, we have no plans to do so at this time.
10) Are any IMVU staff on the administration/mod team?
With exception of Dragoneer (who was brought on to IMVU staff to maintain and run the site), IMVU is hands-off and the site will continue to be run as it always has been: by furries, for furries.
11) How does this apply to FA United (www.faunited.org)?
Just like the website, nothing is changing in regards to the FA United’s direction (except that we may have a larger budget for nicer events!). The convention will still be held September 11-13, and the site is launching early next month.
12) What happened to the funds from the donation held in Oct 2014?
The money raised for the donation drive went to several things:
A) Upgrading our DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) protection from Cloudflare
B) Purchased a new server (replacement app/advertising server)
C) Upgraded existing servers (e.g. doubled the RAM in our main DB)
D) Extensions to the site’s SSL certificates
E) Purchased promised donor rewards
In addition, there have been rumors that the discussion of sale happened during this donation drive. This is incorrect. The donation drive (a reaction to constant DDoS attacks) was held mid-October. The sale of the site did not take place until January.
13) What is IMVU?
IMVU (www.imvu.com) is a 3D avatar-based social network with over 130 million registered users from around the world. It is available on desktop and mobile platforms. People come together to dress up, chat, role-play, make friends and express their creativity in various ways including creating products for the world’s largest virtual catalog with over 16M products. IMVU is free to register and play, with opportunities to earn Credits (IMVU currency) in multiple ways as well as purchasing them along with account upgrades. The community is open to 13+ users and does have an Access Pass section for mature-themed content.
Furry Times 