Google Game & Editing FAQ page

Q: "Do I need to pay to make products for IMVU" ("does it cost money to become a Creator")?

A: There are two parts to this question; (1) "does it cost to make products for IMVU?" and (2) "does it cost money to be an IMVU Creator?". Both currently answer in the affirmative - "Yes".

(1) There is a 'cost' associated with the upload, submission and/or publication of items to IMVU's virtual catalogue. This cost is in the form of 'credits' that can be obtained from IMVU themselves or one of the many trusted and authorised resellers of IMVU credits. The 'cost' of submission varies depending on the item itself - the amount of profit the Creator wants to generate; and the costs associated with the item from the the product was derived - the 'derivation' costs and IMVU's 'submission' fees^.

(2) As of the 10th May 2012 in order to create items for IMVU, user will need to be subscribed to IMVU's VIP service [see official announcement here]. This change affects NEW USERS and/or NEW CREATORS ONLY who sign up to the Creator Program ON or AFTER the 10th of May; all users who were signed up to the Creator Program BEFORE the 10th have been "grand-fathered" into the system, meaning, they can continue to create and publish products as normal. Some key points to the new VIP program are;

• As VIP 'rents' a users name (it temporarily removes the "Guest_" tag prefix), NEW Creators will not be required to 'register' their names in order to make and publish items as was previously the case.
• If at any point a users* VIP subscription lapses, all benefits, both as a Creator and VIP member will be lost and any submitted products hidden from the catalogue.
• Should users* VIP lapse, accounts will revert back to "Guest_" status and access to Create Mode will be prevented.
• Although a users* products will be hidden upon lapse of VIP, they can still be purchased it linked to directly.
• If a users* items are hidden, they will continue to earn sales income from such items - items ARE NOT disabled

Footnotes:
^ The cost of products varies. Currently the only way to find these out is to go through the submission process, during which the associated costs will be calculated. Note that credits are not regarded by IMVU to be money or virtual currency; although purchased with 'real' money, they are simply seen as being tokens, used as a medium of exchange within IMVU.
* As applicable to Creators signing up to the Creator Program AFTER the 10th May 2012.

For IMVU homepage display issues (user profile pages) when using Internet Explorer version 8, 9 or above, check that "Compatibility View" is active - in the address bar at the top of the application is a series of icons, one looks like a torn sheet of paper, click this to activate "Compatibility Mode" for the page being viewed. The settings for this mode can also be changed in "Tools > Compatibility View Settings".

Activating Compatibility View in IE9


Compatibility View Settings


If neither Compatibility View nor the Menu shown above are not visible, Right click the grey area and select "Menu" from the list of available options. Once the menu is visible, check the settings for Compatibility View.

Activating IE's menu

Problem Description
Blackberry's Playbook isn't immune from problems, the "Black Screen of Death" being one whereby the screen suddenly goes 'black' and the device becomes unresponsive; pressing the power button does nothing (note that this tends to be a non-responsive system and/or screen rather than a "bricked" device). To test what type of 'crash' this is, press the "up" ("+") and "down" ("-") volume buttons at the same time, the 'shortcut' to using the Playbooks camera, if the screen is blacked pressing the two buttons will result in the camera-click noise which informs us the device is on but the screen is non-responsive. If nothing happens the device likely had a full system crash (this assumes there isn't a fundamental hardware fault or failure in the device).

Problem Solution
In either/or situation the fix is to reboot the device. This is done by holding down the 'Power' and '+' ("Up") buttons at the same time for a number of seconds until the small red 'activity' LED lights up. Alternatively, hold them down for a few seconds, release and then press the 'Power' button again. Either/or should work depending on whether it's a system crash or just the black screen of death (sometimes doing this may seem unresponsive, so although the aforementioned are supposed to be the correct way to reboot, try also holding down the 'power', 'up' and 'down' buttons for a few seconds, release and then press the power button again to start).

Why does this happen
There are a number of reasons for the Playbook to crash, typically it will be the result of an app or a flash-heavy website trying to do a lot of CPU/GPU intensive actions at the same time (not to mention poor scripting) rather than the Blackberry itself causing the problem. Turning off flash/script support may help for website related crashes. Make sure to be running a fully updated system for everything else.

Cannot Connect to Steam Network
If you're getting the "Cannot Connect to Steam Network" error during the installation of either Steam itself or a game that has some form of dependance on the system (Splash Damages "Brink" for example), the likely culprit is still the *.blob files originally indicated here. The immediate fix then it to delete (or rename) the following;

• ClientRegistry.blob

Which can still be found in Steams system directory, typically;

• C:\[path-to-steam-installation]\Steam\

For example (for Windows XP/Windows Vista;

• C:\Program Files\Steam\

Or (For Windows 7);

• C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\

Installing Games that use Steam Network
IMPORTANT: If a game make use of the Steam Network (for game updates and/or other downloadable content), connect to the Steam Network BEFORE installing - the above error appears to be happening as a result of older version of Steam attempting to install or change files already on the system. This way the connection to the network is already made, which should allow the game to install as normal.

Be warned if updating your iPod Touch, iPad, or iPhone from iOS4 to iOS5 that there is an issue with the new iOS5 version (5.0.1 at time of writing) which is apparently draining battery power much faster than previously (using iOS4). Temporary fixes for this mean making sure that all 'ping' and 'push' services are disabled, including iCloud, Location Services, Calendars, Mail checking and/or any service, device, feature or App that does something automatically. This seems to increase battery time somewhat but does not fix the problem entirely.