Avatar Visibility "Only Friends" instead of just "Public" and "Private"
Shinyflvres
Right now, you can upload a personal avatar either as a Public Avatar or a Private Avatar. Some users do not want their avatars to be indexed by avatar databases, which is understandable. They may only want to share their own creations with friends without constantly sending Unity projects back and forth.
Public = Anyone can use the avatar. It can also be indexed under Section 8.3.
Private = Only the uploader can use the avatar. It cannot be indexed.
Friends Only = Only selected friends, or all friends of the uploader, can use the avatar. It cannot be indexed.
A lot of users are currently asking for blacklist or opt-out systems for avatar search services such as VRCNext Avatar Search, Prismic's Avatar Search, Avtr.zip, Cute Avatar Search, and many other avatar search worlds and websites.
Complaints toward database providers and avatar search world creators have become increasingly common because some creators do not want their public avatars to appear in these databases.
Adding a Friends Only visibility option could be a simple solution to this problem.
It could also reduce unnecessary API requests. Right now, when someone blacklists or removes an avatar from a database, multiple databases may need to re-check that avatar through the VRChat API. A proper Friends Only visibility setting could prevent those avatars from being indexed in the first place, reducing repeated requests to VRChat's API servers.
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-WildCat-
A "Friends Only" setting wouldn't cover enough use cases, and I don't think a 3rd setting is necessary. Instead, I believe we need the ability to:
Share Private Avatars
This is the ability to share an avatar you uploaded with specific people (friends or not). To illustrate the need, I concocted these four user stories:
Story 1
- My non-technical friend doesn't own a PC capable of running Unity. I agreed to customise and maintain an avatar he bought on Booth. I don't want to make the avatar public, and I shouldn't ask him to share his login credentials. I want to upload it to my account and share it exclusively with him.
Story 2
- I run an 18+ verified 'Nudist Beach Party' group. Newcomers sometimes arrive without a suitable avatar. I have a couple of avatars I made for this purpose. I don't want to set them as Public because they contain content inappropriate for a general audience. I want to share them with specific people who may not be on my friends list.
Story 3
- My friend and I thought it would be fun to 'swap avatars' for a week to see what it looks like to view our usual selves animated by someone else. We don't want the hassle of sharing our avatar projects, and we don't want to make our avatars public. We need a quick way to share them with each other.
Story 4
- I'm a very annoying and sanctimonious "journalist" who rants about sexy content being accessible to minors. VRChat should more aggressively search and destroy Public ERP avatars, but people will keep uploading more. Maybe if the perverts could share them privately, it would stem the tide.
Acceptance criteria
- I can share Private avatars with specific people.
- For a given avatar, I can see the list of people I shared with.
- I can later revoke specific people's access.
- The UI lets me easily see which of my avatars are shared with anyone.
- If I set a shared Private avatar to Public, the list of permissions isn't deleted. When I set it back to Private, the people I previously shared with still retain access.
- The person who uploaded the avatar is the only one who can share it.
Mayrui
We've been needing this for a very long time. Avatars shouldn't restricted to Private and Public. People have been selling upload only avatars and sharing account details for years directly against TOS as well as general user safety because no alternative exists besides file sharing.
Shadowriver
This wont fix problems of indexing avatars have as it still relay on user actually picking a option and you still gonna have people complaining about avatars being cloanble and accessible when they not suppose to be. In fact some model artists may not like this idea as it prevents tracking out avatars that break there ToS. There lot of legal complications here that always been there and kind of hard to solve to make everyone happy.
Vistanz
Your title confused me, you should say "cloneable", "searchable" instead of "visibility".
If you ask for visibility I would simply answer you can use the
IsOnFriendsList
parameter.Shinyflvres
Vistanz "If you ask for visibility" read the text wall. Public/Private is a form of release visibility.
Vistanz
Shinyflvres I won't consider that is called "visibility", but "accessibility". Visibility means can you sees the avatar in action, no matter you or the others wearing it. Accessibility means can you request it's info (i.e. metadata) via API (and implicitly, search it).
But this is not the point of your request originally arguing so I would leave it.
Clover Kurokami
I feel like rather than "friends only" a simpler system would be "Cloneable only from the creator or a pedestal owned by them." It gets rid of any messy friend management issues while allowing a creator to have a "Semi public" avatar that they can share with specific people without it showing up in search worlds.
Elocin_Anagram
I have been on this game for 8 years. In that time I have dealt with a lot of crashers. I have a feeling this will be a new vector for malicious crashers to share their Crasher avatars. For that reason if this gets implemented I would still want to be able to track the avatar ID so that way groups and other people can blacklist the avatar. For me I only want the Avatar ID for reporting to trust and safety.
DnutCfe-Obscura
Elocin_Anagram I completely agree with that.
phone2345
I think the issue isn’t that more avatar usage permission options should be added, but rather that the existing permission system should be managed more effectively to prevent unauthorized avatar copying.
For example, public avatars could require a usage token by default, which players receive when the avatar owner enables copying. When someone tries to use the avatar, the token would need to be verified. The avatar uploader could choose to disable token verification, or invalidate all existing tokens at once.
`Squishy
phone2345 Do you mean cloning? Because that's a totally different thing. There's no such thing as "enabling copying" and I'm not sure what you mean by "unauthorised". If an avatar is set to public then it's authorised.
phone2345
`Squishy Yes. I mean avatars obtained through player-to-player cloning, favoriting, or avatar pedestal in worlds.
Once you’ve cloned an avatar, you can let other people clone it as well, allowing the token to spread further. However, you wouldn’t be able to switch to that avatar directly using its Avatar ID unless you had previously obtained the token through one of those cloning methods.
This mechanism could allow an avatar to remain distributed within a relatively small circle.
Prismic247
Allegedly already tracked in:
https://feedback.vrchat.com/feature-requests/p/friendswhitelisted-only-publicity-setting-for-avatars
and:
But yeah, along with platform built in avatar search, this is my most wanted feature.
Shinyflvres
Prismic247
I mostly want this feature to be implemented as you may know people complain to us, they want blacklisting vice verca and each provider may handle it differently as well. this feature is def. needed.
The fact it is being tracked since 2019 and 2022 makes it even worse. this needs to be done.
SummerTYT
I understand the reasoning behind this proposal, and I can see legitimate use cases for a Friends Only option. For example, someone might create an avatar for a small group of friends and want everyone to use the same upload without having to distribute Unity projects.
However, I don't think avatar visibility should evolve into an increasingly granular permission system with Friends Only, Group Only, individual whitelists, multiple authorized groups, etc.
Public and Private already have a clear purpose. If an avatar is Public, you're choosing to make it available for other people to use. If you don't want other people using it, you keep it Private.
Friends Only could be a reasonable convenience, but going further creates an entire access-control system. What happens when someone is unfriended while using the avatar? When they leave an authorized group? When a creator removes someone from a whitelist? Does the avatar disappear from favorites? Are they immediately switched out of it? What about multiple authorized groups? These aren't impossible problems, but they add complexity to solve increasingly niche cases.
I also don't think selling avatars is a strong justification for this. VRChat already has an official Avatar Marketplace specifically designed to sell avatars and grant access to buyers. Using whitelists or groups as an unofficial entitlement system would partially duplicate something that already exists.
And I think there's an important distinction between sharing and indexing. If the real problem is that creators are fine with people using their Public avatars but don't want third-party databases indexing them, then indexing is the issue that should be addressed. Redefining avatar visibility is a much broader solution.
I wouldn't necessarily oppose a simple Friends Only option, but I think that's where the line should be. Public should mean publicly usable, Private should mean uploader-only, and the Marketplace should handle commercial distribution. Turning avatar visibility into a full permission hierarchy feels unnecessary for the actual problems being discussed.
Cassette_Bat
SummerTYT disagree entirely. It shouldn't have to only be one of two extremes. Either share with EVERYONE or noone? Nah having the ability to share avatars ONLY with your chosen community is a really great idea. There's no true downsides that would come close to the benefits. If you let or get removed from the group, you lose the avatar, yeah that sounds about right. You want only friends to use and avi and unfriend someone, they lose access. That sounds fine.
Also vrchats built in marketplace isn't a reason to limit the abilities of avatar sellers or kitbashers.
Docteh
SummerTYT
For the access permissions of avatars, the permissions are checked every time you change into an avatar, or join a world. If access to wear an avatar is revoked, I believe a user is changed into the robot avatar, and the favorite is not removed, but it is no longer usable.
SummerTYT
Cassette_Bat I don't think it's a bad system BUT my concern is the complexity that comes from making access depend entirely on the creator. What happens if there's drama and the creator gets angry with someone and decides to unfriend them or revoke their access? VRChat isn't exactly known for having drama-free private instances, just saying. What if a group gets reported, suspended or deleted? Or if one day the creator simply disappears and deletes the group, causing everyone to lose access?
Friends Only and Group Only have valid use cases, but once access depends on friendships, groups and whitelists, we're turning a simple Public/Private system into an access-management system with a lot more edge cases.
SummerTYT
Docteh Yeah I know, thats is how currently "public to private" avatars work, but you miss the point of my concern
Cassette_Bat
SummerTYT that still completely fine. If a creator of an avatar wants to revoke usage of an avatar from someone else, unless they're a client of some form, that's valid. "I don't like you any more I'm not letting you use the avatar I created and uploaded" feels like something that is fine being up to creator discretion.
And much of the other cases you mentioned can happen with normal public avis anyways.
Yeah avi uploaders should have some ability to limit and even revoke access to their creations beyond "private or public, no in between"
Nuoance
100% needed! I run a horror show, which means I make a lot of our avatars for the actors. Making them public is a necessity, especially with quest users on our team, but I don't want strangers trying to use the avatars for their own reasons or during the shows to confuse people. Its well overdue cuz I know I'm not the only community x'D
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