''Neopets'' is a virtual pet website. Users can own virtual pets ("Neopets") and buy virtual items for them using one of two virtual currencies. One currency, called Neopoints, can be earned within the site, and the other, Neocash, can either be purchased with real-world money, or won by chance in-game. The website was launched by Adam Powell and

Donna Williams Donna Leanne Williams, also known by her married name Donna Leanne Samuel (born Donna Keene; 12 October 1963 – 22 April 2017), was an Australian writer, artist, singer-songwriter, screenwriter, and sculptor. In 1965, aged two, Williams was a ...

in late 1999. Two years later, a consortium of investors led by

Doug Dohring Doug Dohring is the founder, CEO, and Executive Chairman of Age of Learning, Inc., the Educational technology, edtech company that created and runs ABCmouse.com Early Learning Academy, ReadingIQ, Adventure Academy, and My Math Academy and My Read ...

bought a controlling interest in the company and in June 2005, Viacom (the company that owns

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its networks division's Kids and Family Group. It ...

) bought Neopets Inc. for US$160 million. On 17 March 2014, Viacom and Nickelodeon sold ''Neopets'' to

JumpStart Games JumpStart Games, Inc., formerly Knowledge Adventure, Inc., is an American edutainment video game company based in Torrance, California. Founded in 1991, it owns the ''Neopets'' virtual pet website, and is itself owned by Chinese holding company ...

for an undisclosed amount. On 3 July 2017, Chinese company NetDragon acquired JumpStart.

Gameplay

''Neopets'' allows users to create and care for

digital pet A virtual pet (also known as a digital pet, artificial pet, or pet-raising simulation) is a type of artificial human companion. They are usually kept for companionship or enjoyment. People may keep a digital pet in lieu of a real pet. Digital ...

s called "Neopets" and explore the

virtual world A virtual world (also called a virtual space) is a computer-simulated environment which may be populated by many users who can create a personal avatar, and simultaneously and independently explore the virtual world, participate in its activities ...

of Neopia. There is no set objective for the users, but they are expected to feed and care for their Neopets when they grow hungry or ill. Neopets will not die if neglected, but their health can limit their gameplay. Neopets come in a variety of species and colors and users can create or adopt their own. Users can obtain items to interact with their Neopet, such as books to read and toys to play with them. Neopets can be customised with certain clothing items, paintbrushes, morphing potions, and accessories. Neopets themselves can have pets of their own called Petpets. Users can build a customisable Neohome for their Neopets and furnish it with furniture, wallpaper, and flooring. Neopets can battle against other Neopets or

non-player character A non-player character (NPC), or non-playable character, is any character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster ...

s in the Battledome but they cannot die there. Neopia is a virtual planet with fantasy lands inhabited by Neopets and other virtual creatures. Each land has a different theme, such as

pirates Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, v ...

prehistory Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The us ...

, and their own shops, games, and attractions. Neopia follows its own

calendar A calendar is a system of organizing days. This is done by giving names to periods of time, typically days, weeks, months and years. A date is the designation of a single and specific day within such a system. A calendar is also a phy ...

and

time zone A time zone is an area which observes a uniform standard time for legal, commercial and social purposes. Time zones tend to follow the boundaries between countries and their subdivisions instead of strictly following longitude, because it ...

, which runs concurrent with real-world Pacific Time, and has tie-ins with certain real-world holidays such as

Halloween Halloween or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints' Day. It begins the observan ...

and

Christmas Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year ...

. It has its own

economy An economy is an area of the production, distribution and trade, as well as consumption of goods and services. In general, it is defined as a social domain that emphasize the practices, discourses, and material expressions associated with th ...

and

stock market A stock market, equity market, or share market is the aggregation of buyers and sellers of stocks (also called shares), which represent ownership claims on businesses; these may include ''securities'' listed on a public stock exchange, ...

based on Neopoints. Users can earn Neopoints through various means including playing games and selling items, which can be invested or used to buy various virtual goods and services. The site is regularly updated with features like new games, items, and content. Occasionally, the Neopets team release interactive storylines to expand the in-universe lore. In addition to the site content updated by the Neopets team, users also contribute

content Content or contents may refer to: Media * Content (media), information or experience provided to audience or end-users by publishers or media producers ** Content industry, an umbrella term that encompasses companies owning and providing mas ...

to the site. User contributions come in the form of prescreened submissions and readily editable content that is automatically

filtered Filtration is a physical separation process that separates solid matter and fluid from a mixture using a ''filter medium'' that has a complex structure through which only the fluid can pass. Solid particles that cannot pass through the filter m ...

, such as the site's weekly electronic newspaper ''The Neopian Times''. There are different types of submissions that will be accepted.

Games

Users can earn Neopoints from playing games. Games come in many different genres, which include action, puzzles, and luck & chance. Most games have set maximum earnings or playtime. Players may also earn trophies and other awards from games if they score high enough or perform better than other users. Many

single-player A single-player video game is a video game where input from only one player is expected throughout the course of the gaming session. A single-player game is usually a game that can only be played by one person, while "single-player mode" is usually ...

and

multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system ( couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...

browser games A browser game or a "flash game" is a video game that is played via the internet using a web browser. They are mostly free-to-play and can be single-player or multiplayer. Some browser games are also available as mobile apps, PC games, or on co ...

are available. Users can also participate in contests and spotlights judged by staff to showcase the users' talents. Quests to retrieve items may also be performed for specific

NPCs A non-player character (NPC), or non-playable character, is any character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster ...

. Challenges may be made against other players or random players in a "World Challenge" for a prize piece and Neopoints from the jackpot for certain web games. Monthly competitions also exist for multiplayer games with four week-long elimination rounds.

Economy

The

is based on Neopoints. Users can also exchange real money for Neocash, used exclusively for the NC Mall. Users can earn Neopoints through playing games, selling items, and other transactions. Once earned, they can be saved in the bank, used to buy items from other users or

(NPC) shops, used to buy and sell stocks in the Neopian

called the NEODAQ (a parody of the

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market () (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations Stock Market) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the US by volume, and ranked second ...

), or used to buy various other things. Items can be bought from shops found throughout the world of Neopia that are run by NPCs who may allow

bargaining In the social sciences, bargaining or haggling is a type of negotiation in which the buyer and seller of a good or service debate the price or nature of a transaction. If the bargaining produces agreement on terms, the transaction takes p ...

. Users can open their own shops to sell items, sometimes after obtaining those items at a lower price from sources such as other shops or charities. Items may also be exchanged through trading or auctions.

Community

''Neopets'' has a community for users to chat with and contact other users. Each user has their own profile they can edit with

HTML The HyperText Markup Language or HTML is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It can be assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and scripting languages such as JavaS ...

and

CSS Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a style sheet language used for describing the presentation of a document written in a markup language such as HTML or XML (including XML dialects such as SVG, MathML or XHTML). CSS is a cornerstone technolo ...

and are represented by avatars provided by the website, as users cannot upload their own. Most avatars must be "unlocked" by completing certain in-game tasks, such as winning a contest or getting a high score on a game. Users may request other users to be "Neofriends" or block other users from contacting them. To comply with COPPA, users under 13 years of age cannot access any of the site's communication features without sending in parental consent via fax. The main features include: * NeoMail, a personal in-game communication system like regular

email Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a method of exchanging messages ("mail") between people using electronic devices. Email was thus conceived as the electronic ( digital) version of, or counterpart to, mail, at a time when "mail" mean ...

. Users can write messages to other users and restrict who can contact them through NeoMail. * Neoboards, public discussion boards for on-topic discussions. Users can enter their own "neoHTML", a restricted form of

BBCode BBCode ("Bulletin Board Code") is a lightweight markup language used to format messages in much Internet forum software, first introduced in 1998. The available "tags" of BBCode are usually indicated by square brackets ( _and_.html" ;"title="/code> ...

, to customise their posts and signatures. * Guilds, groups of users with similar interests and their own message board. Discussions through these features are restricted and may not involve topics such as dating and romance or controversial topics like politics and religion. Continuous moderation is performed by paid ''Neopets'' staff members, and users can help moderate the site by reporting messages they believe are inappropriate or offensive. Messages are also automatically

to prevent users from posting messages with profanity or lewd content.

History and development

Creation and growth

''Neopets'' was conceived in 1997 by Adam Powell, a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

student at the

University of Nottingham , mottoeng = A city is built on wisdom , established = 1798 – teacher training college1881 – University College Nottingham1948 – university status , type = Public , chancellor ...

at the time. He shared this idea with Donna Williams and the two started work on the site in September 1999, with Powell responsible for the programming and the database and Williams the web design and art. Their original office was located in

Guildford Guildford () is a town in west Surrey, around southwest of central London. As of the 2011 census, the town has a population of about 77,000 and is the seat of the wider Borough of Guildford, which had around inhabitants in . The name "Guildf ...

. With the help of two friends, the site launched on 15 November 1999. Powell stated that the original goal was to "keep university students entertained, and possibly make some cash from banner advertising". The site contained

popular culture Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as, popular art or mass art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a ...

references, such as a Neopet that was simply a picture of

Bruce Forsyth Sir Bruce Joseph Forsyth-Johnson (22 February 1928 – 18 August 2017) was a British entertainer and presenter whose career spanned more than 70 years. Forsyth came to national attention from the late 1950s through the ITV series '' Sunday Nig ...

. The user base grew by

word of mouth Word of mouth, or ''viva voce'', is the passing of information from person to person using oral communication, which could be as simple as telling someone the time of day. Storytelling is a common form of word-of-mouth communication where one pe ...

and by

1999, ''Neopets'' was logging 600,000

page view In web analytics and website management, a pageview or page view, abbreviated in business to PV and occasionally called page impression, is a request to load a single HTML file ( web page) of an Internet site. On the World Wide Web, a page request ...

s daily and sought investors to cover the high cost of running the site. Later in the month,

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

businessman

was introduced to the creators of the site and, along with other investors, bought a majority share in January of the following year. Dohring founded Neopets, Inc. in February 2000 and began business on 28 April. Dohring used

Scientology Scientology is a set of beliefs and practices invented by American author L. Ron Hubbard, and an associated movement. It has been variously defined as a cult, a Scientology as a business, business, or a new religious movement. The most recent ...

's Org Board to manage the company. Adam and Donna were unaware of the Scientology connections until googling the employees at the newly formed company six months later but did not address this until the company hired a woman to introduce Scientology to ''Neopets''. Adam and Donna stopped the addition of any Scientology education to ''Neopets'' and ensured such content never made it into anything site-related. With the new company,

intellectual property Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, co ...

that did not belong to ''Neopets'' was removed but the site kept the British spellings. The website made money from the first paying customers using an advertising method trademarked as " immersive advertising" and touted as "an evolutionary step forward in the traditional marketing practice of

product placement Product placement, also known as embedded marketing, is a marketing technique where references to specific brands or products are incorporated into another work, such as a film or television program, with specific promotional intent. Much of th ...

" in television and film. In 2004, ''Neopets'' released a premium version and started showing advertisements on the basic site that were not shown to premium members.

Viacom era

Viacom, the American conglomerate that owns

, purchased Neopets, Inc. on 20 June 2005 for $160 million and announced plans to focus more on the use of

banner ad A web banner or banner ad is a form of advertising on the World Wide Web delivered by an ad server. This form of online advertising entails embedding an advertisement into a web page. It is intended to attract traffic to a website by linking ...

s over the site's existing immersive advertising. Adam Powell and Donna Williams left Neopets, Inc. shortly after the purchase due to creative differences. The website was redesigned on 27 April 2007 and included changes to the user interface and the ability to customise Neopets. In June, Viacom promoted ''Neopets'' through minishows on its Nickelodeon channel. Promotions included the second Altador Cup and led to an increase in traffic through the site. The first Altador Cup was released as an international online gaming event to coincide with the

2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Germany 2006, was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to host th ...

to improve interactivity between users and had 10.4 million participants the first year. On 17 July, the NC Mall was launched in a partnership with Korean gaming company

Nexon Corporation Nexon Co., Ltd. is a global video game publisher, listed in Japan, that specializes in online Virtual World games for PCs, consoles and mobile. Nexon is one of the world’s ten largest interactive game companies based on market capitalization a ...

. It allowed users to use real money to purchase Neocash to buy exclusive virtual items. On 17 June 2008, Viacom formed the

Nickelodeon Kids & Family Virtual Worlds Group Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its networks division's Kids and Family Group. Its ...

to "encompass all paid and subscription gaming initiatives across all relevant platforms", including ''Neopets''. By June 2011, ''Neopets'' announced that the website had logged 1 trillion page views since its creation. In July 2009, the ''Neopets'' site was the target of an

identity theft Identity theft occurs when someone uses another person's personal identifying information, like their name, identifying number, or credit card number, without their permission, to commit fraud or other crimes. The term ''identity theft'' was c ...

hacking scheme that attempted to trick users into clicking a link that would allow them to gain items or Neopoints. Upon doing so,

malware Malware (a portmanteau for ''malicious software'') is any software intentionally designed to cause disruption to a computer, server, client, or computer network, leak private information, gain unauthorized access to information or systems, depr ...

was installed onto the user's computer. According to reports, the hack was aimed not at child players' ''Neopets'' accounts, but at using the malware to steal the financial data and identities of their parents. Viacom stated that it was investigating the issue, and that the hack was a version of social engineering rather than an "indictment of Neopets security practices". In an on-site newsletter for players, ''Neopets'' denied the report and claimed that the site's security measures prevented the posting of such links.

JumpStart era

acquired Neopets from Viacom in March 2014. Server migration began in September. JumpStart-owned Neopets was immediately characterized by glitches and site lag. On 6 March 2015, much of the Neopets Team remaining from Viacom were laid off. Then-CEO of JumpStart David Lord assured the community that there were no plans to shut down Neopets and instead, resources were allocated to develop new content and address improve lag and site stability with plans to expand to other platforms including mobile and

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dust ...

. The Neopets team started developing in-universe plots again in 2017 for the first time since the JumpStart acquisition. On 3 July 2017, Chinese company NetDragon acquired JumpStart Games. With the support for

Adobe Flash Adobe Flash (formerly Macromedia Flash and FutureSplash) is a multimedia software platform used for production of animations, rich web applications, desktop applications, mobile apps, mobile games, and embedded web browser video players. Flash ...

ending in 2020, the Neopets Team announced in 2019 that it planned to transition Flash elements of the site to

HTML5 HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the World Wide Web. It is the fifth and final major HTML version that is a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendation. The current specification is known as the HTML ...

by the end of 2020. The team prioritized popular features and some parts of the site are not functional. The Neopets Team also started working on developing a mobile-friendly version of the site as well as a

mobile app A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a phone, tablet, or watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop applications which are designed to run on d ...

. During the weekend of 27–28 June 2015, the site's chat filters stopped working. The site's forums were flooded with age-inappropriate messages. In a statement on

, JumpStart apologized, explaining that the issue was due to a "facility move," and that during that move, the moderation team was not able to access the Neopets community. In 2016,

Motherboard A motherboard (also called mainboard, main circuit board, mb, mboard, backplane board, base board, system board, logic board (only in Apple computers) or mobo) is the main printed circuit board (PCB) in general-purpose computers and other expand ...

reported that the account information of an alleged 70 million of Neopets accounts had been compromised. The hack contained usernames, passwords, email addresses, birth dates, gender, and country from 2012 (prior to JumpStart's acquisition), but did not contain credit card information or physical addresses. Neopets responded by posting about the leak on their official Facebook page and sent emails out to all affected players telling them to change their passwords.

Metaverse

On September 22, 2021, the Neopets Metaverse Collection NFT was revealed in collaboration with JumpStart, Cherrypicks, and Moonvault. Users could purchase NMC tokens on the Neopets Metaverse Collection website from November 12, 2021 ― November 15, 2021 that could then be exchanged for a randomly generated Neopet NFT on the Solana blockchain from November 15, 2021 - November 18, 2021. 4,233 NMC tokens were sold for a total of 8,708 SOLs which resulted in 4225 pieces minted for the genesis collection. Shortly after the project was announced a unique visual glitch (certain attributes were layered and colored incorrectly) revealed that at least one of images used for promotion on the Neopets Metaverse Collection website was generated using the Dress to Impress fan site, the Neopets Metaverse team replaced the image in question shortly after it was noticed and haven't responded to allegations they used Dress to Impress to generate the entire NFT collection. The Neopets Metaverse project has received a significant amount of criticism from within the Neopets community, citing general concerns about NFTs, as well as details specific to the Neopets Metaverse. On July 20, 2022, Neopets confirmed that it had suffered a data breach the day prior. The data breach exposed Neopets' entire database schema, including usernames, emails and passwords of its 69 million users. Neopets responded by forcing a password reset for all users on August 1, 2022, causing some players to be locked out as they no longer had access to the e-mail addresses linked to their accounts. On August 29, 2022 Neopets sent an e-mail to users detailing the results of their subsequent investigation, noting that the following information for past and present users was compromised: name, email address, username, date of birth, gender, IP address, Neopets PIN, hashed password, as well as data about a player’s pet, game play, and other information provided to Neopets. They also stated that non-hashed, but inactive, passwords for players that played prior to 2015 were accessed and potentially downloaded between January 3-February 5, 2021, or July 16-19, 2022.

Reception

Described as an online cross of ''

Pokémon (an abbreviation for in Japan) is a Japanese media franchise managed by The Pokémon Company, founded by Nintendo, Game Freak, and Creatures, the owners of the trademark and copyright of the franchise. In terms of what each of thos ...

'' and ''

Tamagotchi The is a handheld digital pet that was created in Japan by Akihiro Yokoi of WiZ and Aki Maita of Bandai. It was released by Bandai on November 23, 1996 in Japan and in the USA on May 1, 1997, quickly becoming one of the biggest toy fads o ...

'', ''Neopets'' has received both praise and criticism. It has been praised for having educational content. Children can learn

to edit their own pages. They can also learn how to handle money by participating in the economy. Reviews from

About.com Dotdash Meredith (formerly About.com) is an American digital media company based in New York City. The company publishes online articles and videos about various subjects across categories including health, home, food, finance, tech, beauty, ...

and MMO Hut considered the multitude of possible activities a positive aspect. Most of the users are female, higher than in other

massively multiplayer online game A massively multiplayer online game (MMOG or more commonly MMO) is an online video game with a large number of players, often hundreds or thousands, on the same server. MMOs usually feature a huge, persistent open world, although there are ...

s (MMOGs) but equivalent to social-networking-driven communities. Lucy Bradshaw, a vice president of

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...

, attributes the popularity among girls to the openness of the site and said, "Games that have a tendency to satisfy on more than one dimension have a tendency to have a broader appeal and attract girls". Luck & chance games draw criticism from parents as they introduce children to gambling. In Australia, a cross-

promotion Promotion may refer to: Marketing * Promotion (marketing), one of the four marketing mix elements, comprising any type of marketing communication used to inform or persuade target audiences of the relative merits of a product, service, brand or i ...

with

McDonald's McDonald's Corporation is an American multinational fast food chain, founded in 1940 as a restaurant operated by Richard and Maurice McDonald, in San Bernardino, California, United States. They rechristened their business as a hambur ...

led to controversy with ''Neopets luck/chance games in October 2004. Australian

tabloid television Tabloid television, also known as teletabloid, is a form of tabloid journalism. Tabloid television news broadcasting usually incorporate flashy graphics and sensationalized stories. Often, there is a heavy emphasis on crime and celebrity news. G ...

show ''

Today Tonight ''Today Tonight'' is an Australian current affairs television program produced by the Seven Network. It aired from January 1995 to November 2019 in Adelaide and Perth. Editions in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne were previously produced befor ...

'' featured a nine-year-old boy who claimed the site requires one to gamble in order to earn enough Neopoints to feed one's Neopet or else it would be sent to the pound. While gambling is not required, nor are pets sent to the pound if unfed, the website includes games of chance based on real games such as

blackjack Blackjack (formerly Black Jack and Vingt-Un) is a casino banking game. The most widely played casino banking game in the world, it uses decks of 52 cards and descends from a global family of casino banking games known as Twenty-One. This fam ...

and lottery

scratchcard A scratchcard (also called a scratch off, scratch ticket, scratcher, scratchum, scratch-it, scratch game, scratch-and-win, instant game, instant lottery, scratchie, lot scrots, or scritchies) is a card designed for competitions, often made of ...

s. After this incident, ''Neopets'' prohibited users under the age of 13 from playing Neopets's casino-style games.

Rise in popularity and decline

In the 2000s, ''Neopets'' was consistently noted as one of the " stickiest" sites for children's entertainment. Stickiness is a measure of the average amount of time spent on a website. A press release from ''Neopets'' in 2001 stated that Neopets.com led in site "stickiness" in May and June, with the average user spending 117 minutes a week. ''Neopets'' also led in the average number of hours spent per user per month in December 2003 with an average of 4 hours and 47 minutes. A 2004 article stated that

Nielsen//NetRatings Nielsen Media Research (NMR) is an American firm that measures media audiences, including television, radio, theatre, films (via the AMC Theatres MAP program), and newspapers. Headquartered in New York City, it is best known for the Nielsen rati ...

reported that people were spending around three hours a month on ''Neopets'', more than any other site in its Nielsen category. By May 2005, a ''Neopets''-affiliated video game producer cited about 35 million unique users, 11 million unique IP addresses per month, and 4 billion web page views per month. This producer also described 20% of the users as 18 or older, with the median of the remaining 80% at about 14. ''Neopets'' was consistently ranked among the top ten "stickiest" sites by both Nielsen//NetRatings and comScore Media Metrix in 2005 and 2006. According to Nielsen//NetRatings, in 2007, ''Neopets'' lost about 15% of its audience over the previous year. In February 2008, comScore ranked it as the stickiest kids entertainment site with the average user spending 2 hours and 45 minutes per month. In January 2017, Neopets then-JumpStart CEO David Lord estimated 100,000 active daily users. In January 2020, Neopets only logged 3.4 million views per month, a significant decline from its peak. In June 2020, JumpStart CEO Jim Czulewicz estimated Neopets had 100,000 daily active users and 1.5 million monthly active players.

Immersive advertising

Immersive advertising is a trademarked term for the way ''Neopets'' displayed advertisements to generate profit after Doug Dohring bought the site. Unlike pop-up and

s, immersive ads integrate advertisements into the site's content in interactive forms, including games and items. Players could earn Neopoints from them by playing

advergames An advergame is a form of advertising in video games, in which the video game is developed by or in close collaboration with a corporate entity for purposes of advertising a brand-name product. While other video games may use in-game advertising (s ...

and taking part in online marketing surveys. Prior to the arrival of the NC Mall, it contributed to 60% of the revenue from the site with paying

Fortune 1000 The Fortune 1000 are the 1,000 largest American companies ranked by revenues, as compiled by the American business magazine '' Fortune''. It only includes companies which are incorporated or authorized to do business in the United States, and fo ...

companies including

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

General Mills General Mills, Inc., is an American multinational manufacturer and marketer of branded processed consumer foods sold through retail stores. Founded on the banks of the Mississippi River at Saint Anthony Falls in Minneapolis, the company or ...

, and

. It was a contentious issue with the site with regard to the ethics of marketing to children. It drew criticism from parents, psychologists, and consumer advocates who argued that children may not know that they are being advertised to, as it blurred the line between site content and advertisement. Children under eight had difficulty recognizing ads and half a million of the 25 million users were under the age of eight in 2005. Dohring responded to such criticism stating that of the 40 percent of users twelve and younger, very few were seven or eight years old and that preschoolers were not their target audience. Others criticised the functionality of the site. Susan Linn, another psychologist and author of ''Consuming Kids: The Hostile Takeover of Childhood'' considered the purpose of this site was to keep children in front of advertisements.

Kalle Lasn Kalle Lasn () (born March 24, 1942) is an Estonian-Canadian film maker, author, magazine editor, and activist. Near the end of World War II, his family fled Estonia and Lasn spent some time in a German refugee camp. At age seven he was resettled ...

, editor-in-chief and co-founder of ''

Adbusters The Adbusters Media Foundation is a Canadian-based not-for-profit, pro-environment organization founded in 1989 by Kalle Lasn and Bill Schmalz in Vancouver, British Columbia. Adbusters describes itself as "a global network of artists, activis ...

'' magazine, said the site encouraged kids to spend hours in front of a screen and recruited them to

consumerism Consumerism is a social and economic order that encourages the acquisition of goods and services in ever-increasing amounts. With the Industrial Revolution, but particularly in the 20th century, mass production led to overproduction—the su ...

. ''Neopets'' executives stated that paid content comprised less than 1% of the site's total content. Children were not required to play or use sponsor games and items, and all ads were marked as such.

Merchandise

The popularity of ''Neopets'' spawned real-world merchandise including clothing, jewelry, stickers, books, cereals,

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedba ...

s and more, sold at mainstream outlets and online retailers. The most common items were plushies (stuffed animals). Each piece of merchandise has a code which can be redeemed at the site for an in-game reward. ''Neopets, Inc.'' had always planned to "bring the online and offline worlds together in ways that have never been done before". An investment banker at

Allen & Company Allen & Company LLC is an American privately held boutique investment bank based at 711 Fifth Avenue, New York. The firm specializes in real estate, technology, media and entertainment. History Founded in 1922 by Charles Robert Allen, Jr., he ...

in New York said that ''Neopets'' was the only online media he had seen "that might have the ability to capture market share in the offline world". Neopets, Inc. signed various licensing deals with companies such as Viacom Consumer Products, Thinkway Toys, and

Jakks Pacific Jakks Pacific, Inc. is an American company that designs and markets toys and consumer products, with a range of products that feature numerous children's toy licenses. The company is named after its founder, Jack Friedman, who had previously fo ...

over the years.

Wizards of the Coast Wizards of the Coast LLC (often referred to as WotC or simply Wizards) is an American publisher of games, primarily based on fantasy and science fiction themes, and formerly an operator of retail stores for games. It is currently a subsidia ...

released the ''

Neopets Trading Card Game The 'Neopets TCG' is a collectible card game and a spin-off of the popular virtual pet website, Neopets. The game was launched in 2003 and produced by Wizards of the Coast, a large Trading card game, trading card company that produces a variety o ...

'' in September 2003, which was promoted in three of General Mills "Big G" cereals and ten

Simon Property Group Simon Property Group, Inc. is an American real estate investment trust that invests in shopping malls, outlet centers, and community/ lifestyle centers. It is the largest owner of shopping malls in the United States and is headquartered in In ...

malls. It received two different nominations for "Toy of the Year" as well as other recognitions. ''Neopets: The Official Magazine'' was a bi-monthly magazine released the same month but it was replaced in 2008 by ''Beckett Plushie Pals'', which featured ''Neopets'' news as well as other companies' products such as

Webkinz Webkinz is a stuffed animal franchise by the Canadian toy company Ganz, consisting of stuffed animals that have online counterparts in the games "Webkinz Classic" and "Webkinz Next". It was originally released by Ganz on April 29, 2005. Each W ...

. In 2005, ''Neopets'' expanded to film and video game deals. The first movie was to be written by Rob Lieber and produced by Dylan Sellers and

John A. Davis John Alexander Davis (born October 26, 1961) is an American film director, writer, animator, voice actor and composer known for his work both in stop-motion animation as well as computer animation, live action and live-action/CGI hybrids. Davis ...

for Warner Bros., but the project has since been cancelled with no other projects announced. Two video games were released by Sony Computer Entertainment, '' Neopets: The Darkest Faerie'' for the

PlayStation 2 The PlayStation 2 (PS2) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on 4 March 2000, in North America on 26 October 2000, in Europe on 24 November 2000, and in Australia on ...

in 2005 and '' Neopets: Petpet Adventures: The Wand of Wishing'' for the

PlayStation Portable The PlayStation Portable (PSP) is a handheld game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on December 12, 2004, in North America on March 24, 2005, and in PAL regions on September 1, 200 ...

in 2006. 2006 also saw the release of ''Neopets'' mobile, which allowed users to visit the new land of Lutari Island, but it was discontinued on 30 June 2009, leaving the island completely inaccessible. In 2007, MumboJumbo developed a match-3 game ''Neopets: Codestone Quest''. ''Neopets'' wouldn't attempt another mobile game until 2015, when they released a match-3 game called ''Ghoul Catchers'' for Android and iOS. However, they still released other games during those years, including ''Treasure Keepers'' for

and '' Puzzle Adventure'' for

Nintendo DS The is a handheld game console produced by Nintendo, released globally across 2004 and 2005. The DS, an initialism for "Developers' System" or "Dual Screen", introduced distinctive new features to handheld games: two LCD screens working in t ...

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major home game console, ...

, and PC. In early 2019, Jumpstart announced that they were making a full mobile-friendly ''Neopets'' app, and it was scheduled to launch late in the summer of 2019. On 10 February 2020,

Blue Ant Media Blue Ant Media Inc. is a Canadian broadcasting and media company headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. The company was founded by Michael MacMillan and formed in 2011 following the acquisition of Glassbox Television. Its name was chosen in refere ...

's Beach House Pictures announced that a ''Neopets'' animated television series is in development and was set to air in 2021, though there have been no recent updates. Neopets plans to expand to the

Nintendo Switch The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a tablet that can either be docked for use as a home console or used as a portable device, making it a ...

References

External links

* * {{ViacomCBS 1990s toys 1999 establishments in the United Kingdom 1999 video games Active massively multiplayer online games Fictional mammals Former Viacom subsidiaries Internet properties established in 1999 Massively multiplayer online role-playing games Pet websites Video games developed in the United Kingdom Virtual economies