Surely creating communities is meant to be tougher than this?

We chew the fat with the super-cool production team behind one of the hottest new social sites to hit the web. Welcome to the world of Virb.com...

Perhaps the greatest single motivation behind Web 2.0 and what it is supposed to represent is a greater sense of community. This has largely been facilitated by the notion that online content shouldn’t merely be passive and should instead be shaped and influenced by the people who view it. Think of the supposed next-generation ‘big guns’ like YouTube, MySpace, eBay, or Flickr and they all share that quality of constant evolution an activity that has made them so popular with vast international audiences. So just how tough is it in the current climate to break on through and establish a community-led presence in the wake of such stiff competition? Well that’s the prospect that awaits the team who have built and launched the gorgeously hip and trendy Virb.com - and intimidated they are not. Fresh from the success of PureVolume, Brad Smith and Todd Palmer decided against resting on their laurels and kicking back, and have instead crafted a really impressive presence that manages to exude a more sophisticated identity than its contemporaries. The creative community has certainly embraced its attempts to provide a home for musicians, artists, film-makers and photographers, with portfoliolike blog pages providing a natural home for their talents. We decided it was time to get the low-down on what the project is all about, and so founder Brad Smith and Lead Designer Ryan Sims were only to happy to let us in on Web 2.0’s best kept secret.

RS: Ryan Sims, Lead Designer
BS: Brad Smith, Virb Inc.

WD: Firstly, for the uninitiated, how would you explain the overall vibe behind Virb – what does it stand for?
RS: So basically, Virb represents the fact that as a group of twenty-somethings here in our company, we were very frustrated by the variety of social communities out there. Which is slightly absurd, considering a new “MySpace-killer” pops up every other week. We just wanted a place to go and network with our friends and family and not feel completely creepy about being there. We felt there was a big void where we could come in and create something that would cater to those people who care a little bit more about design, aesthetics, simplicity and clarity. As for the name “Virb”, it’s four letters long, makes for a short domain and is pretty easy to remember. We think it has a nice ring to it, though it doesn’t really mean anything.

WD: It seems to have an artistic sensibility running through it that seems more sophisticated, cooler, and creative in attitude than similar sites like MySpace. Are deliberately targeting that kind of audience, if so, what’s the thinking behind it?
RS: First off, we’re not deliberately targeting any one specific audience. We want to keep Virb open to any type of individual that wants to join, but the way it’s worked out is the tastemakers and earlyadopters are signing up first and getting in on the ground floor, providing that foundational layer of community leaders. On the whole, Virb does seems to cater to people that are creating things–musicians, photographers, filmmakers, etc. That sort of culture tends to place a higher value on the aesthetics of things and has really embraced the site from the getgo, which is fantastic..
BS: Nearly all the people that built Virb are actively contributing things they have created or found online, so we definitely set the precedence for it catering to those individuals.
RS: Hopefully in the long run that won’t be intimidating to a person who doesn’t fit that “creative contributor” mold. We’re changing a lot of things on Virb so those “followers” can also join and feel right at home and not feel kind of like they’re walking around an art museum - too scared to use anything because it looks too pretty. We’re just constantly honing and clarifying things so both personality types feel completely comfortable and stay engaged while they use the site.

WD: How long has the site been up and running and what kind of success in terms of attracting a Virb community has it enjoyed?
RS: The site went to private beta towards the end of 2006 and we launched publicly March 2007. The initial success of attracting the tastemaker/creative audience could possibly be attributed to the fact we got linked up on Digg and a lot of designer blogs.
BS: With only word of mouth – people really liked what they saw, people are telling their friends to check out Virb. Because of that we saw around 100,000 signups in our first couple of months after the launch.

WD: The site undeniably adheres to the look and feel that has come to define Web 2.0 content. How important was it that Virb followed this trend and why was this the line you took?
RS: It’s kind of hard to pin the needle on the web 2.0 donkey here because if you’re labeling web 2.0 as “easier to use” or “not as messy” from a design perspective, that’s been our approach for as long as I can remember. We’re just making things how we think they should be made. If you want to call that web 2.0, that’s fine. At the end of the day, the greater goal is taking a simple and tasteful approach to designing of a social network that we would like to see made. In the long run, it’s better for everyone– not just for us as a company but also the community at large. We could certainly care less if our design doesn’t adhere to the Web 2.0 Handbook as long as our community is thriving, healthy and genuinely engrossed in the tool we are giving them to make and keep good friendships.

WD: Did you allow yourself to draw inspiration for the way the site’s designed from any of your contemporary Web 2.0 sites – any nods to anyone in particular?
RS: We kept coming back to a handful of sites which we felt had really done a good job at creating strong communities. Sites that we used on a daily basis. Sites like Flickr or Vimeo or Twitter. Sites that went so much deeper than just “it looks pretty” and started pushing the line of “I might be addicted to this”. The bigger idea here is to create a place where people really are compelled to come back daily, hourly. Apple would also be a continual source of inspiration in the sense that they are consistently making products and software that appeal to such a wide array of people. Good design sense has afforded them the ability to reach so many different personality cultures and we’re trying to approach Virb in a similar manner.

WD: What was the biggest technical challenge in making a community-driven site such as Virb a reality? What extra development decisions are involved or must be considered?
BS: We had the luxury of going into Virb knowing this wasn’t our first large social website and confident we could tackle any technical obstacles we might encounter. Purevolume.com, our flagship website, is a music sharing website that has a lot of social tools at its core. We’ve got a good 3 to 4 years under our belt dealing with anything from what users want & need to see, to how a music player should work, server structure, bandwidth, etc.
RS: Technically speaking, the biggest challenge we had was taking the lessons we learned from Purevolume and saying “We’ve got a blank canvas here with Virb, let’s iron out all the little annoying things and build it right from the ground up.” It wasn’t so challenging from the sense of “What are we doing here?” but more of “How do we build this quickly and correctly while staying flexible enough to make big changes in the future?” Preparing for large amounts of traffic, large amounts of signups and continual daily use on a grand scale didn’t play as big a role as it had in Purevolume.com’s development process.

WD: In terms of the site’s creation and implementation how many development staff were involved in building it and what were their roles during the project?
BS: All in all, the Virb Inc. (formerly Unborn Media Inc.) team consists of 18 individuals who oversee more than just Virb.com, ranging from PureVolume. com and advertising to server administration, support and development.
RS: Initially, Virb.com was developed by a team of 10 or so. 2-3 interface designers doing design and css/xhtml, 3 PHP developers, 2 server/infrastructure people and a couple more not really doing production, but fueling the conversations and fueling the information architecture and voice of what Virb should be. Now that the initial crunch of development has subsided, we’ve shrunk the Virb. com team down to 5 people: a project manager, a creative director, two designer/developers and a community manager. This allows us to stay agile and make important decisions very quickly and act on them in a nearly instantaneous manner.

WD: What key technologies were employed during the site build and why were they chosen within the context of creating and running Virb?
RS: As for the front end, CSS/XHTML played a vital role keeping the site lean and compatible on all modern browsers, mobile devices, etc. On the back end we used PHP because that’s something we’ve used as our core technology for 4 years now.

WD: We don’t see any advertising – how do you fund the project and what revenue streams will you look to exploit in time?
BS: We funded Virb’s development solely from the revenue we generate from Purevolume, which comes from a small subscription model but primarily through advertising. One thing Ryan and I might mention is the fact that being a company like this, with 1 (now 2) popular social sites, it’s kind of automatic to think, “They’ve taken funding or VC money”. But we’re quite proud to say that we’ve been doing this for 4 years now without any investment.
RS: Something that is always a thorn in people’s sides on social networks is the overwhelming and annoying nature in which advertising is presented to the visitor. It seems to always be infringing on their territory and mucking things up. With Virb, we have a fresh slate to persue creative monetization schemes instead of just using banner ads or google ad words. That’s on the backburner right now because we’re more interested in getting people to use the site and enjoy it. Then, we’ll figure out the best way to monetize. We definitely have some interesting things brewing – all in good time.

WD: As a general question, where do you see the Web 2.0 revolution heading in over the short or longer-term future and where do you hope Virb wil sit within that?
RS: Right now you have this trend of sites that do very niche, specific tasks like your Twitters, your Flickrs, your Vimeos, which is producing this fragmented space where you’re contributing a lot of things all over the place. We’re taking a guess that at some point people are going to want to bring everything they do together in one. A place where, if you want to upload photos to Virb or to Flickr or to Photo Bucket, it doesn’t matter. It’s more about what are you doing, what are you creating, what are you sharing with friends and where can I go to find all the stuff you’re creating/finding that makes you you. I’m tired of scouring 5-10 different sites to find everything one of my friends is doing. I think the more fragmented the web 2.0 space gets, the bigger the need for a home base, a rallying point.