>>346652336
This is the crux of what people complain about vs. 2018 /vrg/. In modern urban life you organize your social circle based on shared interests and culture, and VRChat allowed us all to self-filter into a small group that shared three traits:
1. Interested in VR
2. Into anime
3. Familiar enough with 4chan to be tolerant of free speech
Initially that was enough to create a small, Dunbar's Number-size group where everyone who showed up could consider themselves friends. With the continued rapid growth of VR and VRChat, though, we've outgrown that number and added subgroups with additional filtering criteria, like
-Plays Halo every Sunday
-Crafts a new avatar every week
-Likes huge boobs
-Likes flat chests
Along with preexisting IRL social divides like nationality, race, and politics, which shouldn't matter as much in VR but become relevant simply because we need filtering mechanisms to keep social circles manageable.
All this is a natural part of community growth, but it means people who've been around since the start see their old friends drift away into other groups as more and more specific filters become relevant.