CNN Future Summit

Watch me on CNN International's Future Summit - Virtual Worlds.

On April 23rd 2007, I was part of a taped panel for a CNN program (Future  Summit - Virtual Worlds) exploring the impact of virtual worlds on society. Because of the dissertation and my recent illness, I had forgotten that the planned air date for the edited program was mid-June.
   
The CNN Future Summit is being broadcast on CNN International globally this week. As you may or may not know, the CNN you get in the US is a separate channel altogether where, as my father eloquently explained, they replace substantive content with prettier anchors and juicier news for the American audience. Executives felt that CNN International would be perceived as bland by Americans and so they dumbed down CNN specifically for them.
   
Thus, the show is not being broadcast in the US, but 10 times this week everywhere else in the world, including Hong Kong, where my parents live. On Wednesday night, they recorded the program premier on DVD. They gave me a copy of the DVD last night when they arrived (for graduation on Sunday). I was awed by the editing, presentation, and content of the program, but was saddened that it would never be broadcast in the US.
   
I am honored to have learned how to edit videos from my experiences at Seriosity. I realized I could rip the DVD, edit the video down, and post it on YouTube. I edited the 50 minute program down to 8 minutes, focusing on the segments on online gaming and, of course, my responses. You can watch the 8-minute cut here on YouTube.
   
I began my research in online gaming 8 years ago when there was no academic support for studying online games (apart from the violence agenda). It was my adviser, Doug Davis, from Haverford College who inspired me with the strength and courage to fight for a dream, no matter how tremulous it seemed at times. Over the past years, a small band of colleagues and I have worked hard to carve out a viable field of academic study, dramatically shifting attention away from agendas focused on deviant outcomes of game-play. The study of online gaming and virtual environments is now something that most universities are desperately hiring positions for. I am blessed to have been given the opportunity to change a part of this world such that others interested in studying online   games no longer need to struggle the way I did alone for so many years. Over the past years, my colleagues and I have created a vibrant community of scholars spanning the fields of psychology, communication, economics, law, sociology, among others.

I hope you join me in celebrating this moment and cherishing the conviction that while the light will always be a burden to bear in the darkness, that the beauty of dawn will always be worth fighting for.

Comments

[Tim]

Congratulations!

[Rory]

Good stuff! Congrats, Nick!

[Urizenus]

Hey I accidently ran across the show while channeling last night in my hotel room in Amsterdam. It was good enough to keep me out of trouble for an extra hour.

[John Beety]

Congratulations on your graduation, Dr. Yee!

(Hey, you will be by the time you get to read this.)

[Raymondo]

Very entertaining. I look forward to catching the full programme this week.

[Syntheticist]

I'm glad you are feeling better, and I'd like to second John's congratulations on your PhD... are you going to stay in academia or move on to an industry job?

[Dmitri Williams]

Nicely done, and grats on the RL ding!

[rikomatic]

Congratulations, Nick! Thanks for the edited version.

[Prokofy Neva]

Nick, why, in the trailers leading up to this CNN special, out of all the things there are to say, you had to pick this concept, typical of elites among the Metarati, to the effect that "people have all this opportunity but all they do is replicate real life and build suburban tracts."

Why can't they? Why do you have to dump on them? Why can't you just build your ideal steel-and-glass modern-looking enclave (which is actually replicated more than you'd feel comfortable knowing about) and be done with it?

Why can't mass taste exist in virtual worlds? Can't you just do your thing on a private island without kicking others in the teeth?

People want to be free.

[Lavant]

Congratulations Nick. Look forward to future greatness. And this RL Ding was substantial! Couldn't agree more that it is the people that truely matter!

[Joe Sanchez]

Thanks for providing the clip for us Nick. I enjoyed the video

[Reality]

Hmmm, I see prok is busy once more using terms for things that don't exist ....

[LEKO]

I would like to see the whole show now! :)

[Jim Miles]

Thanks for that, very interesting and useful.

You do say "you know" rather a lot.

[Tripp]

Congratulations, Nick.

I look forward to seeing you at the Wallenberg Videogames and Education week at Stanford in August!

I too want to see the whole show now! It says something that a mainstream medium like CNN Int'l would spend an hour on that topic. And it says something else that the program directors at CNN didn't think the US audience would want to watch it!

[Nick Yee]

Thank you all for the kind words (well - almost all). Your comments mean a lot to me.

I plan to start working for PARC in September while also working a little with Jeremy (my advisor at Stanford). So I'd say I will keep a foot in industry and the other foot in academia.

I hope to start on a book project soon.

The rest of the program covers non-game applications of virtual worlds - such as photo-sharing sites, the future of movies, and information-sharing sites. Unfortunately, as I mentioned, the program will not be broadcast in the US.

[Nick Yee]

You can watch the full video online here:
http://edition.cnn.com/CNNI/Programs/futuresummit/