Yes, the lunatic has finally taken over the asylum.
I'm organizing an academically-oriented virtual worlds workshop under the aegis of both State of Play and Terra Nova. It's running at New York Law School on Dec 1-2, down in bee-you-ti-ful Tribeca. Attendance is very small and exclusive. The people speaking are very smart, and the audience is going to be even smarter and involved in all the panel discussions. The conference registration is cheap. The food will be good.
Details are here and registrations are now open.
When will the first virutal symposium take place - in Second Life or WoW? Or maybe I missed it and its already happened?
Posted by: Jürï Saar | Nov 11, 2006 at 14:19
Good luck with the symposium.
If I was there, I would ask to discuss if we are all currently fooled by games that just happen to look like "virtual worlds" when they are, in fact, merely games.
And if these games will automatically lead us to "true" virtual worlds. I guess not actually.
My own definition of a "true" virtual world would be:
1: It's reliably persistent
(you know it will be around for a long time and online all the time)
2: The users can influence and change it
(chop down/plant trees, build houses/spacestations dynamically everywhere, dig holes in the landscape, pick apples and throw them, etc)
3: These changes have real consequences
(if there are none, it will feel like a 3D-chat room. In a virtual world, I would expect there to grow an apple tree in the place where I threw the apple, for example)
Probably you lot have discussed all this on TerraNova before I came around :) Just adding my 2 euro cent.
Posted by: Thomas | Nov 13, 2006 at 06:16
@Thomas: You're in good company with that point of view. Check out this thread as a starting point.
Posted by: Thomas Malaby | Nov 13, 2006 at 08:47
Hi, my name is Paris Ionescu. I am nineteen, and a sophomore at Bard College. I am chairman of a social networking website for artists called selfportrait.net. I have become, along with my colleagues in the business, very interested in the theory of online social networking as a phenomenon, and in particular with the conflation of social networking/virtual worlds (gaming included) and architecture. I am writing a final paper on the phenomenology of virtual space, and am wondering if attending the symposium might be of value to me. If not, and anyone has any input as to some worthwhile sources in this study, please e-mail me.
Best,
Paris
Posted by: Paris Ionescu | Nov 14, 2006 at 19:09
I am just curious how many of those "smart speakers" have actually truly experienced and lived the life in any of existing MMOPRGs or other virtual worlds. I am a law student in the 2nd year, who has been an avid MMOPRG player for years. My study is largely focused on virtual worlds and the minitoring, particualy of the property rights. I have read opinions of scholars but have not yet encoutnered one, which is written by a scholar, who had actually "spent his/her life" in the MMOPRG (or virtual world). "Spending his/her life" does not include merely being a casual player or a player who owns property in the virtual world for a research purpose. It means that he or she has lived in the world to the extent that the real life had essentially become his/her "second life." I am interested in hearing opinions of legal scholars who appreciate the environment of MMOPRG or virtual world at that level.
Posted by: Rachel | Nov 14, 2006 at 22:31
Rachel -- we understand your general concern here. One problem with some of the early VW scholarship and the State of Play conferences was that too many presenters would lead off with statements like "I don't play videogames, but my kids do..." Suffice it to say that the majority of the speakers at this iteration have spent significant time engaged with one or two VWs. However, I don't think the majority of the speakers would meet your criteria of having "real life" become secondary -- a handful would be able to say that, I think, but not the majority.
If you're willing, please send us (the TN authors) a draft of your paper when you have it completed -- we would be interested to see it.
Posted by: greglas | Nov 15, 2006 at 09:46
What a great combination of two important communities. If you plan for a live feed out from the event, please let us know at Global Kids if you'd like us to host one for the teenagers in Teen Second Life.
Barry
Posted by: Barry | Nov 16, 2006 at 07:49
Sounds like a great little event.
I wonder if it is too late to organize a panel or add a speaker to discuss some of the socio-political, economic, and legal/IP implications of the recent Copybot debacle on Second Life? Sounds like just the sort of group to raise the dialogue beyond the hand-wringing and flaming going on right now.
Posted by: rikomatic | Nov 16, 2006 at 10:38
I'm sure we'll be talking about Copybot at this a bit -- we've been knocking it around in the backchannel recently...
Posted by: greglas | Nov 16, 2006 at 11:06
Greg, thank you for the response. I should be done drafting my paper in January or February. I am happy to send you the draft. As Mr. Castronova mentioned in his article "The Right to Play," the world of MMOPRG is a special place for many players, often more than just as entertainment. I was once one of them, too. I want to assure that the current virtual business fever and government interference will not destroy the many lives of people in MMOG, who deserve an absolute peace, in a long run.
Posted by: Rachel | Nov 16, 2006 at 18:44
Quick question: Will this event be recorded? If so, is there a chance that it will be podcasted or released to the masses?
Thanks in advance.
Posted by: Jeff | Nov 21, 2006 at 21:43