Real Politik

Almost exactly a year ago I asked whether virtual world makers with significant economies and RMT should "'open their books' about how their economies operate, given how much control they have over the conditions and mechanisms of those economies." Today, via the New York Times, comes this account that suggests that the makers of EvE Online have answered in the affirmative.

In the wake of recent concerns over corruption (Nate provided many of the key links in this post), CCP has announced that they will hold elections among their players for an oversight committee, one empowered to visit CCP's  offices and "audit" their operations. Scott Jennings chimes in, as do Endie and Mark Wallace.

Like many of you I eagerly await Nate's take on the recent developments for EvE, but what does this mean for virtual worlds more generally? The broader issues generated by the power that virtual world makers wield over the the deep architecture of increasingly high-stakes economies are not going away. The analogy to gaming (gambling) commissions is apt, not because these virtual worlds are, effectively, virtual casinos (well, some of them might be), but because of the underlying principle that informs that policy-making; i.e., when a group of people puts real capital on the line in a broadly contrived environment there is a compelling public interest in ensuring that the conditions conform to some notion of fairness.

CCP's solution is intriguing, striking even, because it breaks from a largely unspoken assumption that the relationship between players and developers should be distant -- or, at least, heavily managed and regulated (by the developer). We'll have to see how this solution unfolds in practice, of course, but for the moment at least it suggests a new ethic surrounding these environments with regard to accountability and political legitimacy. CCP may have opened its doors in the name of transparency, but is letting those who are not gods (in Richard's formulation) check the gods' work the direction in which virtual worlds must move?

Comments

[Prokofy Neva]

1.

This seemed like a good development, but from the discussion I've seen around on it, such as www.raphkoster.com, there is concern that power gamerz or FIC types will be the ones who get to be in the oversight committee.

And there's an odd feature to it -- the game company itself will fly this committee at its own expense to their headquarters to do this overseeing. That just doesn't seem right. Inspectors have to be independent and one way you make them independent is to have their expenses paid for independently.

Perhaps there has to be a Metaverse Gaming Commission or Oversight Committee that has a non-profit status that lives off membership dues and service fees like the AP or something.

It just seems to me obvious that whoever writes the check for the expenses can call the shots, unless it is separate from the entity being inspected.

Also at SOP II, I believe it was Michael Johnson or someone on his panel, I'd have to go check, who said he thought eventually some sort of Gaming Commission would have to be formed to regulate things like SL.

[Timothy Burke]

2.

I give CCP some credit for the latest round in their thinking, particularly in their comparison to how reputations for corruption with real-world governments construct the expectation (and subsequent behavior) of their citizens.

[greglas]

3.

I'm not too surprised by this. They suffered a major PR blow to credibility and their single world architecture / zero-sum game makes that a serious problem. This might fix it at the cost of a few plane tickets, hotels, etc. Probably cheaper than an advertising campaign and more effective.

I guess the questions I have are: 1) what's next in this sequence of events (if anything) for Eve? and 2) how could this map to more conventional sharded spaces? (See this old post.) Whatever you think of shards, they do seem to make conventional political systems difficult.

[greglas]

4.

I'm not too surprised by this. They suffered a major PR blow to credibility and their single world architecture / zero-sum game makes that a serious problem. This might fix it at the cost of a few plane tickets, hotels, etc. Probably cheaper than an advertising campaign and more effective.

I guess the questions I have are: 1) what's next in this sequence of events (if anything) for Eve? and 2) how could this map to more conventional sharded spaces? (See this old post.) Whatever you think of shards, they do seem to make conventional political systems difficult.

[Andy Havens]

5.

"...An oversight committee, one empowered to visit CCP's offices and "audit" their operations."

Like Dorothy went to Oz to audit the Wizard's operations?

This may be in earnest, sure. But them's that control the code, control the multiverse. And I'm unsure how users would be able to uncover serious wrongdoing, if the company was determined to hide it.

Concealing income from the Feds has been going on in many industries (and private homes) for years. If you can hide a bit of cash, you can hid a cache of bits.

6.

"If you can hide a bit of cash, you can hid a cache of bits."

Oooh, I like that one!

[Matt Mihaly]

7.

This is a PR exercise, nothing more. A bunch of players wandering around the offices of CCP isn't going to catch corruption, at all. It's naive in the extreme to believe it will, and I'm sure CCP isn't that naive.

This is placation.

--matt

[Daniel Speed]

8.

I doubt it's going to be about using those players to catch people - that's the point of the internal affairs department that CCP set up. The point is much more likely to increase the understanding of the player base of how things work, and what measures are in place. Like I've said before, most players assume there's a heterogenous uni-dev that has full access to everything.

[Don Temujin]

9.

I naturally tend to share Matt's skepticism, but CCP history suggest otherwise.

None of the CCP founders has any pre-EVE experience of game design, and the incredible drive they've shown in bringing this project to life comes bundled with serious hubris about them being smarter than the lot of old-guard MMO* makers.

This is a company that pretty much reinvented the wheel, sometimes for the best, yet oftentimes falls for beginner's trap, especially in the PR/CM department.

Their last move I'm afraid may be earnest, albeit totally lacking in the forward-thinking area: similar systems exist in northern europe countries governments, where citizens are entitled by law to request the books an perform audits on ministries adn government institutions, and CCP may genuinely think that's the way to go to prove transparency.

That sort of 'public scrutiny' has been attempted in MU*, usually with disastrous results, especially when prompted (as is the case here) by a crisis of trust in the game managers.

Obviously, the implementation they announced is doomed, since we're not talking about concerned citizens dropping unannounced to check some state secretary expense bill, here, but about a group of 'elected' people taken on a PR tour of a police station by IA...

The process is by design, doomed to fail.

On a more positive note: Extended comments on the recent CCP soap opera

[Don Temujin]

10.

Add: as suggested in Raph's site discussion on the topic, inviting players to come and meet CCP for policy making brainstorming could probably do some good.

The EVE community has produced a lot of good ideas that CCP has made limited profit of, and there is ample room for improvement here.

Unfortunately, the premises of this initiative are not about policy making, and unless CCP smartens up before people get there, and go public about the change of direction, they will once more promise one thing and deliver another, which is damning, regardless of the merits of what they eventually deliver.

Sorry about the double-post, I blame the lack of editing ability of comments within session. ;)

[Sam]

11.

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
- Who guards the guardians?

If a player committee gets any true insight, how is being ensure that they do not abuse this power? Either they don't get any power, or it's the same problem just with a group of people that's even more difficult to control.

Why not take the insight from the Bragg vs. Linden Labs ... get a third party auditor / mediator for conflicts. Attribute a certain amount of player subscription payments (e.g. 0.25%) to an external "auditor/mediator" who investigates a fixed number of cases every month?

This way you could get a group of people who actually have an understanding of the game, are independent and can help to create a fair playing field.

[Amarilla]

12.

"Why not take the insight from the Bragg vs. Linden Labs ... get a third party auditor / mediator for conflicts. Attribute a certain amount of player subscription payments (e.g. 0.25%) to an external "auditor/mediator" who investigates a fixed number of cases every month?"

Because if you allow it , then you can't do any more shady/illegal/immoral/unethical biz , also it becomes public the real number of your actual players. No more hype PR .