Terra Nova

Ninjas attack

Clearly demarcated as blatant self-promotion: I'm happy to announce that an effort I've been working on for about 3 years in semi-stealth mode is now live. After doing big data work for the spooks in the government and running a team of social and computer scientists, a few of us spun out a commercial venture I dubbed Ninja Metrics (www.ninjametrics.com).* Much of this comes from constantly asking game companies for data, then getting smart people to do cool things with it. Our team has now published 80 papers on game data, which is kind of ridiculous. It was time to put that power into an engine so we don't have to work quite so hard.

Among other things, we've figured out how to automate predictive analytics. WTH is that, you ask?

Diablo III Auction House Closes

It's not easy being a bank. Blizzard's experiment with a real-money trading system in its game Diablo III has come to an end. It is a good thing too. By embedding real money in its service, Blizzard was vitiating any claim that D3 was separate from the real economy and therefore not subject to real world taxes and laws. What a terrible precedent that would have made.

10 years!

Well, almost.  Next Wednesday will mark the 10th anniversary of the Terra Nova weblog.

Here's Ted's first post.  Hard to believe...

 

The Politics and Economics of Closure

Toontown is shutting its doors. (Thanks Pidge Fielder for the tip.) When gamer properties close down, the gamers rant and, understanding that no one will actually listen, move on. Toontown is a Disney property, however, filled with ordinary people. They've started numerous petitions at Change.org, a place dedicated to windmill tilting."Disney! We insist that you ignore your bottom line and do what we want instead! Or else, or else..." Or else what? You'll throw away your Mouse ears? You'll stop going to horrible movies like Planes? You'll refuse to go to theme parks that charge a million dollars for the experience of standing in two-hour lines while eating food that would kill a buffalo?

One of the petitions is targeted appropriately. It asks Jesse Schell, a developer of the world, to take it over.

If I were Jesse, I'd consider buying the property and creating a new format for the industry: The Community MMOG. Make it a corporation and sell all the shares to users. Like the Green Bay Packers. Set up by-laws to regulate affairs among shareholders. Have an annual meeting to appoint a board of managers. Running a community MMOG would be a natural stepping stone for young people who want to build their own.

It would be good for the world if old virtual worlds were sold to their users in this fashion. And if it doesn't happen, I will refuse to purchase any Jesse Schell branded merchandise, INCLUDING the bobble head, the mud flaps, and the his-and-hers towels. Who's with me?