Maria Bäcke Defense

Power Games:Rules and Roles in Online Worlds

------Maria Bäcke

Blekinge Institute of Technologymaria.backe@bth.se

May 27, 2011

Opponent: RobinTeiglandStockholm School of Economicsrobin.teigland@hhs.se

Who is Maria?

Here comes the “Immersive Internet”

O’Driscoll 2009

4

VWs moving out of “Gartner hype cycle” trough

Virtual worlds today

http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=1447613

>1 bln usersMay 2006

July 2007

> 560 mln VW users under age 15

http://www.slideshare.net/nicmitham/kzero-radar-q1-2011?from=ss_embed

…..we’re all on Facebook 24/7. But if I ask my 10 year old cousin, who

is addicted to Stardoll, she does not see why I like Facebook so

much since I can only read what other people send me. For her it is just natural for all of her friends to

be moving around the Stardoll website.

- Masters Student at Stockholm School of

Economics

Drivers of changeIn

crease

dIn

tera

ctivity

DiGangi 2010

Research Purpose

“My aim is to understand role-play in a digital realm in a new way, in which two modes of performance, dramatic and social, take place in a digital context online.”

Research Purpose

“My aim is to understand role-play in a digital realm in a new way, in which two modes of performance, dramatic and social, take place in a digital context online.”

But how would you explain this

to your grandmother?

Make-believe

Make-belief

Vs.

Make-believ

e

Make-belief

My strategy course at SSE

Make-believe or make-belief?

Definitions

What is power?

What are trajectories of power?

Assumptions?

Role-players need to feel emotionally safe so need rules

Rules enable magic circle boundary of make-believe vs make-belief dichotomy

Role-playing communities need to be administered and maintained through rules and rule enforcement

Power is influential in this process

Assumptions?

Role-players need to feel emotionally safe so need rules

Rules enable magic circle boundary of make-believe vs make-belief dichotomy

Role-playing communities need to be administered and maintained through rules and rule enforcement

Power is influential in this processWhat do we already know?

- Offline settings- Online communities

- Identity

Why Second Life?

Why not other virtual worlds with

communities, e.g., EveOnline, World of Warcraft, Entropia

Universe?

Why/how did you choose these

four?

Nekos Caledon

Midian Gor

Data collection

Can you fill in the empty boxes?

How did being/performing a

Neko influence your data collection?

What are your research

questions?

Research questions

What is the level of analysis?−Individual?−Interplay between individuals?−Role-playing community?

What is the focus of analysis?−Make-belief vs make-believe within individual?−Online vs offline identity?−Interplay between individuals in community?−Interplay between leader and community?−Interplay between community and LL?

Discussions

Neko−What is a Neko? Japanese Neko vs. western Neko, Sexy Neko, Herding Nekos

Midian −What should role-play be like? Sim managers. Who

decides?Gor

−Is Gor Philosophy fantasy role-play or example to live by? What happens to those who get caught in mixing of fantasy and reality?

Caledon −What should Second Life be like? Are we going to stay on this platform? Situation for programmers/scriptors and content creators

Approaches to play - Schechner

Structure− Relationships among events within play act, each act consists of sub

acts, distinct behaviour units make up coherent whole, i.e. gameplay gestalt

Process− How play acts are generated and what are their phases of

development

Experience− What are the feelings and moods of the players and observers?

How do these affect playing? What are different experiences? How do they change over time? How is it “good” or not?

Function− What purpose do play acts serve? How do they affect learning,

growth, creativity, aggression, values, or other “uses” of play.

Adapted from emma.westecott@newport.ac.uk

CONCLUSION

Make-Believe and Make-Belief Performances

− Linden Lab decisions affect four role-play communities in various ways

− Performative utopias — the exit argument: ”if you don’t agree, please leave”

− Creating fiction — sustaining boundary between make-believe and make-belief, in character and out of character, dramatized and social

− Power and performance — constructions of gender and hierarchy, creating “reality” of your choice, virtual becoming actual

− Performative layers — social and dramatic role-play on different levels, online as well as offline, online make-belief social sphere where negotiations of power take place

CONCLUSION

Make-Believe and Make-Belief Performances

− Linden Lab decisions affect four role-play communities in various ways

− Performative utopias — the exit argument: ”if you don’t agree, please leave”

− Creating fiction — sustaining boundary between make-believe and make-belief, in character and out of character, dramatized and social

− Power and performance — constructions of gender and hierarchy, creating “reality” of your choice, virtual becoming actual

− Performative layers — social and dramatic role-play on different levels, online as well as offline, online make-belief social sphere where negotiations of power take placeGeneralizability?

Causality?

?A B

Tension?

?A B

Comparing communities

Is there a pattern?

Comparing goals for actors/role-playing

Individualism

Collectivism

Hobby:

“Live to

play”

Serious:

“Play to live”

Leaders

Challengers/learners

Socializers

Explorers

Play as performance

the performance

the “game”

the actor & audience

Adapted from emma.westecott@newport.ac.uk

Dynamics of role-playing communities

the performance

the “game”

the actor & audience

Exploring the tensions

the performance

the “game”

the actor & audience

When does the “game” start/stop?

Goal conflict

Value conflict

Rule conflict

What do your findings mean…..

Methodologically−For cyber-ethnographers?

Theoretically−For performance studies?−For game studies−For community studies?−For other studies?

Practically−For role-playing community leaders?−For platform providers, eg Linden Lab?

What do we know now that we did not know

before?

My CV• Leading a virtual team of 30

individuals from across the globe

• Creating and successfully executing strategies under

pressure• Managing cross-cultural conflict

without face-to-face communication

Building skills in virtual environments

Practicing international entrepreneurship

http://www.industrialgaming.no/Program-EpisodeIV.html

Welch et al 2010

Merck’s Global R&D

NVWN Monthly Project Meeting

http://freshtakes.typepad.com/sl_communicators/2006/09/

ibms_second_lif.html

Virtual collaboration

ProViWo: Professional Collaboration and Productivity in Virtual Worlds,

http://vmwork.net/proviwo/

HP rolls out virtual banking with Avaya’s Web.alive

http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2011/04/hp-rolls-out-virtual-banking-with-avayas-web-alive/

“Clearly, if social activity migrates to synthetic worlds, economic activity will go

there as well.” Castranova, 2006

http://www.flickr.com/photos/rodenberger/5085364909/in/pool-popartlab/#/photos/rodenberger/5085364909/in/pool-1240578@N23/

US $3 bln in virtual good sales in 2009 to grow to US $12 bln in

2012

US$ 635,000 for an asteroid!

http://blogs.forbes.com/oliverchiang/2010/11/13/meet-the-man-who-just-made-a-cool-half-million-from-the-sale-of-virtual-property/

• US$ 500,000 profit in 5 years by Jon “Neverdie”

Jacobs• Entropia Universe with GDP

>US$ 440 mln

From the mobility of goods to the mobility of financial capital to …

Teigland, JVWR, 2010

...the “mobility” of labor?

Summary

Research area and questions−Very timely and relevant research area!−Interesting research question

Literature−Performance studies as insightful lens

Method−Daring to explore cyber-ethnography

Findings−Fascinating insights!!−Implications for many areas

Summary

Research area and questions−Very timely and relevant research area!−Interesting research purpose

Literature−Performance studies as insightful lens

Method−Daring to explore cyber-ethnography

Findings−Fascinating insights!!−Implications for many areas

Thank you!!

I enjoyed this!!

Karinda Rhode

aka Robin Teiglandrobin.teigland@hhs.se

www.knowledgenetworking.org

www.slideshare.net/eteigland

www.nordicworlds.net RobinTeigland

Photo: Lindholm, Metro

Photo: Nordenskiöld

Photo: Lindqvist

“We ain’t seen nothin’ yet!”

Lessig on regulating behavior

Laws – dictated by external regulatorsNorms – accepted behaviors - internal

regulatorsMarket – business model Architecture/code - protocols

Future implications

What will happen as VWs become more and more realistic?

Neko

Within individual−Enables more aspects of personality to emerge IC−OCC learnings impact IC behavior (Villota)

Between individuals −Power is distributed

Midian City – Interplay between rules and role-play

Within individual−IC skills enable OCC development, eg Steele’s

management training

Between individuals −Power is centralized. How was new leadership

structure developed?−Similar to growth of a firm – more routines,

procedures

Gor

Interplay between sl and outside of sl

Open source VW platforms

Virtual Worlds on Demand

www.kitely.com

Increasing pace of VW/3Di development!

VWs on stick

Browser-based VWs/hyperlinked

3D

Seamlessness between VWs

http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2009/05/hypergrid-101-why-its-good-for-business/http://mediagrid.org/groups/technology/OFF.TWG/

"Create Once, Experience

Everywhere” Expanding uses

For smart phones and tablet PCs