Category Archives: Academia

Yay! Henry Jenkins is blogging!

24 June 2006

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What joy!!! Definitely a welcome presence!

Henry Jenkins is the Director of the MIT Comparative Media Studies Program and just a MUST READ!

I’ve just read his post “Fun vs. Engagement: The Case of the Great Zoombinis” where I was introduced to Scott Osterweil’s at The Education Arcade and his captivating podcast.

It’s so good to see discussions and research about learning and games beyond ‘just’ simulations. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for simulation games, but I do believe there is a clearer learning power in actual gameplay. And ofcourse this has been a topic for a long time – I guess I just understand the language so much better!

“What we did when we started designing Zoobinis was to try to think about our own experience with the mathematics of the game and try to access our own learning of it — trying to remember what it was like to encounter the subject in school or thinking about how we’d use the subject in our daily lives and try to identify times when we had been playful with the concepts in the past. In fact, most of us when we are trying to master something we find ways to be playful to it and in accessing our own playful approach to the material what we were really doing was finding the game that was inherent in the mathematics. Instead of putting math in the game, we tried to find the game in the math” – Osterweil

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Daily Show On Violent Video Games

24 June 2006

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So…there’s a lot of yoo ha in the states about violent video games and whether retailers should be forced by law to follow the ESRB’s recomendations. So pretty much what we have here in Europe – if the game’s rated 15 retailers should make sure not to sell to under 15 year olds. Now…if a grandma decides to buy an 18 rated game for her 14 year old grandson – that’s her problem. I’m so tempted to become a ludologist here – because sometimes I really do feel that the fiction of a game just provides the rules for gameplay, it’s meaning isn’t that essential when playing games. But – then I realize that I’m just saying that because I enjoy violent gameplay (although it’s been a while now!). Anyways!!!! I found this video hysterical! His new rating of “Child trapped in man’s body” is funny and the politicians are just soooo amusing as well!!!

When technology governs

20 June 2006

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Mark Wallace had a very honest and reflective post in his blog yesterday about ‘the issue of trademark, copyright and intellectual property rights in Second Life’. There seems to be a lot of trust in Linden Lab’s technology to take care of these rights – but that technology can only govern in its space, Second Life. If someone were to copy these virtual objects into another program – what happens to these issues? If then the object comes back into Second Life but modified from another program? And…well…what about when some of the virtual objects become real, without the original creator’s consent? And…oh I’m on a roll now – with virtual worlds such as Second Life, where citizens are making real money from real businesses – well, Linden Lab can’t protect the intellectual property rights of this, can they…would they?
It seems the IP rights issued for creators in Second Life are governed by technology – the ability to protect objects from being copied technolgically. But ideas and creativity go so far beyond technological restrictions, do they not?
Mr. Wallace feels that laws of the physical world should apply to the metaverse as well. And what I think is so funny in these discussions is the assumption that we’re trying to protect the rights of the little man from being stolen from the big corporational man! Or is it just me? These programs were designed to help creators – to create, to be imaginative, to be free – when we start protecting things with an iron fist of the law (real world) and screaming out “You can’t touch this, this is mine ALL MINE!” (wow – it just dawned on me why MC Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This” is so popular now days) – it tends to put a damper on creativity and freedom to express oneself. If there’s absolutely anything this whole Web 2.0 movement has taught me is that you can actually trust people to create, be thoughtful and respectful at the same time. Give them the trust and they’ll give you a lovely gift economy.
I guess I’m wondering, what’s stopping the Creative Commons being involved in Second Life? I’m actually asking here! Is there really a need to go as far as the courts to deal with this issue? And does someone really have to be sued in ‘small claims court’ in order for people’s creativity to be protected as their own?
I’m very wary of the advocation to get real world courts involved in issues concerning the metaverse, but I find Second Life a difficult issue. It’s gone so far beyond any definition of a game and the protection of ‘the magic circle’, so I really can’t say if I agree with Mr. Wallace’s post or not, I just thought I’d point it out as an interesting read! But I will concur that I don’t think we can trust technology to govern such worlds! As he so cleverly puts it:

“If the focus remains on technology as enforcer of the law, then it will eventually be (as Lawrence Lessig has pointed out) the technologists who are writing the laws. Now, I’m all for technologists, don’t get me wrong. But we didn’t elect them as legislators, did we?”

Griefers

15 June 2006

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The Guardian has a great article on griefers and the evolving community counter measures to tackle them.

I think it’s interesting how the journalist brings up 2 examples of ‘griefing’ that have caused the debate about gaming ethics (although it’s a discussion that’s been going on forever – at least since the LambdaMoo days).
The first is the EVE Online incident where a group calling themselves the Guiding Hand Social Club, cunningly infiltrated the Ubiqua Seraph corporation and basically ruined them! They worked on this for over a year! I first heard about this after watching one of the State of Play III debates, where Dr. Kjartan Pierre Emilsson brought this up as an example of how sometimes developers just have to shrug and say “Hey! It’s all part of the gameplay!”. I remember being so amused and uttering a little ‘Yay!’. The debate harrowed in the community, however.
The second example, is ofcourse when World Of Warcraft mourners (mourning the death of a real life player in WoW) were completely ambushed by a rival guild. Which was ofcourse seen as disrespectful and awful.
But these two examples are not griefing incidents, in my opinion! And we can’t start punishing players for how they’re playing the game. I mean most of these outcries are like children screaming “BUT IT’S SOOOO UNFAIR!”. It reminds me a lot about my life at the moment. I’m moaning and groaning about my thesis and my friends and family are hitting back with “For crying out loud, Linn! Will you please just get over yourself and finish the goddamn thing! Stop taking yourself so bloody seriously!” – the analogy here is me being the screaming child and my friends being the ‘griefers’! My point is….thank God for ‘griefers’!!!! Sometimes it’s good to have players come along and take the piss of those taking the game way too seriously! Which, in my opinion, doesn’t make them griefers at all!!! So what are griefers? I would call advanced players living off of stealing and hassling new players, griefers – but why? They’re still playing the game, are they not? I’m rambling here, sorry about that – it’s just that I feel we really need to define what griefing is before we start making executive decisions about who’s playing the game the right way and who’s not. I don’t believe that anyone should be punished for these two ‘griefing’ examples, but others may disagree.
So who gets to decide what griefing is and what actions are offensive enough to merit punishment? Who should decide? Game masters or democraticly organised groups? Community or an authoritative power?

I’m gonna leave you with these questions which have so often been thrust at you in this blog – and promise to come back with some reflections on what works and why tomorrow! It’s about time, right?!!

Controversy and drama

23 May 2006

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Super Columbine Massacre RPG

It’s caused a lot of controversy lately, which I suppose is only natural. It’s a game about the Columbine school shootings of 1999, and you know…it’s not pleasant. This ofcourse has raised havock! Ian Bogost at WaterCoolerGames, who is quite passionate about games with an agenda – wrote an interesting piece a few weeks ago, which has caused people like Brent Bozell, president of the Parents Television Council to call for Bogost’s resignation from Georgia Tech.I suppose that’s what upset me the most really. Personally, I haven’t played the game because it just seemed too uncomfortable, for me – I’m such a wimp, I know.

Mr. Bogost has written yet another brilliant post on the media coverage, which really needs to be read in full – I’ll cut’n’paste the summary here though:

“Most of all, I am deeply worried by this culture of ineffability, a culture that would rather not talk about anything at all for fear that it might make someone uncomfortable. This trend descends from Theodor Adorno’s argument that the holocaust becomes “transformed, with something of the horror removed” when represented in art, thus his famous statement that to write poetry after Auschwitz would be barbaric. These events are considered “ineffable” — unspeakable, unrepresentable. It is a tired sentiment that we must move beyond. Of course topics like 9/11 should make us uncomfortable. Of course Columbine should make us uncomfortable. But that is no excuse to put these issues away in a drawer, waiting for some miraculous solution to spring forth and resolve them for us. If we do so, history is much more likely to forget them. I don’t care if we make videogames, films, novels, poems, sidewalk art, cupcakes, or pelts as a way to interrogate our world. But we must not fear that world.”

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Player vs. user

10 May 2006

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Before I design some lethal weapon to kill the bird that’s franticly chirping outside my window telling me that I’m still nowhere and it’s morning – I thought I might vent out a bit in here!

Last year I had an incredibly difficult time discussing narrative with my fellow students in Games and Game Culture! They just refused to discuss with me the meaning behind the aesthetics of the worlds we were playing in. I remember someone, slightly frustrated with me, explaining to me that narrative is something that has happened. You can’t be playing narrative because narrative is story telling and you’re not telling a story. When I then (stubborn as I sometimes can be) emphasised that the whole geography we were in (Prince of Persia at the time) was basically telling us something, they usually sighed and gave me a whole song and dance that it was all code. When I then further persisted in stating that “well the game designer must have had some intention by designing this temple that I just can’t seem to get out of!” – respons: “No, Linn!!! It’s all just obstacle to reach your goal!”.

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Am I cheating if I do this?

9 May 2006

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So…I’m really into a flow of writing (expect a post on what soon) and I’m trying not to get caught up with ‘who said what and did they really say that’ glitches that often lead me astray to even more interesting reading which in the end leaves me with an even more immense sense of low selfesteem!

But along the way I keep using the phrase ‘sanbox games’ and a question popped up in my head (I’m sure if you could look inside my head you would probably only see a big shiny question mark, anyways). So I thought that I would just use this blog to put the question out there instead of using an hour to track it down and loose my ‘flow’!

Does anyone know who came up with the term ‘sandbox videogames’? I feel very strongly that it must have been Will Wright – but then again, Henry Jenkins is a strong candidate as well. So if you know who started using the term and where first – I would love a little hint in the right direction! But I seriously do feel like I’m cheating by asking and not doing the fundamental research that I should do all by myself! Oh the morals of life and the desire to do things right!! Will they ever stop tormenting me?

"…even if their world doesn’t really exist."

9 May 2006

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Clickable Culture reports on a lawsuit made against Linden Lab for “a virtual land deal gone sour”. From what I gather, Marc Bragg found some glitch in the system (bug?) of Second Life where he could buy land for under the market value. He decided to invest in this discovery and see if he could make a profit when he proceeded to sell the land for market value.

And from what I gather something suddenly happened that made him loose his Second Life account. According to Bragg, Linden Lab terminated his account “without explanation, without citing any violation of community policy, and have since refused offer a credit or a refund”.

Bragg in a statement says: “These games are like the virtual Wild West, but Linden Lab is still obligated to honor real-world contract law and consumer law, even if their world doesn’t really exist.”

Of course he’s right! Second Life has a potent market with US dollars and since they’ve issued Intellectual Property rights to their citizens – they really do have to think about real life contract and consumer law. Second Life very much exists then, if you ask me. But by what laws should they adhere to? Don’t get me wrong, I love what Second Life has done! But with it comes some democratic responsibility and not dictatorial rule. I’m no lawyer, so I’m not sure – and to be honest, lawsuits like this kinda scare me for what’s going happen in the future. I, for one, don’t want too much reality in virtual worlds although it is exciting to see it evolving, it’s like a whole new society being born – and that is fun!

I find it really suprising if Linden Lab truely has behaved in this manner. They must have been prepared for this happening somehow, haven’t they? And I’m sure they’re within their rights of punishing those who take advantages of bugs for profit (after all, we’re not talking about a game here, we’re talking about reality) – but to just cut him off with no reason, no explanation and furthermore no dialogue! I’m sure they could have worked something out, somehow and learned from this ‘glitch’! So…I’m not sure if this is really the way it all went down – I’m looking forward to hearing Linden Lab’s response!

Public Diplomacy Through Games

7 May 2006

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The University of Southern California has come up with the novel idea of hosting a competition to create a game promoting public diplomacy. I’ve been eagerly awaiting the results for months now!

“The USC Center on Public Diplomacy is looking for people to showcase their talent with a bit of world class game-making. The challenge to the game mod community, and current and aspiring game designers is as follows: design a prototype or modify a game incorporating the fundamental characteristics of public diplomacy”

The finalists’ presenations are now available and the winner is to be announced today.

Looking at these, I was searching for something creative and fun. As much as I adore and admire simulations such as Peacemaker – I was hoping something less ‘obvious’ would make the finalist list as well. I’ve often thought that the trick to learning in computer games is to hide the ‘message’ behind humor and absurdity. For a game to be truely successful in teaching something like the promotion of diplomacy, I feel it has to lure those who just want to go and have a great gaming time as well. I know of very few who play to learn something and having played my fair share of dreary simulation games for the jobs from my past (I’ll have to tell you about those some day! ) they usually don’t work (at least I can’t remember what I was supposed to learn).

I truely love the idea behind Hydro Hijinks, it actually made me think about Myst and the game of consequence.

The others are brilliant as well! Ambitious but lovely! I would however, love to see more fun and absurdity!

Anyways it’s a great initiative and a big ‘yay!’ to Second Life for making them all possible!

Using my blog as a resource

2 May 2006

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I’m not going to be blogging much this month as it is serious crunch time (urgh…who am I kidding? The summer’s gonna disappear into this thing!) I keep encountering problems! Such as I’ve eagerly avoided anything to do with story, narrative and fiction in games – specially MMORPGs. I’ve enjoyed reading about it and discussing the topic, but I’ve avoided having to dig deep into it – I’ve only skimmed the surface. But I keep coming back to the notion that MMORPG players are co-authors in the games they play! The fiction is the law – geography and rules. And well, I can’t seem to shake it off! So as well as looking at labour theory – I thought I might dip into some narratology (well…at least I’m enjoying it!!!).

But here I am ‘speaking’ my mind again, without thinking through what impression an unknown reader can get from reading this blogpost – so let me stop my trail of thought right there – and come back when I actually know what I’m ‘talking’ about (ha ha ha ha ha ha ha)!

Anyways! I was just going to slap in a little fact about rl killing in China because of a vl theft of a sword in my thesis and I knew I had blogged about it ages ago so I thought I would dig it up and find the link to a ‘true and believable’ source, so I could actually use this little fact! Ofcourse the links were dead! Typical! So what to do?! A lot of digging to find a reliable source, infact and it’s REALLY annoying when you know you’ve already found it once! Really annoying!!!! So I’ve started to wonder…maybe I should bring Dekcuf with me into my thesis! Oh…even better…when I hand it in it will say “By Linn Søvig and Dekcuf” – oh wouldn’t that be great!!! But I’m sure there’s some way I can do this, can’t I? All the stuff I’ve already blogged about I can reference my online personality, Dekcuf! She’s reliable enough for the university isn’t it? If Dekcuf says it’s so – it must be so!!! He he! I know, I know! I just became so fond of the idea! Not because I would be referencing myself (although that would be sooooo cool as well), but because I also feel it demonstrates Dekcuf as her own online personality. But ofcourse – if I could just reference to this blog it would be a hell of a lot easier for me – and as you all know I am lazy!
On a side note, however, I started to seriously doubt that this murder had ever taken place! That it must have been some blogger who made the story up, because blogs were all I could find! And that has to say a lot about the web, truth, reality and time!!!