Edward Castronova (2005). Synthetic Worlds. Chicago: The Chicago University Press
- Economista, Castronova analisa o impacto do emergente campo dos mundos virtuais. Observa três tipos – fps, que considera limitados no âmbito e experiência (jogadores matam e são mortos), sociais e MMORPGs. É neste terceiro tipo que Castronova centra as suas observações, claramente fascinado pelas potencialidades sociais e económicas do ambiente de jogo. Aborda impactos pessoais, sociais, legais e éticos. Analisa a fundo a realidade financeira das economias virtuais das terras de fantasia.
Castronova é um defensor entusiasta dos mundos virtuais, antevendo um maior papel destes espaços nas sociedades futuras. No final do livro acaba por reconhecer o potencial social e económico de espaços sociais como o Second Life e ensaia uma análise curiosa à eterna promessa da realidade virtual, cuja conceptualização científica continua longe dos potenciais utilizadores, mas cuja promessa está a ser realizada pelos ambientes de jogo e virtuais 3D.
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The thesis of the book is that the synthetic worlds now emerging from the computer game industry, these playgrounds of the imagination, are becoming an important host of ordinary human affairs. There is much more than gaming going on there: conflict, governance, trade, love. The number of people who could be said to “live” out there in cyberspace is already numbering in the millions;
it is growing; and we are already beginning to see subtle and not-so-subtle effects of this behavior at the societal level in real Earth countries. (p: 15)
But the virtual reality I am talking about has emerged independently of that program; it grew out of the game industry, without any influence from the scientists. Game developers had been exposed to the same basic ideas of virtual reality that everyone else had—Gibson’s Neuromancer (1984),Vernor Vinge’s True Names (1981), and so on—but they took them in a completely different direction. The difference was this: the science program focused on sensory-input hardware, while the gamers focused on mentally and emotionally engaging software. (p:18)
Next, you will see a “Code of Conduct” (CoC) or “Terms of Service” (ToS) agreement (sometimes folded into the EULA). You will probably see this regardless of whether the world is owned or open-source, because this document explains that you are entering the world with other people, and that you have to control your behavior or you might be kicked out. If you call people “nigger” or pressure them for kinky sex, and you get caught, you can be banned from the world forever, with no compensation. And of course there’s no doubting that you should be banned for these things—just because it is a synthetic world, and not the Earth, does not mean that the notion of moral choice has vanished. (p:44)
As this growth continued, games began to garner more attention from scholars. In the humanities, a new field of “Ludology” has appeared which claims that games are a unique form of cultural expression; opponents of this new school argue that games are an extension of existing artistic forms (Aarseth 1997; Juul 2001;Murray 1997). (p:70)
Looking first at the synthetic side of the competition of the worlds, we have to recognize that virtual worlds are malleable enough that almost anything could be built there. Given time and technology, in other words, we can assume that anyone who wants a certain kind of fantasy world will probably find it being provided sooner or later; (p:88)
place. One reason, I suspect, is because accurate detail is not the ultimate objective of any work of art (any good one, at least). (p:100)
Social worlds are usually built to a large scale and the emphasis is exactly the opposite of the small-scale FPS worlds: rather than join the world, fight, die, and join again, in social worlds the pattern is to join the world and just hang out. Players might spend their time building new things—a house, some object—or in more or less peaceful pursuits, like racing a car or exploring the terrain. Primarily, however, the world exists as a place for people to meet other people and talk to them. (p:104)
With no danger, no lore, and no missions or objectives, social worlds don’t seem to have any game elements at all, unless users make them. (p:118)
the term virtual is losing its meaning. Perhaps it never had meaning. The things happening online have always been literal human things; there was never anything metaphorical, as-if, or subjunctive about them. At first it may have been convenient in many ways to think of networked human interaction as only a model of the real thing. Now, however, and specifically in the arena of synthetic worlds, the allegedly “virtual” is blending so smoothly into the allegedly “real” as to make the distinction increasingly difficult to see.2 There’s nothing revolutionary in this, though. It is merely a recognition that these things were always as real as anything else in the human culturesphere. (p:161)
On the other hand, this is an odd despotism, and one that might be quite benevolent. After all, this despot is in intense competition with other despots for your entertainment dollar. Being a nasty despot rather than a benevolent one will cause the citizens to move away eventually. Thus, because they pay a subscription fee voluntarily, the people do have some power, perhaps more power than an individual vote gives them. For the tyrant, losing citizens means losing revenue. Perhaps, then, this is the best possible form of government: a highly efficient despotic regime that, thanks to competition with other despotic regimes, does its best to provide legitimate services for the people. (p:221)
Thus, from my perspective as a long-time player, not despotism but anarchy seems to be the de facto form of government in synthetic worlds. No one is in charge. If there is order, it is spontaneously generated by the player community. If the community of players does not spontaneously generate and enforce a norm for or against some behavior, it goes unregulated. And in my experience, quite a lot of bad behavior is unregulated, far more than on Earth. Indeed, it often seems that anything that people can get away with, they do. (p:222)
The lesson is that the army must fight where the war is, and the war will go where the people are. In 1814, everybody was on foot. In 1914, they were on trains. In 1940, they were in cars. In 2040, they will be in avatars. The battlespace will shift accordingly. (p:243)
Now that we have this technology, we have the ability to build societies under any physical conditions we wish. Through artful deployment of code, we can structure social, economic, and political institutions to meet specific standards. This opens wide possibilities for teaching and training applications. Throw in sufficient and effective AI, and each person can relive any history whatsoever, and shape that history from any vantage point. Anyone can try her hand at building a
church, an empire, or a business. Anyone can learn how to run a city. Anyone can experience a life of solitude in an empty wilderness. And all of this learning can happen at a distance, from any spot where the Internet is accessible. Synthetic worlds are also methodologically superior teaching and training tools (see Steinkuehler 2004).Much of learning requires immersion, and immersion is what
virtual worlds do. (p:265)
Besides interpersonal connection, synthetic worlds offer other good things. First, take note that in synthetic worlds, we do not get a body, we pick one. Therefore, our bodies will generally be just what we want them to be. Imagine the broad impact on human society of a world in which body appearance was completely fungible. Erase, at a stroke, every contribution to human inequality that
stems from body differences. Skin color, weight, height, perceived beauty—all gone. (p:271)
It is a terribly damaging testimony for the state of relationships on the Earth, but it may well be
the case that people enjoy synthetic worlds because AI is doing a better job of bonding with them than humans are. (p:288)
The technology behind today’s immersive 3D gaming worlds was invented in 1991—the same year as Rheingold’s Virtual Reality— by a then unknown programmer, John Carmack, who was working at a tiny game wholesaler in Louisiana at the time. (p:303)
