Posit the second: When a virtual good is destroyed, so is its value.

Demonstration: This video, from the MMORPG EVE Online, depicts the destruction of approximately US$15,000 worth of virtual goods.

Via Kotaku

…While supporting the overall goal of interoperability, this paper provides a cautionary note. It argues that the value of standards is contextually based. Thus, for example, while interoperability may be highly valuable in a purely economic/commercial context, it might, in fact, engender some unintended, negative consequences in the political and cultural realms. On this basis, the paper contends that, as standards efforts become increasingly focused on the upper layers of the Internet, care should be taken to assure that appropriate metrics be adopted to determine the costs and benefits of these standards with respect to other realms of life.

We argue that such faith in the predictable outcomes of standards betrays a tendency both to think of virtual worlds as the intentional outcome of rational design, as well as to misapprehend the roles of diversity and play in discrete environments.

Employing an interdisciplinary approach, this paper takes a first step in exploring these issues. Focusing on the highest-level applications in particular, it examines current efforts to create standards across virtual worlds, using material from the MPEG-V working group as a case study. Advocates for these standards foresee clear economic benefits for producers and maintainers of virtual worlds, as well as for their inhabitants (Sivan 2008). We argue that such faith in the predictable outcomes of standards betrays a tendency both to think of virtual worlds as the intentional outcome of rational design, as well as to misapprehend the roles of diversity and play in discrete environments. We question this narrow economic perspective. Arguing that a metaverse — like all worlds — is highly complex, we contend that virtual world standards — ranging from EULAs to the software code itself — can only beget unpredictable outcomes, which will not only affect relationships between worlds, but inevitably within communities. To identify the costs and benefits of standards in these complex environments, all of these relationships must be considered (Steinkuehler, 2004). As importantly, we argue that virtual diversity, like biological variety, is inherently beneficial to users of synthetic worlds. To realize the benefits of what Sutton-Smith (1997) calls “the potentiation of adaptive variability,” we contend that what is needed is not standards across virtual worlds but rather a broad diversity of synthetic, discrete ecosystems.

To make our case, we proceed as follows. First, we characterize standards and describe their role in society from the perspective of complex adaptive systems. Second, we look at how — from an historical perspective — formal standards and standard setting has evolved, emphasizing their link to the ascent of technological artifacts with the consequence that standards development concerns have generally been skewed towards relatively narrow economic criteria such as cost, competitiveness, and efficiency. Next, focusing on the case of MPEG-V, we show how this trend is being replicated today with respect to the development of standards for virtual worlds. This, we conclude, is an alarming trend, which could give rise to a number of unfortunate and unforeseen consequences. To make this point, we look at the unique (some might say sacred) role of games in the realm of culture, which allow mankind to both generate and adapt to a changing environment. We conclude that designing play environments, based solely on economic criteria, might seriously undermine the innovative and adaptive role of play as well as the evolution of diverse cultures..

Guilds are like that. But in this case, typographical idiosyncrasies aside, it’s been a rewarding adventure so far, and I’ve learned a lot from it. Take, for instance, the character of in-game guild text chat. Outside of a guild, the chat channels in WoW are full of snarky, silly chatter. In my guild, at least, chat is (1) constant, (2) situated both within and without the “reality” of the game, and (3) unfailingly supportive.

Level up? “Congrats” pour in from all around. New achievement? “wtg.” Getting camped by some level 20s? “I’m on my way.” Once you’ve played WoW in this fashion, going back to solo seems an unappealing option.

Here’s how they describe the Regolith Grinder (aka “The Taurus”):

“Contructed from an advanced smelting process and lunar factory, it is a general-purpose vehicle with a plow option.”

Maybe things are more exciting over near the Moonbase?

“The centre of operations for Moonbase Alpha, this inflatable, reinforced structure is the core. Look at the scale of the extensible walkway system!”

Nothing says “I can’t wait to play this” like “extensible walkway system.”

“Social Drivers for Organizing Networks in Communities” appeared as part of a panel called “Analyzing Virtual Worlds: Next Step in the Evolution of Social Science Research.”

The findings are interesting. According to VWNews:

A group of researchers recently took a look at social habits inside the MMOG Everquest II. Their findings show that players tend to associate with others from their nearby geographical community. Obviously, gameplay heavy MMOGs like Everquest attract a different user than more open-ended or social worlds like Second Life or Habbo, but habits like that could present a challenge to creating international, large-scale communities in virtual worlds.

“People end up playing with people nearby, often with people they already know,” social scientist and engineer Noshir Contracto said in a statement. “It’s not creating new networks. It’s reinforcing existing networks. You can talk to anyone anywhere, and yet individuals 10 kilometers away from each other are five times more likely to be partners than those who are 100 kilometers away from each other.”

Via Virtual Worlds News, “Research Shows Worldwide MMOGs Not Very Cosmopolitan”

WoW’s two factions are the Alliance and the Horde: Your standard Human / Elf / Dwarf power trio pitted against the Orcs, the Trolls, and the Walking Dead. But whereas Tolkien and others in the literary tradition clearly see this as a contest between good and evil (and even Good and Evil), WoW equivocates. Good, yes: Alliance characters (human, anyway) make frequent reference to light and righteousness. But Evil, not so much: Horde characters include the Undead and spells make frequent use of demons and imps. But these are not malevolent. Sometimes they are “bad,” and frequently merely “different.”

Indeed, the idea of the Horde as some overwhelming, ubiquitous evil is frequently skewered. On one recent outing, for example, a horrifying giant ogre asked me to help him fetch “gloom weeds” for an zombie apothecary who had built him with leftovers from the graveyard. After a considerable effort, I brought the gloom weed to the frightening skeletal pharmacist, who complained, loudly, that he wanted “doom weed, not gloom weed.”

There is no evil here. The Horde is just like the Alliance, except the Horde’s narratives are infused with irony and humor.

For December, among American gamers who play Warcraft, Nielsen finds it played on average over 11 hours / week.

Years ago, I was a “Nielsen family.” The unwieldy set-top box, hard-wired into the TV and the Cable Box, was a mysterious, exciting presence, and leant an air of authority to my cable TV watching choices (however dubious they seemed to girlfriends at the time).

I don’t own a TV now, but do have several game consoles and a WoW account. It seems that since the mid-90′s, Nielsen and I both have changed. Now, Nielsen tracks games: mobile, console, and PC. And, according to the latest data, World of Warcraft continues to be the most popular PC game title in the US.

For October 2008 specifically, WoW netted a 12.509 share, and was played (among people who play PC games) an average of just over 9 hours / week. [As in TV, a "share" is a percentage of total audience: Thus, 12.5 gamers out of 100 were playing WoW in October.]

Nielsen also estimates the Total Minutes Played (out of all PC games measured): WoW here earned a 62.280%.

For December, among American gamers who play Warcraft, Nielsen finds it played on average over 11 hours / week.

It is interesting to speculate about how many “PC Gamers” there are in the US. While they provide no specific definition of “PC Gamer” in this press release, Pew has noted that upwards of 53% of American adults play at spend some time playing computer games.

According to Nielsen, 0.723% of “PC Gamers” are playing Warcraft during any given minute.

Subscriptions and virtual-world populations are a frequent topic of discussion in game studies, but the facts are notoriously hard to come by, since population density — often perceived as an index of popularity — is a selling point, and therefore subject to spin. Blizzard is generally regarded as one of the most forthcoming and transparent of the online gaming services, as their definition of “subscriber” refers clearly to members who pay a monthly fee:

World of Warcraft subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access. Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days are also counted as subscribers. The above definition excludes all players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, and expired prepaid cards. Subscribers in licensees’ territories are defined along the same rules.

This differs substantially from online services like Second Life or MMORPG competitors like Atlantica (which calls itself “#1 ranked”): While SL and Atlantica boast many million “subscribers,” their definition of a subscriber includes those who sign up for free (and may never even have subsequently returned to the site). Blizzard’s pricey subscription may be the source of much complaint, but that cost guarantees the relative equivalence of subscriber base and shard population.

I’d like to research this further, but for the moment, the math on WoW is sufficiently interesting. If, as of Dec 28, 2008, there are 11.5 million subscribers, and approximately 236 known shards (“realms” or game instances, probably equivalent to physical servers), then there is a mean of roughly 48,700 subscribers per server. One difficulty with this number: I’ve no way of knowing how many avatars each subscriber maintains: I have 3 characters on Thrall, 2 on Crushridge, and 2 on The Underbog; based on anecdotal evidence, I doubt that my arrangement is atypical. Consequently, that 48.7k subscribers/shard mean fails to reflect the reality of individuals who play across several servers.

This afternoon, in Darnassus, I ran across some NPCs flirting with one another in a corner of the local inn. Their clothing — pointy felt caps and cotton-trimmed smocks in bright red and green — is utterly out-of-place here, but the significance is clear, nonetheless: It is a Christmas card from Warcraft‘s developers to the players. Later, in the dwarven keep, I met some shady NPCs hawking cheeselogs from “Smokeywood Hollows.” If you have ever grappled with a salesperson from Pepperidge Farms during the holidays, you cannot help but smile.

Part of gaming is reading playfully: It is how we learn to unfold the screen’s codex. In the end, I am attracted to these Christmas card not because of what they do, but what they do not do: They do not spoil the game. Smokeywood Hollows and the flirty elves demonstrate the limitations of a faith in the “willing suspension of disbelief” model of immersion in synthetic worlds.