I keep trying to grasp the advent, depth and nature of the massive multi-player on line roal playing games (mmorpg), such as World of Warcraft, and in many ways Second Life. In trying to do so I tend to see at the hart of these games, as virtual worlds, more or less defined by the rules and conditions of the game. Now this is not a ground breaking realisation but, its the seeded conditions of these games, the rules (if only very loose), technical limitations, objectives ex-cetera, that lead me to think of the games as social experiments. Perhaps with these kinds of systems, we can start to reveal how humans behave, interact, and analyse what players try to achieve as a result of the rules and limitations of the game. Far from a Newtonian universe these games often lead to surprising, unpredictable behaviour –– such as Chinese firms hiring players to mine and resell for a profit, virtual gold, the currency of the game World of Warcraft.This post is in part a response to Ellie Harrison's earlier entry In a world without consequences which reminded me of ideas we'd included in our early discussions (found in the post "Almost twenty questions"). Ellie in her project ran up against a wall I'll call 'negative-motivation' in her persuit of radical extremism in SL, stating "there is no pressing need to change the status quo". And I thought to myself, and agreed, sure Second Life seems to be Utopic. But what was the nature of that void she ran into? - was it really there? -- surely an urge subvert, manipulate, even to overthrow "the system" is rather pervasive? Perhaps the conditions those urges needed to manifest had been omitted from the game? Or perhaps those urges had just morphed into something else and we were looking in the wrong place? What was the nature of that urge in the first place?
If thought about as a social experiment, I begin to see all games of these types as huge systems where the results of peoples behaivior are a combination of the rules of the game and our own humanity. Of course as soon as we start talking about systems I begin to wonder about the rules that govern them –– and what light might the laws that govern other systems suggest about our behaviour in SL? How about the Second Law of Thermodynamics for example?
Now I'm not an expert in systems or thermodynamics, so please forgive me if it seems I'm engaging in a bit of low level sophistry –– but I cant help but try it on for size and see if there's something to be gained in this thought experiment, even if its faulty.
The laws of thermodynamics talk about closed versus open systems. A loop of pipe that closes back in on it self could be a closed system. A hot area of water, or a concentration of salt in one area of this closed system would eventually equalise itself with all areas with in the system. That behavior is known as entropy, and its describes the phenomenon of a cup of salt and a cup of pepper to become inextricably mixed in a bag. Its the force of randomisation which mixes things back into their lowest energy state - stasis. It's entropy, among other forces which omits the possibility of perpetual motion machines and the like.
With an open system, instead of a loop one might consider a river with many streams feeding in on it. This is just a matter of perspective of course –– step back 600 kilometres into space and the Earth begins to look like one massive closed system, but then we'd be forgetting the influence of the massive burning star behind us, feeding energy into the earth. One can step back and repeat this process –– ad infinitum. As near as I can tell the concept of a truly closed system is just that - a concept.
But we're talking about social experiment here and as a tool to look at how people behave and interact, I find Second Life is a compelling example. But honestly it didn't take the advent of Second Life to put the tools of free and accessible social experimentation into the hands of the masses - A form of these has been around since the paleolithic period –– storytelling. Storytelling has been the tool of choice for conveying information too complex to be passed from generation to generation by biologic methods like DNA. Think morality tales - short 'what-if' scenarios passed from parent to child that put you mentally in a situation where A] the protagonist (potentially you) is screwed by their own doing and B] their chances for survival or finding a mate are especially slim. "You don't want to end up like that person do you Son?"
Stories, especially fiction, but most especially science fiction (i.m.h.o.), excel as a kind of complex thought experiment. As readers we are swept into the framework of the story and world is made real for us. The more true and plausible the author's leaps of reason, the more we can begin to believe, even empathise with the characters and their impossible circumstances. If the secinaro or rather the character's reactions are too far fetched, alarm bells go off in the reader's mind - and we start to question the whole premise. The author has stumbled against a limitation in either his or her own craft - or perhaps the limits of what we socially and inheriently believe to be human nature. To me it also seems, in these fictions, there lies a potenttial to expand our concepts of who we are as people. The more we suspend our disbelief, the more we accept the currency of the narrative, and in that exchange, what is possible for us as individuals, and as culture in real life –– expand ever so slightly.
There has been a lot of writing arround these areas, specifically the possibilities of narrative within new digital environments. One notable is Marie-Laure Ryan and her book Narrative as Virtual Reality: Immersion and Interactivity in Literature and Electronic Media. Here Ryan among other things draws comparison between our imagination and its ability to visualise the world constructed in a work of fiction, and the digital worlds of these massive an immersive games, among others thing. Suffice it to say, narrative delivered on printed pages of book, is a static system - closed yes like our thermodynamic closed system before, but they are more then just 'closed'. There is in most cases no movement possible within it these narratives. The story remains as the author has written it, and we though can bring new insights and understanding to it, generally we cannot change it. There exists social structures to prevent such changes as well. For examplethe more sacred the text, the greater the effort to preserve its authenticity over time - ie protect it from the forces of entropy. Copyright laws are also created to preserve the status and authority of the mortal author as well.
As Ellie discovered in the process of her own work - there is apparently little to rebel against in Second Life. It seems that radical extremism is rendered impotent in the face of Utopia. Everyone has whatever they want and there are few real consequences. Wait, no consequences? Well on a scale, relatively minor. If a player gets expelled for bad behaviour, he or she can generally create a new avatar, a new character and be more careful about getting caught in the future. There are examples of characters permanently ban from games, forfeiting significant amounts of invested time and intellectual property, they are uncommon and so this is as close to mortal peril as one can get. Also the greatest damage one can generally inflict is on 'property' and though there may be a modicum of embarrassment, the time it takes to rebuild and restore virtual property back to its original state, is generally quiet short. So given all this, as Ellie discovered, the efforts to rebel seem to fail pathetically or apathetically. Perhaps its a world without that particular friction, a world that resists that particular plot.
Someone famous once said "put a gun into a plot and its got be used...." I'd love to know who that famous person was. . .
Apathy is what happens when people give up, no one cares. To me it seems the onset of decay, and apathy cuts two ways. The inherent of lack of concern over impotent terrorism, is equal to the inherent lack of interest in what anybody is doing as well. This can be seen an increased commentary in some journalism on Second Life which observes how little in going on in many areas of Second Life - where once there seemed a hum of activity. In our game as system analogy, and taking from the Second Law of Thermodynamics, we would immediately suspect this might be seen as evidence of the forces of entropy. But what happens if apathy grows a spine, gets some brass knockers, gets (quasi) organized - and wants to show off? Well I believe its been around since Second Life's inception, and its called greifing.
The Patriotic Nigras (PN) are perhaps one of the best known example of successful anti-establishment popular movements within Second Life. Their motto? "Ruining Your Second Life since 2006". The group's attacks are known as 'griefing', the practice of being a nuisance and general annoyance by creating disturbances that run counter to the rules of the game environment. And it just so happens that greifing is one of causes I've often see listed for the decline of Second Life's popularity.
In general greifing attacks do not cause any lasting damage, though there have been exceptions - for example there was an instance of a viral, self-replicating object which shut down the entire network of Second Life servers in 2005 (see gray goo link below). But this was more a prank - or a scripting experiment which was way more successful then anticipated then a forceful attack and safeguards to prevent such objects have been put in place.
As we've mentioned, in Second Life there are no rules per-say, so any event staged that deliberately inhibits the experience of others tends to fall under this blanket category. To my mind greifing is delightfully close to Dada, Fluxsist, Surrealist and absurdist concepts of intervention, performance, happenings etc. At the same time however greifing tactics also remind me of a playground bully named Biff –– mean, ugly and with an inferiority complex the size of truck.
Highly technically accomplished, the PN have developed an independent version, several generations in development, of the Second Life client software called Thuglyfe. The Thuglyfe client sidesteps the hardware & software measures implemented by Lindin Labs to deter griefing, as well as introducing several genuine innovations to their user community. The Patriotic Nigras websits acts as an active community portal and bulletin board and the PN's wiki is very much the Second Life equivalent to the Anarchist's Cookbook / terrorist training camp all rolled into one. The Wiki offers anyone, n00bs (new users) included, complete weapons, techniques, scripts, and community discussions on methods the tools for griefing. How many government agencies are/aught to be paying attention to this? The mind boggles –– Biff just got his hands on a cannon.
Looking at The Patriotic Nigras' attacks they seem generally uncoordinated and lack the political ambitions, at least ones you might attribute to groups like The Weathermen, circa 1960 United States, which had overt revolutionary objectives. That said, elements within the group have a tendency to target the Lindens (employees of Lindin Labs, the creators of Second Life) and have taken responsibility for highly public griefing attacks on virtual representations of real-world entities, such as corporations and politicians –– including the virtual encampment of Democrat US Presidential hopeful, Jonathan Edwards in 2007. Here the group defaced virtual buildings with virtual poo, graffiti and generally inflammatory images, all the while their invading avatars waved BUSH'08 propaganda. The group claims the attack wasn't politically driven - more for the kicks - just because they could.
In reflection the event seems sort of a reverse wammy - deface the extreme Right wing conservative Republicans by posing as rabid versions of the same Republicans defacing a liberal Democratic candidate - perversely genius?
These kinds of attacks generally seem to be the exception rather then the rule. Looking through their material you'll notice that they are aggressively anti 'politically correct' with sardonic slurs peppered though out their online material and its this sardonic spirit which most embodies and emboldens their actions. Even the group's name tap-dances on racial sensitivities, and their attacks are flamboyantly posted on youtube.com as videos scored to catchy music. These films seem to be more gleefully irreverent then genuinely hateful and a quick search for them on youtube.com comes up with almost two hundred videos documenting attacks, pranks, and weapons demos. Clearly they like showing off their skillz. Is this asocial behaviour? Wide scope - possibly - but clearly they are more interested in impressing their own community then they are playing nice in yours (if you happen to be on the receiving end). So again its a perspective, from there view - they are actually community building activities.
In a system that is real (if only virtual) as well as ideological, as Second Life aims to be Utopian, the Patriotic Nigras could be understood to have taken Anarchy as their de facto ideological position (though collectively they might even object to this). Here hedonism becomes the motivating force, the engine of activity in place of real political will, as does competition and showmanship between the griefer communities –– of which The Patriotic Nigras are only one of many.
Dead-obviously an individual's actions can be a generative or destructive influence. But in terms of our understanding of these games as systems, I suspect griefing may be an expression of entropy and perhaps predetermined to appear, or inherent in these worlds. But while entropy and order are always at odds with each other, what is notable is that within the pranks and interference of the PN's activities one can tell that these people are seriously testing the limits of the system, its technology and our own social interactions in very particular, though perhaps unfocused ways.
In the end its the group's inventiveness and humor that, with a little surprise, keeps me from being completely dismissive –– This said, I've yet to fall victim to an attack, and perhaps my view would change. Is this too much of an invitation?
Entropy - wikipedia
Second Law of Thermodynamics - wikipedia
Grey Goo - esacpistmagazine.com - The day the Grid Disappeared
Cnet -Second Life griefers claim responsibility for Edwards vandalism
Cnet - Images: Griefing in 'Second Life'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriotic_Nigras
http://www.thuglyfe.org/about
http://wiki.patrioticnigras.org/wiki/Main_Page
http://www.patrioticnigras.org/
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_type=videos&search_query=patriotic+nigras
The intro photo was taken from CNet.com (link above) and is a snapshot of the vandalism of the Second Life campaign headquarters of US presidential hopeful Jonathan Edwards in 2007.
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