The urge to be a part of...

A few interesting stories and events came to my attention recently. And one of them i find interesting is yet another death of a child that is supposedly cause by a computer game. This time it was a suicide because he couldn't reach the heroic status:

"Zhang Xiaoyi died on Dec. 27, 2004, leaving behind a suicide note saying he wanted "'to join the heroes of the game he worshipped...'" More here.

The problem with online multiplayer games is that they are made in such a way that you have to constantly play if you want to be one step ahead of opponents. And people (especially children) without any parental guidance could get addicted in a way. and lately these games are not liek before when you bought them once and played them. you have to pay for it every month to play. And you have to play to build up your character's level. Not to meniton that it is often better to be in a team when chasing the monsters through the new unknown world. If you stay alone you (i.e. your character) die. So you have to be accepted in a team. And usually they only accept those that are of any use to them. This is somewhat similar to the gangs issue. People want to be a part of certain group (especially teenagers) and if they dont' succeed it can be a big burden for them.

One my fellow forum visitors posted a very vivid description of his experience with these games.

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"I think parents like this think "Oh how nice. Billy is playing. He is silent, he doesn't asks for money, he is not causing trouble, he wont hurt himself there, he it not out on the street(it's dangerous). Yes maybe he is playing a little too much, but hey, in the meantime he is not using drugs, he is not having unsafe sex and don't drink. And I can relax a bit while he is sitting there. Pure asset."

And this is the bad thing. While Billy is busy mutilating orcs in Azeroth, he get more and more drawn away from the real world and becomes addicted. Believe me, I've been there unsure.gif I was playing Anarchy Online for months. College internet is free, the pizza comes when I need it, sleeping... bah, who needs sleeping when I need to reach level 50. It's just 4000 more XP... just a little bit more... oh YES, I'm lvl 50... hmm... but to use this pistol I need level 55... damn... okay, level 55 here I come!!!
I think you get the picture....

When I realized what I was doing, my grades took a fall to the gutter, I gained much weight, I lost friends, I lost money, I lost my social skills("I'M playing here damit! Leave me alone!"), my health was so bad I catched every single sickness came my way...

Okay, to put it another way: DON'T F*CKIN PLAY MMORPGS!!!! EVER!!!
Oh, sure there are some people that can keep a distance and don't become addicted, but don't find out if you are one...

All in all, MMO games are dangerous. Literally. To your health, to your bank balace, to your social connections...etc. And this is not on the box for a reason"

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New guerilla marketing

In the recent month or so i came acrooss a couple of posts in internet forums that were about certain product. Often the poster was a frequent member, talking about new things to come up. So i did a bit of search and it seems that the companies are actually using children to advertise their products. So how does it all work? Well the forum has a specific group of people. And if when you "serve" the information to them you basically target the very core of the market segment. The opinion leaders. If you succeed with them, the chances are that others will follow. The companies pay children to post about their new games. The children might even do it for free in exchange for a working, playable preview demo.

"Bots" that post are being hunted down and eliminated. So a human's touch is necessary. The worst thing is that the users can not clearly distinguish the information (as reliable data and facts) and propaganda material (one sided, distorted facts).

Guerilla marketing seems to be becomming very devious, trying to invade the communities. So Administrators and moderator already took precautions by being aware of this and in better forums they are trying to eliminate this. But a lot of forums doesn't have such awareness. This makes the users quite vulnerable.

So if you see a post that is saying how comething is "cool", "fantastic" etc, think about all this before taking the posst seriously.

And so it begins....

Just as Jurgen Habermas noted people have started to turn to less imporatant issues: "...[internet provides] decentralised access to unedited stories. In this medium, contributions by intelectualls lose their power to create a focus." (Habermas, 2006). And what is worst it seems we are headed in direction where blogs will become news. Here is a site Digg.com that will try to revolutionise the news. The editorial policy would become redundant. On this site, for example, the users decide which news are top news.

"How do they do it?" is the question that pops into one's mind. Well basically on this site the users add links to blogs, news, podcasts...

The news that get on the first page (front page ?!) had gotten at least 30 of so called "diggs". The site hasn't been operational for long and it often get the so called "digg effect". this is when server with prioritised news, blog or podcast can't hold the number of views of click and therefore it crashes.

Still it is an interesting idea. I wonder what the future will bring. Especially which issues will become the top issues for the public. Will it be politics? Social events? Advice on how to cook a good meal?

More on diggs and explanations can be found on Wikipedia here.

The accessibility of the internet

While our government is reducing the accessibility (no tax deduction for computer only for net-plugs), some other ones are trying to increase it. And they are not only doing it for us normal people but also for disabled. Although the Great Britain's (GB) government still doesn't have it perfect, they do (obviously) try to perfect it. And this will also in a way increase the political participation of marginalised groups. If nothing else at least their ideas, suggestions etc. might find a place in public domain.

In my opinion everyone should have access to internet and should be thoroughly educated about how to use it. Instead of being online all the time, sitting in front of computer and wondering where they might find the information they are looking for. Maybe it would also open the eyes to those who think internet is a bad thing made by the devil himself. Sadly such people do exist.

Link!

Internet control

It kind of bothers me because more and more countries are tightening their control over what we do online and what we don't. They keep tell us what is good for us without considering that we might be old enough to decide for ourselves.
So when i saw this picture:


It made me laugh, but at the same time it's a bit frightening. Google is well known for it's control over your emails and various other stuff they have. They are constantly scanning the users. So beware! You have been WARNED!

Another day, another post...

Well it's been another long day with multivariable statistics to occupy my time after work. It's 2200 now, came home about 20 mins ago. Anyway it's time for another post. I was thinking in connection with some other posts do people actualyl read these blogs? I mean how many hits do we actually get per day? And while i was thinking that i remembered Maddox and his website: "The best page in the Universe". He get's about 100 hits per minute and is very popular among various internet communities. Well i think his words say it pefectly: "This page is about me and why everything I like is great. If you disagree with anything you find on this page, you are wrong." Anyway the reason he popped in my mind is because quite some time ago he made this post about blogs and why he hates them. He has some serious issues with them. He can't really stand them and the words that were formed arround it. So in his own very sarcastic way he decided to say a few things about them. Therefore if you want to see the completelly opposite perspective on blogs click here.

Apparenlty new media can help prisoners to rehabilitate

Well I would never guess that computer games can bring people closer to society. But here is the proof. The thing is that computer games are usually hated for their violent contents. And often have various marks that rate them. And usually parents try to get their children away from computers.

On the other hand it seems they also might help create communities (especially nowadays). People become part of something. And that is very important for those that were rejected by society for various reasons.

A second entry

Well nothing much to say... I seriously belive forums RULE! compared to blogs. There. I've said it.

Virtual communities
By Gregor Gorjan

Virtual communities were made with emergence of new media, specifically the internet. The members in such communities are usually geographically unrelated. But there is some issue that binds them together. Be it computer games, cars, various hobbies etc. they are closely connected through the issue.
What I find interesting is what happens if the issue or theme that binds them suddenly becomes forbidden. It appears that communities also fall apart in such case. I personally witnessed two such events. One was a Firearms half-life modification community. The community was relatively strong with a very lively political debate over firearms issues and it was very much easy to spot republicans and democrats. Suddenly the Half-life engine that was used to run this modification (multi-player online computer game) rapidly change. Half-life 2 came out, there were sudden changes in user checking (WON has changed to STEAM) and many users had problems with it. Suddenly the internal “battle” became more apparent as one group managed to sabotage the discussion board. The community instantly split in two. And soon 2 new modifications started it’s development, both claiming to be the legal successor. For about six months debates were whether this is good or bad and similar. Until recently when many users permanently left the old discussion board and joined to the other, due to often covert pressure from administrators and covert nationalism. But what I am trying to point out is that old community fell totally apart and it all happened very fast.
Another example I had witnessed was a community of old computer games - the so called abandonware site. Abandonware is a term that specifies computer games that are not supported by it’s authors anymore. It is technically still illegal to publish them, however since the author (company) doesn’t exists anymore no one will prosecute you for doing that. Some companies when they go bankrupt even give away the games for free. The site I am talking about was formed 2 years ago. The number of games on site was increasing due to sites policy that every game that is not sold anymore is considered to be abandoned. The number of people in community grew almost exponentially. But then suddenly ESA (Entertainment Software Association) stepped in with a very nasty threat. Apparently some other companies were holding copyrights over a lot of published games and unless we had a specific deal we are allowed to publish them they would have pursued legal action against the owner(s). So a lot of games have been removed form the site overnight, because owner had no other choice. People instantly became rebellious. The discussion boards had most users online at the same time (142 people). And suddenly a large community that was growing became much smaller. A lot of people had seen that since no good games will be on they should leave. They weren’t tied to it as if they would be in real community. And it was easy for them to leave or become a “lurked”. A “lurked” is a person that only watches posts form time to time and doesn’t contribute to debate. So the topic (theme) that was binding them was gone and so were the users. A few left and continued with dedicated work and soon community started to grow back but it will probably never reach previous status (unless there is some world-wide change of policy about copyrights)
Virtual communities, as Rheingold establishes (Rheingold, 1993b), developed their own language. But as things change fast on internet the language development progressed. And now they developed their own writing. The so called “Leet” language (or 1337), which includes jokes outsiders don’t understand and very loose structure. It includes words (and looks) like: h4x0rz, ch34732, n00b, w00t, pwn3d, pwn4g3, kekeke, 11… Leet language appears to be the next stage from so called AOL-messaging language.
Since new languages have developed perhaps even bigger focus should be set to culture within these communities. It appear that most of it is based on sci-fi and Mythical (such as Lord of the rings) series, books, films… It is important to study these communities because they combine intellectual as well as children.
Literature:
Jankowski W. Nicholas. (????) Creating community with Media: History, Theories and Scientific Investigations.
Rheingold, H. (1993b) The virtual community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. Reading MA: Adison-Wesley, Avalilable online: http:www.rheingold.com/vc/book