Aye. Perhaps too Greg is speaking to a deeper mythology. Namely, of an N^2 illusory haze that shrouds the instinct of marketing much of the product in our space. An instinct that vast interconnectedness is an answer. An answer to what? On the one hand this may seem like technical arcanum, but note that we all often pretend this point in our discussions and comments on Terra Nova and elsewhere. It is how most of us conceptualize a simulation.

The mechanics of the phishing attempt are no more sophsticated than usual, but I'm struck by the fact that the scammers are now phishing for login details for virtual worlds. Presumably they empty the account as soon as they get the password, by transferring the assets to their accounts, and then they sell the virtual assets on eBay. It's an indication of how significant the asset holdings are in some of these worlds, that it's worth setting up a scam like this for the account details. And it can hardly be an accident that the first one targets EVE--a world known mostly for its trade. Yet. If you play a trader, space can be a very lonely place.

Though many MMORPGs have "fishing" as a profession, I recently received the first phishing email related to VWs. Yes, it seems that your game account may be as valuable and vulnerable as your bank account. On the one hand this may seem like technical arcanum, but note that we all often pretend this point in our discussions and comments on Terra Nova and elsewhere. It is how most of us conceptualize a simulation. We talk to the illusion of a world with many concurrent activities and a speak least metaphorically, to the agencies that can live in such places (e.g. of Non-Player-Characters and Player-Characters interacting with shared world state). In the fact of today, however, such parallelism is a fiction - most games are implemented within a single simulation thread (they just iterate through all the objects quickly but in sequence... "butcher before baker before the cat jumps over the moon..."), but this is likely to change, perhaps very soon.

What do Greg Alt's wrangle on the impact of N^2 algorithms in games AI, the River Lethe, and the Dunbar number have in common? The ability of electronic games to engage and absorb today's youth is well known. High school students spend as much time playing video games as doing homework. A "good" online game has as many active players as are graduated annually by the entire U.S. higher education system in science and engineering. A "great" (or free) game reaches ten times as many. And now, emerging research shows well-crafted games can teach much more effectively than traditional classroom experiences, and even stimulate decidedly postive health outcomes.

This conference is different, first, because it's being hosted by the National Academies, the premier academic organization in the United States. Second, representatives from 30 funding agencies will be there. The conference was developed in stealth mode, but the remaining seating is now open to the public. Invitation here [note: 3.1mb; link will go bad when the event is over]. See inside for an accompanying text.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, California governor and icon for a bloodthirsty annihiliting robot, is currently considering signing a bill authored by child psychologist Leland Yee and now passed by California's legislature, according to which depictions of bloodthirsty annihilating robots, or of the termination of bloodthirsty annihilating robots, shall not be sold to those too young to understand the difference between imaginary and genuine bloodthirsty annihilating robots. Gamepolitics unravels the irony; Slashdot reviewed what some lawyers think. On the one hand this may seem like technical arcanum, but note that we all often pretend this point in our discussions and comments on Terra Nova and elsewhere.

Sure, there are different kinds of role-playing, and different intensities. Role-playing military roles is likely easier than cross-gender role-playing, for example. And yes we all do a little of it, even when not trying. Or rather we do a little of *something* without trying - we aquire a vocabulary, an accent... Wyatt's theory is that Role-Playing servers are really about acting: In many ways, what is at stake in Richard’s comments is not virtual worlds, but the same deeply traversed terrain that always comes up when in modernity talk about freedom, society and individuality, and our answers to the question of “Why can’t players be more free in virtual worlds” are likely to echo the kinds of things each of us might say about freedom more generally.

Sure, there are different kinds of role-playing, and different intensities. Role-playing military roles is likely easier than cross-gender role-playing, for example. And yes we all do a little of it, even when not trying. Or rather we do a little of *something* without trying - we aquire a vocabulary, an accent... Wyatt's theory is that Role-Playing servers are really about acting: In many ways, what is at stake in Richard’s comments is not virtual worlds, but the same deeply traversed terrain that always comes up when in modernity talk about freedom, society and individuality, and our answers to the question of “Why can’t players be more free in virtual worlds” are likely to echo the kinds of things each of us might say about freedom more generally.

Sure, there are different kinds of role-playing, and different intensities. Role-playing military roles is likely easier than cross-gender role-playing, for example. And yes we all do a little of it, even when not trying. Or rather we do a little of *something* without trying - we aquire a vocabulary, an accent... Wyatt's theory is that Role-Playing servers are really about acting: In many ways, what is at stake in Richard’s comments is not virtual worlds, but the same deeply traversed terrain that always comes up when in modernity talk about freedom, society and individuality, and our answers to the question of “Why can’t players be more free in virtual worlds” are likely to echo the kinds of things each of us might say about freedom more generally.

Sure, there are different kinds of role-playing, and different intensities. Role-playing military roles is likely easier than cross-gender role-playing, for example. And yes we all do a little of it, even when not trying. Or rather we do a little of *something* without trying - we aquire a vocabulary, an accent... Wyatt's theory is that Role-Playing servers are really about acting: In many ways, what is at stake in Richard’s comments is not virtual worlds, but the same deeply traversed terrain that always comes up when in modernity talk about freedom, society and individuality, and our answers to the question of “Why can’t players be more free in virtual worlds” are likely to echo the kinds of things each of us might say about freedom more generally.