Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Dear Tom Boellstorff,


I thought it was interesting that you said that in virtual worlds that there is no true "native" to that virtual world. I agree with the statement because I think that there really is no "native" in something that is virtual (unless they are a npc, in which case they were built into the system and could be considered a 'native') because we are not really part of that virtual world. In massively multiplayer online games, our rankings are different. They are decided either by our skills/level or by how long we have been playing.

People need to study such online communities because in many ways they mimic how communities work in real life. In some ways, they go even further than that because it shows a person's real personality since they do not get any repercussions from  doing something negative within the game.

When researching a study,  there are many things you should consider before starting and when you are drawing your conclusion. I think you have to consider the many different groups and playing style within the game community. Different communities will act differently to their environment or any problems they encounter, so it would be important to be part of all the different communities within a game. But at the same time there should be more than one personality/character, so they can each be part of the smaller communities. Sometimes changing from a different community into another with the same character does not go well or they view you with biased eyes.

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