Online Roleplaying games are more popular now than ever before. These virtual creations are magnificent, both in scale and beauty. Every square inch meticulously designed, rendered and uploaded for the pleasure of millions who pay to enter these worlds under various guises. The small, friendless boy in South-East Asia becomes, with just a few clicks, a warrior in some distant land, desperate for a saviour. The boy immerses himself in this world, gradually attaining, for his chosen warrior avatar, virtual wealth, skills and experiences that strengthen his position in this problematic distant land. But, just as in the real world, people get lost in these places, beautiful though they may be.
Virtual wealth, it seems, is not so virtual. When avatars become available to buy on auction sites such as eBay, they fetch huge sums of real-world money. People who have neither the time, nor the inclination, to invest large amounts of their time playing the game, are willing, it seems, to spend large amounts of cash to purchase the sign-in details of another person's character.
And it isn't even the characters that are selling; an island in one virtual world recently sold for $30,000! That kind of money attracts a great deal of attention. "Digital sweatshops" are real-world businesses where Third World laborers play online games 24/7 in order to create virtual goods that can be sold for cash. One such 'business', Blacksnow Interactive, actually sued a virtual world's creator in 2002 for attempting to crack down on the practice. The first of its kind to center on virtual goods, the case was eventually dropped.
When the concept is explored, other legal issues come teeming from the woodwork. Imagine a person (perhaps our small South-East Asian friend) investing time and money (via a monthly subscription) into a virtual world. He's made friends, built a reputation and spent a fair amount of time collecting and creating virtual goods. All of a sudden, his work disappears when the game creator, faced with a losing business, pulls the plug.
"Time to get a life," may be the easy response. But for many, the virtual world is their life. According to Nick Yee, a virtual world anthropologist who has been documenting MMORPG's since 1999, the average player spends 22 hours a week online... So who is responsible when this time, effort and work are lost? The company responsible for hosting the game? The power company whose outage might have been responsible for the loss? Is anyone even legally responsible, assuming that virtual products are, from a legal standpoint, non-existent?
And when in these worlds, existing as people do, eating food, socially interacting with one another, our avatars are as susceptible to corporate dealings as the rest of us, despite their 'warrior' status. Virtual advertising and branding take several forms, from ad campaigns and contextual product placements within themed worlds, to entire worlds created solely to promote a brand or organization. Some residents of virtual worlds even create their own unique brands and ads to promote original virtual products produced and sold to other residents.
Reactions to corporate sponsorships in online environments vary widely. Teenagers are generally more receptive to in-world advertising than adults, often bringing elements of corporate branding into the worlds themselves. In fact, many of the fully branded worlds are targeted to teens and children. As of early 2004, companies experimenting with virtual worlds as sites for advertising include Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Intel, Levi's, Nike, and Daimler Chrysler.
Two stories to close on: In a space-based virtual world, a character spent a great deal of money (upwards of $20,000) to purchase a space station. This, he turned into an exclusive nightclub, hosting fashionable events for the elite avatars within that gaming world. The person even enlisted the help of top real-world DJs to play at the club, drawing in avatars from all over this world and charging them, via PayPal, a fee for entry.
In another game, when a popular player died in the real-world, the avatars with whom he had spent so many hours interacting and, supposedly, fighting side-by-side with, joined together on the morning of his funeral and made the weary pilgrimage to the in-game temple, where they held a brief moment's silence and hosted a remembrance service.
It seems that, when real-life is replicated, in whatever form or format, reality continues to creeps in through the gaps... Life finds a way
Good Night, and Good Luck
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