Title: Virtuality Under Erasure; The Complexities of Virtual Worlds

Abstract: What becomes of a virtual world when 'virtual' is increasingly under
erasure? Online worlds are creating considerable 'real' world economic impact,
including very real six figure salaries produced exclusively from trafficking
in virtual goods.  Though perceived by the mainstream as no more than
simulacra, virtual worlds challenge 'legacy' reality's claim as the signified.

Virtual worlds are not economic clean rooms nor ideal laboratories; by virtue
of their contestation for representation, contaminations are ceaselessly traded
between the 'real' and 'virtual'.  Obtaining the grandest virtual rewards,
those that command legacy world currency in legacy world markets, requires
social interactions.  Virtual social groupings often form outside of the
virtual worlds, whether from friendly LAN parties or Black Snow Interactive's
video gaming "sweatshops" in Mexico.  Most games also require a steep entry
fee, from computer hardware, operating systems, and Internet access to the
time, money, and technical prowess required to access and succeed in these
realities.  Such requirements mediate entry into these spaces and police their
homogeneity.

The worlds themselves are also loaded, and Robert Shapiro was wrong to suggest
EverQuest's "virtual market doesn't require a powerful government".  The
<strike>virtual</strike> reality is that EverQuest, as with every massively
multiplayer game/world, requires a government of metaphysical power to
determine how hunger, sleep, even death are integrated.  Outlets for actions
that influence the worlds' underlying dynamics are extraordinarily restricted.
These limitations are introduced not by medium but by priority.

This study compares legacy with new reality in an attempt to measure the
influence of virtual worlds.