Corporate ownership negotiation or in-game terrorism 101?

In 2002, T.L. Taylor came out with the paper "Whose Game is it Anyway? Negotiating Corporate Ownership in a Virtual World. According to Taylor,

While multiplayer games are at their most basic level simply that, a game, they should be more richly seen as spaces in which users come together online and invest enormous amounts of time inhabiting a virtual space, creating characters, cultures, and communities, gaming together, making dynamic economies, and exploring elaborate geographical terrain.

In their Laws of the Virtual Worlds (92 CAL. L. REV. 1, 14 (January 2004), Lastowka and Hunter also described game worlds as places where large numbers of people come to play, trade, and socialize.

Recent developments in the highly popular in-game world of Linden Labs' Second Life leads me to wonder, though, if game worlds have also become places where large numbers of people can terrorize each other.

The game god syndrome and in-game freedom aside, it just isn't right for the Second Life Liberation Army to set off computer-code versions of atomic bombs in SL stores.

Yes, in-game worlds are better viewed as a collaboration between the game developers and the players. No, griefing is not the way to achieve it. Griefing. What SSLA's actions amount to when innocent bystanders get caught in the explosions.

Politics is not the be-all and end-all of any kind of life - even in games. What do people play for? It may be for the money. It may be for the companionship. It may be for the challenge. It may even be for love.

Besides, who made the SSLA representative of the four million residents of the Second Life metaverse? How many of the four million residents even want the SSLA to represent them? I certainly don't.

As for the SSLA declaration that

"When the SLLA succeeds in its aims it will disband and hand power back to the political wing of the movement."

all I can say is, "Seriously?". We're not talking about neutral avatars here. We're talking about avatars who are essentially in-game extensions of their humans. Come on.

Rage of Angels in the Philippine Legislature

Last Tuesday's special legislative session came straight out of Rage of Angels. Yes, Sidney Sheldon. Remember Jennifer Parker, Michael Moretti, Robert Di Silva? Think of last Tuesday's drama as the yellow canary chapter with a legislative twist, a gender exchange for two of the three lead roles, and a foiled communique.

Sources say that X passed on to A(legislative page) a note for Representative Y. It seems that Y did not immediately read the note, but when he did get to read it a few minutes later, whatever was in that note was enough to send his temper skyrocketing. There was a storming of the central gallery's left staircase by His Furiousness, and X and his seatmate, as well as two women a few seats in front of them, had to leave - amidst much fanfare and media coverage.

As far as dramas go, that 30 second display of legislative ire by the Representative was positively camera - err, eye-catching. But His Furiousness's temper fizzled as quickly as it had sizzled, and a few minutes after the scene, while his sisters-on-the-floor were gracing the cameras with their explanations and opinions, he was already well on his way to becoming His Cheerfulness. Go figure.

Some of the legislative staff said that the note allegedly wanted His Furiousness to question the presence of a quorum in session. After all, there were barely 20 members of Congress actually on the floor, in attendance, at the time. It wasn't proper, one of the staff said. Why dictate to a Congressman? Why, indeed?

Could this fantastic departure be the reason why Streaks was seen shouting "Yes! Yes!" into a cellphone while pumping an arm up and down in that classic display of triumphant jubilation on the way to the glassed sitting area just beyond the gallery? A page-headturning exit from the gallery. When Streaks returned, it was to high five some people also seated in the central gallery.

Whatever that note contained, the session still went on, and votes were taken on the controversial bills for the night, the presence or absence of a quorum notwithstanding. Apparently, ink on paper hasn't the charm of a strangled canary as the lobbyists who got thrown out found.

The never-ending session

I've been to several sessions of Congress already this year because of this project I'm working on with a friend for the employer of a friend. (I know. It's a circuitous way of working.) Still, I get hit by the wow factor each time I attend a session.

Wow. There are cuties here with brains to boot. (Too bad that they are too few and far in between.)

Wow. I can't believe the session is being conducted this way. Where else can you see just about a dozen "warm bodies" on the floor during the roll call and end up with 12 + 8 = 128? Seriously.

Wow. It's fun listening to lobbyists bitching about the other side.

Wow. It's amusing to hear the tones in which some lobbyists refer to lawyers - as if lawyers are the most insidious undesirables in the halls of Congress, but it's better not to piss them off to their faces anyway.

And when the session drags on and on ... Wow. So many suspensions, each suspension a class of each own. It's like basketball. A minute can fly, or it can be just three seconds long.

Thank God I can play Tango in Ebony when I'm bored, or imagine Handel's Sarabande being played against a backdrop of warring mechas.