The articles from this week does not surprise to me. The idea that people make money on games like WoW, SL, or any other game for that matter seems to be old news from out discussion in class. We have seen the movie Life 2.0 and how people can live within this games and make a carrier out of it does not seem so strange now. The article “The Life of the Chinese Gold Farmer” outlines a capitalist economy that provides a means to a lucrative business opportunity inside game workshops. In massive multiplayer worlds it would seem almost anything is for sale even a player’s personal avatar. As pointed out in the article there are people work twelve hour shifts 7 days a week, farming gold in WoW for pennies. Yet, there are online economics where people earn millions within these worlds such as the case in the movie Life 2.0. Many of the post today have point to this life style which blurs lines between work and leisure known as the “wiesure” lifestyle. The one thing that hits me about this article, which was mentioned in another post is, “What is the point and the benefits of making a living in these types of games?”. My response to this questions is look at the 12 hours shifts in China and tell me if this does not sound like a modern day sweatshop.
Here is a video on how to mine gold:
As for the article, “How Meeting In Second Life Transformed IBM’s Technology Elite Into Virtual World Believers” is another example of how the real world meets the digital world, where the “wiesure” lifestyle continues to blur lines in this country. This can be seen in the video below.
This video is a service called Manpower were people and employers can connect in SL:
If this is our future we are not to far off were adults and children may never have to leave their home to go to work or school again. What frighten me the most is that this idea was discussed in one of my ITI class Technology and Learning. It was point out that with rising cost to maintain public schools and shrinking state budges that some township may be forced to teach children remotely and children are only required to travel once or twice to a satellite classroom. Just imagine that….
