Qotw5: How to con people when you are on MMORPGs

My Experience on RUNESCAPE

People use online pseudonyms for games and forums. I do too, because I can write better under one. I use another nickname for my character on Runescape. It is an MMORPG that involves choosing a character to fight monsters, mine gold and make armour, weapons etc. I chat with other players on the public discussion. I help newbies by selling (at a cheaper rate) or giving them stuff that I make. People will see your avatar and think whether you are bad or good based on what you do. I realized that an avatar may look mature, but the person might be a kid. The people I talked to on Runescape are twelve year olds! Or they may be lying. The kid’s father or uncle could assume the pseudonym and game too.

Establish reputations?

Erving Goffman states that there are both overt and covert messages given off in the other identities. The “expressions given off are more subtle” (Donath & Goffman 59 ). This is how women and men can do role reversals when they interact on an RPG. My character is a knight and for a while, I went around in breeches, fully armored. People thought I was a man! I also train with melee combat, longsword and battleaxe. Unless I remove my helm and return to my avatar’s clothes, I can pass for a man.

The chosen identity helps you establish your own unique ‘voice’ Yet language markers are deliberately deceptive. They seem to provide safety but may be loopholes. (Donath 1996). There are distinctions between pseudonyms and anonymity.

Is he someone else or a pervert?

In MMORPGs, sex identity is the most categorized façade people assume.

In the example of trolling, Ultimatego changed from one façade to another. She was discovered because of inconsistency. If you are consistently polite or the same, then your persona will be safe. Few identity cues help one to get away with a false identity (Donath 1996). For irritating spammers, you can delete them off the Friend’s list in Runescape. I had two or three people constantly bombarding my account. One of them had a doubtful character, because he was domineering, then nice. He conned me to a dangerous area and my character almost died! In gaming, the way to steal an identity is to use the person’s alias and scam others.

How do people exactly identity- theft? Anyone can track down your login password and keys by cookies. When someone loads a freeware, shareware , the computer can be hacked in and personal information will be stolen. Some thieves give bogus emails to make you cough up personal information like your social security numbers(Blake 2006). In MMORPGs, there are options to join as members, which means you have more privileges. There is additional danger that people will steal your information which you have logged in. In RS, the Jagex security warns players not to give away personal information and to use nicknames.

Safety!

No guarantee but the best is not to use our own IC numbers, birthdates or real names on websites. Besides it is way more creative to use pseudonyms. Your ‘voice’ is determined by your reputation and what you write and do on the gaming sites. Same for blogs and chatrooms

References:

Blake. M W. (Dec 2006) They've Got Your Numbers, Baby: Protecting Yourself from Identity Theft Rural Telecommunications. 25 ( 6).

Retrieved Feb 20,2007 from Proquest Direct database

Donath. J S.(1996). Identity and deception in the virtual community.

Retrieved Feb 20,2007 from http://smg.media.mit.edu/people/Judith/Identity/IdentityDeception.html

Goffman, E. (1959). The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York:Doubleday

Retrieved Feb 20,2007 fromhttp://smg.media.mit.edu/people/Judith/Identity/IdentityDeception.html

Low, I.(2007).Phishing, Pharming,and the latest potholes on the Information Highway.

Retrieved Feb 20,2007 from com125.wordpress.com

Pictures retrieved Feb 20,2007 from images.google.com and Runescape.com

Qotw10: playing for credit-secondlife

Fox! NCmon Jewell is my name here. I put monica but there were already many taking this name. So I combined my chinese and english names.

Before I reached that section of appearance, i already mustered how to fly, hover and take objects.

I changed my appearance of the avatar. I made her skirt spoof, make heels and edit the skin color.

But I love the teleporting. I went to butterfly island which is all pink. The outside garden is so beautiful.

On butterfly island in the main building

Does the character resemble myself?

1) It kind of does, because I love animals. This was the only avatar of animal so I chose it. I have experimented with the clothing, shoes and eye color.

I drove a jeep on Orientation island. It went too slow for normal driving. I would like a fast race car if I could afford it! flying is more exciting.

2) I would like to be a brave explorer and that is what I am doing here. Genderwise it is the same, female. I like to dress with unusual wear. These boots are cool. Although I look mild on the outside, I actually like doing new and exciting things.

I took some hellfire clothes. They were free, so I took the bundle and put it on.

I tried to create things on the lawn, but the notice said ‘owner does not allow it’. A structure gold wire came out. I realize that people can earn money by lying by the pool. When I logged out to stop the comp lagging, I was sitting by the pool.

I hope to earn more money by making objects. That is the primary objective I usually aim for when I game. Money is the resource, just like in reality. You need it for basic clothes and food etc.

Problems I faced

I am a gamer but I think Secondlife is hard to navigate. Today I could not see the usual big map.

I did not know how to read the map and could not find my way around. That is why I took a long time to go around Orientation and finish the exercise. The menus are too wordy. I noticed my friends were only stuck editing their appearance. Perhaps these features can be modified?

I found it so tedious to read everything before I could proceed.

I think the cooler features are making things (yet to succeed in doing), building, flying and teleporting. Secondlife is not really a game. Games are exciting and much easier to do. Instead I think it is a simulation of real places. Malls, fields, casinoes, discos are where humans hang out.

I look forward to meeting familiar people and see Lion City and SIM. I do not know how to go there yet.

In the next mission, I will talk about why secondlife is not a game.

Qotw9: STOMP is it citizen journalism?

Citizen journalism means to report news from your own standpoint. After September 11, many people wrote in their blogs, connecting the whole world on this tragedy. Photographs and little bits and pieces are posted on the web (Gimore, 2004) .



Is stomp.com ideal citizen journalism?

Definitely because people are sending in their mms and emails of recent happenings, like food news, people fighting, who fell down the mrt track. These news are highly personalised.
There is a section on asking questions and " talkback" which allows for audience's opinions. There is two way communication.

According to Bowman &Willis (2005) , citizen journalists filter, check for loopholes in argument, use photographs, audio and videoclips to record, doing " grassroots reporting", and so on. Stomp.com have all these features. People can sign up for a free account to volunteer opinions. I have tried to interact on the forums under the alias slovenlee.

Actually I applaud that Singapore has decided to embrace the new technologicsl method of reporting news, and the page is very colorful. This makes it attractive to readers.


Improvements:

The first disadvantage is that signup is tedious and hypersensitive to login. I had to try multiple times. There were a lot of errors that came out.

The Starblog section should have a better color scheme, green is almost too hard to read from. I think they should stick to a black background like the rest of the Stomp.
The games section under Stink should have more fun games. There are only word-games there. This is quite boring. There should be more shooting or space games for the young. Word games are for more for intelligent and older people. If stomp were to be more youth friendly, this area needs to be improved.

They should show recipes and steps on how to make nice food like what has been shown.
There is a lack in response on the bulletin boards. There are only 2 replies each time.



References:

Gillmor, D. (2004) We the Media. Retrieved March 29,2007 from
http://download.nowis.com/index.cfm?phile=WeTheMedia.html&tipe=text/html

Bowman and Willis (2005) Nieman Reports: The Future Is Here, But Do News Media Companies See It? Nieman Reports, 5 (4) Retrieved March 29,2007 fromhttp://www.hypergene.net/blog/comments.php?id=327_0_1_0_C

Qotw8: Theonlinecitizen

Chosen:

The title of this blog is theonlinecitizen, link is http://theonlinecitizen.com/

Writer is Andrew who is from the Worker’s Party. The first postings began in December 2006. Technorati ranking is 59, 044.

The topics range from social matters, like how to help the elderly to what the Members of Parliament are doing. Sometimes there are posts on world matters, like the March 21, 2007 entry which discussed the ten polluted rivers and why the Pakistani coach was murdered.

The tone is objective for advertisements (like the Asean meeting on Youth) and what people in other countries are doing. But for today’s post, of untrue material, politicians lying and blogs which tell the truth, Andrew comments about Dr Balakrishnan’s remarks that the bloggers can publish freely about the government on the Net. “Blogs can prevent politicians from lying” (theonlinecitizen.com, 2007). He does not feel happy that our government says neutral things.

A second keypost is that he feels job discrimination is not helped. No one can sue employers who are biased against race and disabled people.Andrew sounds critical of the PAP. Readers who dropped comments on this post said they hoped laws would be imposed like in the UK against race and age factors.

Do blogs allow for greater democracy in Singapore?

Blogs are the new media now. Already in traditional media like radio and tv, it seems that whoever cannot win the public’s eye will become out of favor ( Thornton, 2002 ). There is great democracy in other countries. As long as people keep away from Nazism or very inflammatory remarks, most things are all right.

For Singapore, let me examine democracy in various contexts.

Democracy means content is negotiable, people can take part in equal amounts of discussion, even those who are affected (Thornton, 2002).

For the blog I have adopted, he can discuss about the policies of the government. But there will definitely be media watchdogs who keep a tab. It is impossible not to be detected. Racist bloggers were sued some time ago.

What if you kept away from racist content? Basically there are some blogs out there with poorly written English and comments about the government, which still remain. In my search, I came across one called the loud voice. The blogger was using a lot of swear words. But the entries are still up. There is relative freedom for vulgarities. Thornton ( 2002 ) states that if people were to be literate, then there can be equal basis for discussion. Those whose first language is not English sound awkward and are discriminated against. Singaporeans can all speak fluently, so this means there is equal opportunity to post something.

I am appalled at the singlish used. Frustrations and sadness can all be vented locally. It shows that there is no language ban. Teenagers can talk about their personal problems and matters online.

Although blogger.com has a policy that they will remove material that is copyright or offensive, I have seen people post music and other people’s works on the blogs. But for the SDP’s podcasting, Dr Balakrishnan announced a ban against them. Netizens had also filmed and put up videos but they were all right (Giam, 2006). People used their mobile phones to snap videos. So there is democracy because you can film things without any bans or laws against you. But the boundary is, not to comment about polls and elections, especially if you are a politician.

I think that democracy is quite free in Singapore, because vulgarities and politics can be mentioned by most people. Unless you are a government official, you do not have to worry. Singapore will not press charges against your comments on blogs. But the worst case would be Dr Chee Soon Juan who is always on the headlines. He was jailed for talking about the headscarf issue that malay girls can be allowed to wear them and he asked for “the Chinese to speak up”. He admits to being a self-promoter.

References

Andrew (2007). Blog Retrieved from onlinecitizen.com

Giam (2006) The Politics of Singapore’s new media. Retrieved march 23,2007 from

http://theonlinecitizen.com/2006/12/31/review-the-politics-of-singapores-new-media-in-2006/

Hahn, Lorriane( 2002). CNN Talkasia. Retrieved March 23, 2007 from

http://www.singapore-window.org/sw02/020529cn.htm

Thornton,A (2002) Does the Internet create democracy? Retrieved march 23,2007 from

http://www.zip.com.au/%7Eathornto/

Bonus mission #1

From Wikipedia (Feb 2007), ‘personal sousveillance’ is where the mobile phone camera is categorized. Very serious surveillance is only for guards or generals interrogation.

A personal sousveillance clip I found on youtube.com. A guy was impersonating his other friends onstage. I gather that it is a club hosting a comedy show.

“Bullshitting…” was one of the jokes he made. It was hilarious and entertaining.

“The internet, however, is complicating our ability to negotiate the boundary between public and private, making it hard to recover a private self that has been voluntarily exposed” (2004). How do we know for certain that any of our moves made in public will not be posted on Youtube or someone’s blog? Some parties may be willing, but some may not be. This clip could be his friend who filmed him, or it could be a stranger. Then this got posted online. If the person had gone on to film the guy’s friends too, any viewer could piece together some information about their lives, like where they hang out, what they do for a living.

It would be positive if the man wants to be famous. His video could be viewed by some director or producer from the US or any large market. Talents nowadays post their own homemade MTVs. I read about a singer who marketed herself on youtube. She is now asked to perform live at her town.

But this video did not take into account how his friends would have reacted. They may be angry with him for impersonating them! The real mood is not captured.

On the negative side, sharing your feelings may not be the best way to recover from a crisis. Rosen (2004) said that a study of Vietnam soldiers wished they could be left alone when they were interviewed. I agree with this. When the news show, funeral proceedings are filmed at such close proximity! The mourners are already so grieved, should their grief be publicized? For necessary coverage, some little shots will do. But news reporters tend to zoom in that you notice every little detail.

It is unethical to film someone in the act of a private thing, like people crying or going berserk. The nanyang polytechnic video Tammy was memorable. Her friend was so jealous of her having sex with her boyfriend that she posted the video online. It was wrong of her to do that. It seems that the use of technology has stopped people from confronting their anger or sadness directly. She could have talked or vented her anger on Tammy first. Such a pity.

With such advancements in technology cameras and allowance of posting videos online, we should be moral and ethical in our usage of these. Unless people gave you permission that they want to be the next Superstar Idol, you should not take things into your own hands. The people who invented camera phones only wanted to economise the gadget and let us snap photos of our own peers.

Sources:

Rosen, J. (2004). The Naked Crowd.

Retrieved March 9, 2007 from http://www.spiked-online.com/Printable/0000000CA5FF.htm

Wikipedia:Sousveillance. (2007) Retrieved March 9, 2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sousveillance

Qotw4: Free riders/ sharers on forums

A gift is give- and- receive sort of thing. But in present forums and emails, lots of people can be both givers and receivers. A public good is indivisible and non excludable. The problem is how to get someone to contribute without being freeriders (Kollock, 1999). You can easily just lurk around the place without bothering to post anything. I frequent animal lover sites and read the message boards. One can also post on forums that talk about anime, another favorite subject! I visit this forum where everybody posts anime fanfiction. So far I haven’t had the time or motivation to write a story yet. I just upload it on http://www.fanfiction.net . That's a place to do your writing and it is legal to discuss and wax about your favorite anime bishounens!

Kollock says: The second challenge is one of coordination: even if a group of individuals are motivated to contribute toward a public good, they will need to coordinate their efforts and this will involve its own set of difficulties and costs (1999).

"Commons are institutional spaces in which we are free of the constraints imposed by the requirements of markets." (Benkler 2003)

The Beauty of Free Gifts!

The pro is you make friends, and you are connected loosely. If you are sick, for example, you may come across a support group forum to help you get motivated. You are not alone although you are bedridden. Non- profit organizations don't have money to make beautiful advertising or maintain attractive websites and can turn to the gift economy. Information is shared worldwide and become pointers can be exchanged for free.

Linux And its specialty

By 1994 Linux had become a powerful and useful operating system and was officially released. This software is free to anyone who wants it and constantly being revised and improved through the volunteer labor of many programmers (Kollock 1999). From the effort of a private student, this is an example of collaboration with many people to produce a brainChild.



http://www.freedownloadscenter.com/Best/linux-icon-jpg.html
I got this image from here where you can download freeware.
Free software can also be shared, photoshop, beta versions of anti virus programs, firewalls. Students can benefit from these editions which are readily available for use. Buying the actual one is encouraged as you need updated versions each time.


When you make freeware, your invention can come under four kinds of freedom in license. I think the best one is Public domain software, because the author has abandoned all rights! Then you can move in (Wiki, 2007)

For less developed countries, free software is Good. This means that they can delve into new technologies which the poor would not dream of, unless they were rich like Britons. This is beneficial for Africa and Cambodia. Then the people can have access to Word or some programs to be educated(Daffara & González, 2000)

Cons-heavy costs!

It is hard to find resources that are not expensive. Anything online may be cheaply provided, but this cannot last if lower costs and cheaper processes can't be found(Benkler 2003).


Complete loyalty to a group is infinitely rare. People are nomadic. I have moved to another forum group this week, because the last one was all about ozone layers and sulphur. I did not realise that the members were scientists. I just could not relate to their content! They should post on an environmental page, their entries were simply long threads!


Why would somebody be so noble as to post a software free?

On a discussion in class, an expert on piracy told us that if you don't share your software with others your membership may be terminated. The clause is to download, Then share. Most people only want mutual benefits. If there was no money to be had, a user may just make a software and be obligated to make it shareware. For instance, he just wants to fix a glitch on his game and it may be noble of him to wish to share, but that's not his only aim in life.

My take:
I think that free riders number a majority of us. If they are obliged to share what they have learnt, this becomes a boon to the gift economies. Charity organizations and poor people actually benefit from the internet's gifts. Say you wish to talk to others regarding a hobby no one around you seems to have, friends abound online!

References:

Benkler,Y. (2003) The Political Economy of Commons. Retrieved Feb9,2007 from http://www.upgrade-cepis.org/issues/2003/3/up4-3Benkler.pdf

Daffara,C. and M. González,J. (2000). Free software/open source- Information Society Opportunities for Europe?.Retrieved Feb 9,2007 from http://eu.conecta.it/paper.pdf

Kollock, P. (1999). The Economies of Online Cooperation: Gifts and Public Goods in Cyberspace.Retrieved Feb9,2007 from http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/soc/faculty/kollock/papers/economies.htm

Wikipedia(Feb3,2007). Free Software. Retrieved Feb9,2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_software

“QotW3: Anti-piracy for music and other media”

Copyrights and piracy laws, what are they? Downloaders of illegal music have been prosecuted. A man was also caught for riding free on someone’s Wi-Fi network. I own many copies of CDs of my favorite singers Boa and Coco as well as a couple of novels. How amazed I am to learn of the corrected myths surrounding ownership of items like these! I thought the simple line of ‘prohibited sales, distribution and public performance of this work’ was just like that.

According to Brady S Kevin, owning a VD or CD entitles a person to limited rights, “all of the exclusive rights associated with that copyright” are the owner’s. (Brady 2007). It is not necessary to have the actual copyright notice on the work. Since 1989, creators are entitled to the rights of the works when they have made their stuff into a ‘tangible medium”, even if it is just a sculpture or a piece of recording.

The most prominent issue regarding disregard for copyright is that illegal downloaders of software are not buying the legal CD or work. The artistes do not gain from piracy at all( Felix Oberholzer-Gee Koleman Strumpf). They may even be out of job if piracy continues.

Strumpf and Oberholzer-Gee (2005) have surveyed that “less than 1 percent of album sales have been displaced by filesharing”, but other evidence disputes this. German teenagers fileshare more during their holidays to their American counterparts. The professors compared the number of files downloaded and uploaded were the same during the festive season and holidays. But they concluded that filesharing was not the cause of low sales in albums.

Educating the public about all these laws and infringements is the best way to stop the flow of pirated files. Fines and jailing will deter offenders, but I know the majority of my friends still want to engage in filesharing and downloading free songs . People just want to get free music, instead of buying the albums. Users can save the effort of burning their discs and simply channel the files into their MP3s. Recording Industry Association of Singapore (RIAS) found out 25 new cases recently in October 2006( Channelnewsasia 2007).

Instead of getting pirated copies, log onto Pandora.com to listen to samples. I like to have music when I am working on an assignment. Pandora is a web radio that enables users to match listeners with their preferences and gives only a small preview of new titles in the market. This is a very good way of listening to new works without violation of copyrights. One limitation is “Only six skips per hour are allowed, including those resulting from a thumbs down response” (Wikipedia 2007). Of course free services will have disadvantages. I like to “Create new station” when I am bored with the selection of songs.

Even if you only infringe on one song, which seems harmless, under “section 504” of US law, the rightful owner can “collect statutory damages of $750 to $30,000 per work”(Brady 2007). The law that the entertainment industry is determined to go after illegal copiers seems very frightening.

The startling penalties are also implemented in Singapore. Some of them were the first to be arrested in February for having pirated music files. (Channelnewsasia 2007) The Intellectual Property Office of Singapore does not think arrest will warrant an end to piracy. These will only warn the public that it is possible to be caught.

Should information be free? Rebecca Martin (2007) has compiled some arguments pertaining to this. Coates states the CC license is the answer. It enables the creators to decide how much of their work can be open for free public use. This is a very good idea. The creators can share, albeit a small amount and users can have a little preview. Then we as users can benefit from free information if we cannot get in touch with the original authors! A winwin situation for the CC license. US laws presently have a lot of restrictions on everything, even a small paragraph or word can have a dire impact.

Most people on this blog agree that copyright does not stifle creativity, rather, it stops others from infringement. So far, Green Day has chosen not to pursue their rights any further (Martin 2007). Yes some information should be free, so that we can have a variety of arts circling the network and exchange pointers. These are also pretty useful for research purposes.

In conclusion all rights reserved are for the authors and artistes only, and we may be aspiring songwriters next time, so we should stop piracy now! If you do not want to pay the fee to have the album, just go to Pandora.com to listen to songs. Many shops are now following the Heeren in allowing listeners to hear songs at leisure.

The References!

Martin, Rebecca (2007) Remix culture, a rights nightmare Retrieved Feb 2, 2007 from http://www.abc.net.au/catapult/indepth/s1645533.htm

S Brady, Kevin (2007) Copyright FAQ: 25 common myths and misconceptions Retrieved Feb 2, 2007 from http://users.goldengate.net/%7Ekbrady/copyright.html

Strumpf and Oberholzer-Gee (2005) The Effect of File Sharing on Record Sales An Empirical Analysis

Retrieved Feb 2, 2007 from

http://www.unc.edu/%7Ecigar/papers/FileSharing_June2005_final.pdf

Wong, May (Oct 17,2006) 25 new cases of illegal music file-sharing handed over to police Retrieved Feb 2, 2007 from http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/235999/1/.html

Wikipedia: Pandora music service ( Feb 1, 2007) Retrieved Feb 2, 2007 From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandora_%28music_service%29