Thanks Julian and Ana. It seems that Ana was talking about 2 different things, which are now untangled: one market share, and the other ideological dominance. Neither would seem 100%.<br><br>I'm not an expert on games (I don't play), but from where I live, I see Korean and Japanese dominance is at least as importance as
U.S. In Thailand Ragnarok has 1 million users and uses some kind of asian medievalist environment. Might be patriarchal, western-influenced to some extent, but not exclusively.<br><br>I would like to add provocatively that American-style Hollywood movies, are a lot less patriarchal than many Asian movies, a lot more inclusive, and actually have a lot of misandrous content, if you read this:
<br><br><span style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://mqup.mcgill.ca/extra.php?id=51">http://mqup.mcgill.ca/extra.php?id=51</a><br><br><span style="font-weight: bold;">quote: </span>"</span>We began this book, the first volume in a trilogy called Beyond the
Fall of Man, by noting that many pop cultural artifacts and productions
from the 1990s said very negative things about men."<br><br>Again, as a non-expert, and after reading Joi Ito's account on the matter, do the new generations of games not include an increasing amount of cooperative logics?
<br><br>Michel<br><br><div><span class="gmail_quote">On 3/1/07, <b class="gmail_sendername">Ana Valdés</b> <<a href="mailto:agora158@gmail.com">agora158@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</span><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
Julian, I respect your numbers and statistics but in my experience<br>almost ALL the games made "outside" the US are made with American<br>prototypes and American "memes". Yes, you can see some games made for
<br>Israeli companiesm, but theyh are done in English, they have white<br>heroes and they show male heroes.<br>They can be produced "physically" outside the US but they are still a<br>part of the "American way of life".
<br>In Lineage, the popular game played in Korea, the avatars have Western<br>faces. My reflection about the US dominance was the sad constatation<br>we are still reproducing an old fashioned model where<br>heteronormativity and "whitness" rule.
<br>Ana<br><br>On 3/1/07, Julian Dibbell <<a href="mailto:julian.dibbell@gmail.com">julian.dibbell@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>> Michel:<br>><br>> The most reliable source for figures about online worlds is Bruce
<br>> Woodcock's MMOGchart.com, a paradise of market data and charts that<br>> covers nearly every commercial MMO ever released. Unfortunately Bruce<br>> doesn't break things down by corporate nationality, but I did some
<br>> follow-up research through Wikipedia et al, and it turns out you're<br>> right to be skeptical: The U.S. may dominate this market's supply<br>> side, but the dominance isn't even close to 100%.<br>
><br>> Here's the breakdown:<br>><br>> There are 39 titles listed on MMOGchart.com, not counting sequels. Of<br>> those, 24 were developed by U.S. companies. That's just a little more<br>> than 60%. If you leave out
U.S. games with non-U.S. publishers<br>> (France's Vivendi and Ubisoft, for instance, market several U.S.-made<br>> MMOs, as does Korea's NCSoft), the number of titles goes down to 17,<br>> or less than 45%.
<br>><br>> These numbers tell us nothing about market share, of course, but from<br>> that perspective the picture doesn't look much different. If you look<br>> at the market-share chart for subscription-based MMOs
<br>> (<a href="http://www.mmogchart.com/chart7.html">http://www.mmogchart.com/chart7.html</a>), you see World of Warcraft (a<br>> Franco-U.S. production) with a crushing 52.9%. But even with WoW<br>> pulling that much weight,
U.S.-made games get only 61.3% of the<br>> market. Games developed in Korea, the U.K., Japan, Iceland, and France<br>> get 34.3% (with the remaining 3.3% swept into an unalyzable "All<br>> others" category).
<br>><br>> And keep in mind that this is only subscription-based games. There is<br>> a hugely popular class of Asian MMOs that get their revenues from item<br>> sales and so forth, and Bruce lists them separately, since it's hard
<br>> to compare 'active subscribers' to the 'average concurrent users'<br>> figure typically used to measure these games. But back-of-the-envelope<br>> calculations suggest that adding these games in to the mix would
<br>> create a picture in which U.S. MMOs' market share is considerably less<br>> than 50%.<br>><br>> Finally, I'll point out that Bruce, for whatever reason, doesn't even<br>> mention several very popular online game worlds aimed at children or
<br>> teens, such as Neopets, Club Penguin, and Habbo Hotel. These three<br>> come off the top of my head, and their creators are, respectively,<br>> British, Canadian, and Finnish.<br>><br>> Julian<br>>
<br>><br>><br>> On 3/1/07, Michel Bauwens <<a href="mailto:michelsub2004@gmail.com">michelsub2004@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>> > Would be curious to any pointers confirming that the U.S. is responsible for
<br>> > almost 100% of computer games and online worlds ...<br>> ><br>> > Recently, someone mentioned something like 'most Africans are now connected<br>> > with mobile phones'. I checked, it is only 10%.
<br>> ><br>> > Michel Bauwens<br>> ><br>> ><br>> > On 2/28/07, Ana Valdés <<a href="mailto:agora158@gmail.com">agora158@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>> > > That's exact my point when I refered to my short experience in SL. I
<br>> > > think the US (where almost 100 procent of computer games and online<br>> > > worlds are created) has a problem with the reproduction of the nuclear<br>> > > family and the wishing of a kind of Barbie/Ken archetype where the
<br>> > > same house, the same furniture and the same tables and chairs are<br>> > > copied or cloned.<br>> > > In SL you can find hundreds of reproductions of Le Corbusier or of<br>> > > Frank Lloyd Right, it's as the Sims (the popular computer game who is
<br>> > > the most clear "parent" of Second Life, has discovered architecture<br>> > > and city planning.<br>> > > When you have characters who fly what's the point making stairs or
<br>> > > walls? Or to design roads or motorways?<br>> > > For me SL is a kind of perverse reproduction of life but without<br>> > > death, sweat, smells or poverty.<br>> > > In Everquest, the online game I usually played for several years, I
<br>> > > was playing a female avatar and another player, a man playing another<br>> > > female avatar, asked me to marry "him".<br>> > > The marriage thing was a cool thing in EQ, where the weddings in the
<br>> > > game were attended by guests from the whole virtual world. I have<br>> > > attended marriages between vampyres and elfs, centaurs and frogs.<br>> > > We asked the "game masters" to come and marry us, it was Sony's
<br>> > > employees who acted as priests or civil servants and who performed the<br>> > > ceremonies.<br>> > > We got a letter, very polite, but they refused us the right to be<br>> > > married, "two women avatars can't be married. It could upset a lot of
<br>> > > other players who could experience that as offensive".<br>> > > We, Charles, my friend, and me, could not believe what we read. We<br>> > > played as wizards and shamans, we fought demons and zombies, we lived
<br>> > > in a fantasy world where magic and phantasy played an enormous roll.<br>> > > Did they mean that two female avatars were "not natural", but all the<br>> > > other stuff was it???
<br>> > > We argued with them for months and we dropped the idea, but it<br>> > > strenghtened my these about online worlds as very conservative and<br>> > > oldfashioned.<br>> > > Ana<br>
> > ><br>> > > ps. the description of the marriage it's a bit of my research about<br>> > > Gender in the Online Games, I am writing a book which it's going to be<br>> > > released in this Spring, sadly, only in Swedish and Spanish for the
<br>> > > moment.<br>> > ><br>> > > On 2/27/07, Brooke Knight <<a href="mailto:brooke_knight@emerson.edu">brooke_knight@emerson.edu</a>> wrote:<br>> > > > Hi all:<br>> > > >
<br>> > > > I'm an inveterate lurker on the list, but I have to pick up on Steven's<br>> > > > comment a few days ago about how he gave a lecture about SL, both in the<br>> > > > "real" world and the "virtual" world of Second Life. We here at Emerson
<br>> > > > College are currently engaged in the same thing -- as it is opening up<br>> > as an<br>> > > > educational space. We have students cranking away at building what are<br>> > > > essentially avatars of our buildings. In fact, we have an event
<br>> > tomorrow,<br>> > > > where both Trebor and Ulises will be speaking at Emerson and on Second<br>> > Life,<br>> > > > on the Emerson College Island, Emerson Island (145, 109, 23). Come by
<br>> > at 7<br>> > > > eastern and see if it works.<br>> > > ><br>> > > > In this case, it will be inside the Bordy Theater on the island. In the<br>> > > > "real" world (I've never been comfortable with the distinction), the
<br>> > Bordy<br>> > > > Theater is inside of a building alongside other buildings of the same<br>> > height<br>> > > > and size. On Emerson Island, It stands out as one of the only objects
<br>> > > > there.<br>> > > ><br>> > > > So, I ask -- why is it that there seems to be a need to reproduce items<br>> > that<br>> > > > already exist? Is a replica of a real-world place the best way to convey
<br>> > a<br>> > > > message, even if it doesn't work in SL? How is that message different<br>> > in<br>> > > > SL?<br>> > > ><br>> > > > I'm just worried that we continue to experience the tyranny of the
<br>> > metaphor,<br>> > > > as we have so many times in digital media.<br>> > > ><br>> > > > Best,<br>> > > ><br>> > > > Brooke<br>> > > ><br>
> > > ><br>> > > ><br>> > > > Brooke A. Knight<br>> > > ><br>> > > > Assistant Professor of New Media<br>> > > ><br>> > > > Department of Visual and Media Arts
<br>> > > ><br>> > > > Emerson College<br>> > > ><br>> > > > 617-824-8760<br>> > > ><br>> > > > <a href="mailto:brooke_knight@emerson.edu">brooke_knight@emerson.edu
</a><br>> > > ><br>> > > > <a href="http://www.brookeknight.com">www.brookeknight.com</a><br>> > > ><br>> > > ><br>> > > > _______________________________________________
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<a href="http://p2pfoundation.net">http://p2pfoundation.net</a>; Blog, at <a href="http://blog.p2pfoundation.net">http://blog.p2pfoundation.net</a>; Newsletter, at <a href="http://integralvisioning.org/index.php?topic=p2p">
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http://poynder.blogspot.com/2006/09/p2p-very-core-of-world-to-come.html</a>; video interview, at <a href="http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2006/09/29/network_collaboration_peer_to_peer.htm">http://www.masternewmedia.org/news/2006/09/29/network_collaboration_peer_to_peer.htm
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