I believe that virtual world biopower politics should not be treated separately from real world biopower affairs. What is happening online is not just increasingly coinciding with the RL, it is directly being affected by it. While the farming of digital gold and trading of digital goods is unique and new frontier for commerce and the companies running such farms, it is also the livelihood for the folks doing the farming. The attacks and ambushes on farmers I imagine greatly detract from their ability to meet their quota. This impact can be felt monetarily or lead to loss of employment for farmers. I doubt that these repercussions are ever a consideration for the WoW neighborhood watch. While I do agree that bots running around the MMOs and that the selling of characters can undermine community formation, I believe Blizzard founders should take another trip to sensitivity training – perhaps the EULA should be revised to include protection for those that may lose their livelihood due to an attack on their “work.” One of the reasons I am being so sensitive to this issue is because the game has you start our by selecting a “race” and a “class.” By funneling all users through this process, and with the selection of different classes landing you in different WoW states, the game is surely “reconstituting the basic corporeal and psychic aspects of human existence,” and because of such the game creators should be sensitive as well to what that means.
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