Blog Assignment # 4

In the book, Synthetic Worlds, by Edward Castronova, he takes a look at the online game industry and shows us how online games have grown to much more than just the realm for “computer geeks.” This book also shows some compelling opinions on how online gaming is in fact a “lucrative staple of the entertainment industry.” I love how the book shows how many different types of people and age groups can be found completely submerged in the online world. Learning about the whole industry of gaming was probably the most eye opening. This is a field that is about to explode with more and more people being introduced to the gaming world everyday. There are so many different types of games and other online hobbies out there that it is now allowing a broader group of people to be interested in this synthetic world. I think that Castronova’s point where he is exploring the “long-term social consequences of online gaming and posing the question of: If players can inhabit worlds that are more alluring and gratifying than reality, how can the real world compete?” I like this question not only because I was thought about this point as well, but also because I have some light to shine on this thought.

There were many arguments and different topics that were discussed in this book. But, one topic that really intrigued me was the part about online relationship. This part really caught my attention due to the fact that I see not only online relationships as a big problem but the fact that kids today spend so much time talking to one another on the computer rather than face to face. I see this affecting their social skills in the “real world” and as a result making them rather boring to talk to. To back my thought up Castronova says in the beginning of chapter 4, “ It is perhaps shocking to think that, even at their comparatively small size of a dozen million or so participants, synthetic worlds are already beginning to affect the “outside” world, by which I mean the ordinary institutions of human connection: marriages, the web, markets and companies.” He furthers this by saying that “the institution of online friendship takes away time from the institution of offline friendship.” I believe what he is referring to here is that, many prefer to talk to each other online than face to face these days. I see this everyday between my friends and we are even seeing this taken a step farther in the fact that people today are always texting each other. Literally I have seen friends be within feet of each other and rather text each other than talk face to face. What is this saying about our society and where is this leading us to?

I have to say that in the introduction to this book I immediately liked this author due to the main fact that he right off the bat admitted that he felt a bit strange about writing this book, where I felt strange not only having to read this book but also taking this class. However, throughout the book he made me see how much this market is growing and how “the phenomenon of MMORPGs” is taking our society by storm. This is a topic that I would have never spent the time of day even thinking about or even reading about but from all of the information and stats that Castronova presented to me…I guess this is a topic that I should educate myself in. It is hard for me to say that I see much importance of these MMORPGs to the real world because in my eyes I just do not see them helping the world. I read how these games are taking over people lives and making them not deal with their “real world” responsibilities, so to me I just do not see them in a very positive light. I understand that some people need that escape from reality so I can see where the appeal would be in these. However, I also strongly disagree with running away from your problems, it is not a good way to build character or with problem solving. The “real world” is not perfect and part of life is realizing that and dealing with it. So for these games to give people this false sense of utopia, to me is not a good thing. I am not sure where these MMORPGs are going to take our society in the future, I can only hope for the best.