Re: [xmca] latour

Hi all,

Luiz (or anyone), I find it ironic that one of the reasons I quit World of
Warcraft was because I didn't feel like I was *doing* anything, that I
didn't have *enough* agency. Contrast WoW with good single-player RPGs, for
example, where it is much more true that the player/character can
effect/affect the world with real game-state changing consequences.

Would a single-player RPG be much more like a book or less like a book? On
the one hand you have more agency and control over where the story goes (not
like book), but on the other, the world doesn't persist and change when you
aren't playing (like a book). Add to this stuff you can find on
http://www.fanfiction.net and suddenly even static texts become dynamic
ongoing stories across multiple texts. Layer on top of all this the debate
about whether players in general even care about the story or if they are
playing to game the system. There seems like there ought to be some sort of
weight given to why players play.

Just food for thought. :)

Also, for my dissertation I plan on looking at Hutchins's portrayal of
distributed cognition and seeing if it applies to how a raid group in WoW
works. Like Luiz, I'm just starting this avenue of thought (and honestly, I
feel like everyone knows more than me) coming from (and leaving behind
because it lacks so much sociocultural allowances) game theory (individual
vs. collective incentives).

I wonder if ANT vs. Activity Theory would be a good comparison to look at.

mark

On Sat, Mar 8, 2008 at 2:09 PM, Kevin Rocap <Kevin.Rocap@liu.edu> wrote:

> Dear Luiz,
>
> Thanks for the article; I look forward to it! Ah, Paris...have only
> ever been in the airport en route to Sri Lanka.
>
> Not sure I think reality and fiction are opposites, or, in Mike's terms,
> an either/or....can also be a both/and, to my way of thinking. Real and
> fictitious seems perfectly possible, even probable. I think Harry
> Potter is real in important senses of the word, especially in terms of
> having a measurable economic impact on the world. And, then, of course,
> there 's G-d. Real?
>
> Sounds though like we may be saying similar things. I don't
> counter-point reality and fiction which is, perhaps, like your point
> that there is no absolute view-from-nowhere distinction between reality
> and fiction. But then what is unreal? What were you...or were
> you...counter-pointing online games as being like to other people that
> makes you want to argue for them as "real worlds"? Counter-pointing
> "real" and "virtual"? Or "real" and "something else"?
>
> Anyway, I'll be digesting in Brooklyn
>
> In Peace,
> K.
>
> Luiz Carlos Baptista wrote:
> > Food for thought indeed. I'll spend next week in Paris digesting it :)
> >
> > As far as I understand what it's going on in this thread, it is the idea
> > that agents need not be persons. Or, to put it in the analytic flavour
> I've
> > been savouring in the last few years, being person is a sufficient,
> thought
> > not necessary, condition for being an agent. If that is the point, I
> must
> > say I am inclined to agree.
> >
> > As a contribution to the discussion, I attach a recent paper by the
> analytic
> > philosopher Peter Ludlow (who also happens to be a cyber buff), in which
> he
> > defends a "contextualist" view of what counts as real. Basically, the
> idea
> > is that what counts as real depends on the context, so there is no
> absolute,
> > view-from-nowhere distinction between reality and fiction.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Luiz
> >
> > **********
> > "The brain is a wonderful thing. Everybody should have one."
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu]
> On
> > Behalf Of Kevin Rocap
> > Sent: sábado, 8 de Março de 2008 19:47
> > To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
> > Subject: Re: [xmca] latour
> >
> > Dear Martin,
> >
> > Hm. Definite food for thought.
> >
> > At some level since Greimas's usage is targeted at fictional characters
> > as "actors" and, I guess, the deep narrative grammatical/semantic
> > features of those characters (???) as "actants", isn't this, in a way,
> > parallel to the roles of motivations, influences and, dare I say,
> > objects for a live person/live people? Although I'm not oblivious to
> > the possibility of treating live folks as actors and these things we
> > commonly refer to as motivations, objects, etc. as "actants", perhaps
> > you see what I'm grappling with?
> >
> > And of course the "characters" in online games are a kind of hybrid,
> > being caught in a narrative determined, significantly, by the parameters
> > and affordances of the game, but being avatars of living persons (some
> > of them anyway) as well as having potentially scripted interactions or
> > mixed scripted and "live" interactions (e.g., Luiz's passive or scripted
> > character, in his absence, could be dealt a blow by an avatar controlled
> > by a living person). But even the "objects" for the living person are
> > forged significantly by the parameters and affordances of the underlying
> > game narrative, no?
> >
> > Part of me wants to pull this out of online gaming too. Since online
> > gaming, being story-like, does, indeed, resemble aspects of novels,
> > etc. And how do we know what characters in a novel are doing while the
> > book is on the shelf anyway? Even if they do re-assemble themselves
> > into predictable roles and actions when we re-open the book? (they may
> > simply not be interested in our interference in their affairs -
> > fictional autonomy as it were)
> >
> > But I think what we are discussing could be described as well with
> > regard to things like "smart agents". We, live folks, (and I swear to
> > you I am one ;-), do you believe me?) - anyway, we, live folks "educate"
> > smart agents to troll the info-verse for websites, newsgroups, news
> > items, that may, presumably, be of interest to us, and they do that
> > while we're absent. So a kind of "real world" of smart agents, a la
> > your delibrations, Luiz?
> >
> > Thanks all.
> >
> > In Peace,
> > K. (Kevin Rocap's avatar - Kevin's busy today packing, by the way)
> >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
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-- 
Mark Chen | PhD student | Games researcher/designer | Tech instructor
College of Education - Ed Tech | University of Washington - Seattle
My games research and life in academia blog: markdangerchen.net
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