[Air-l] MMRPG cites, study (Re: Greetings and Games)

[Dmitri Williams]

Federico-

In addition to the good cites Lisbeth suggested, there is a study out 
of Simon Fraser U (which seems to have a good number of MA students 
interested and working on games in general) which has interesting 
results:
http://www.sfu.ca/media-lab/onlinegaming/

You should also go straight out and buy "Avatars Offline," a 
low-budget, but thoughtful DVD documentary on MMRPG players. My 
undergraduates really enjoyed viewing and it was great as a starting 
point for effects, culture and policy discussions. It's at 
www.avatarsoffline.com

I'd also recommend reviewing the literature on MUDs and MOOs. There is 
a fair amount of material on them, even beyond Sherry Turkle's 
fascinating work in "Life on the Screen."

And if you're going to be working in this area, you should subscribe to 
the digiplay list at www.topica.com

For myself, I have a two-wave panel study of Asheron's Call 2 that will 
launch within the month (knock wood, and committee members willing), 
and should provide causal data, mostly about social networks, but some 
on general effects as well. A second study of The Sims Online is in 
negotiation.

As a sidenote, I have a draft of my survey instrument ready and in 
place at
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~dcwillia/surveys/SurveyIntro.html

If anyone is interested enough in the effects of online games over 
time, I'd love to get feedback on my survey instrument. I'm also open 
to adding a question or two (within reason), so if anyone is interested 
in collaborating, write me off-list.

Cheers,

Dmitri
****************
Dmitri Williams
Ph.D. Candidate
University of Michigan
Department of Communication Studies
dcwillia at umich.edu
http://www.umich.edu/~dcwillia