UCSD virtual worlds event Feb 8th

 Posted by (Visited 8211 times)  Game talk
Jan 312007
 

Here’s the email announcement — this is at U Cal San Diego, btw. I’ll be there on stage at some point.

Serious Play: MMO gaming, real money, and social worlds A Discussion

Thursday, February 8, 2007, 4-6:30pm
Atkinson Hall, Auditorium

Featured Speaker:

Julian Dibbell (author of Play Money and My Tiny Life) “Play Money: Gold Farms, Polar Bear Rugs, and the World-Historical Relevance of Game Studies”

Continue reading »

Entropia ATM cards go away

 Posted by (Visited 7911 times)  Game talk
Jan 312007
 

VirtualWorldlets is reporting that the bank that provided the service has been dropped from the larger MasterCard network. Therefore, Entropia can’t use them as an ATM provider anymore. The reason?

MasterCard’s action came after the New York Community Credit Union and the card provider, CardOne Plus, had a series of run-ins with a regulatory body, the Financial Institutions Commission of British Columbia, which, in its fourth and last action, a penalty order, called North York a “rogue financial institution” having “shown complete disregard for the laws of British Columbia.”

According to the article, MindArk is in talks with another bank to get up and running with the ATM cards again.

A clash of models

 Posted by (Visited 11259 times)  Game talk
Jan 302007
 

3pointd.com reports that a Second Life server emu is out there, raising the question of what the world looks like when there’s multiple servers to log into. There’s already been some discussion of what happens to the current Linden business model on the day that there’s lots of hosting choices — sort of like a much more sober version of the issues that arose after the CopyBot scandal.

Continue reading »