Journal of Virtual Worlds Research – Intersection of Real and Virtual Economies
Social Structure
Impacts Influences
Invents, Designs, Uses Human Agency
Constrains, Enables
Technology
Figure 3: Systemic Reinforcing Relation Between Technology, Agency and Structure
Steinkuehler (2006) offers the potential for the unexpected (which can be represented as Figure 4) which we can derive from her idea of the "mangle of play:" a messy mix that means one cannot predict outcomes a priori. We can thus portray the creation of MMOGs and their economies as the intermixing of structure, technology, and agency that can sometimes produce a slightly unexpected result, of which we have seen some minor examples in relation to in-game prices and information failures. Social Structure
Technology
Human Agency Figure 4: "Mangle of Play" Relation Between Technology, Agency and Structure
The overall picture painted by the results in the paper shows the need for some combination of the two views but the last, at least, argues the need for continuing research as the field evolves and keeps throwing up the odd unanticipated outcome.
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