In short, synthetic worlds put ordinary humanity in a very strange place, producing forces that deserve hardheaded attention, in my view. All things that matter to ordinary people - their loves, their crusades, their morals, and their material assets - may now have a home in a place other than Earth. As Lawrence Lessig (1999) describes it, the unusual thing about cyberspace is that we can be both here and there at the same time, and the place that is "there" can be constructed, essentially, however we might like. Thus, all of our interests are the same as they ever were, but the environment in which we pursue them has become untethered from the Earth environment with which we have become so comfortable.
-- Edward Castronova
The fading of boundaries between our world and the synthetic worlds of cyberspace is what justifies serious inquiry, in my view. As the lines disappear, we move toward a state in which there is really no barrier to a complete translation of every interpersonal human phenomenon on Earth into the digital space.
-- Edward Castronova
If large numbers of German laborers decide to work in France, the GDP of both France and Germany changes significantly. Similarly, if large numbers of Earth laborers decide [to] work in cyberspace - by which I mean, spend their time creating digital goods rather than ones made of metal and plastic and cloth - the GDP of both the synthetic world and the Earth must change, significantly.
-- Edward Castronova
As one surveys the amount of outside influence synthetic worlds have - significantly changing the real-world institutions that some 10 million people or more are involved in - it becomes evident that this is quite a powerful toolbox. Think of it. Here is a form of practical art, a design skill, that can build places whose effects radiate outward into the daily lives of millions of people. Those who are hungry for connection go there to find groups to join. Those hungry for a sense of mission go to accomplish things. Those who feel trapped go there to explore. Those who feel dominated by their environment go there to make a difference. A breathtakingly complex system of game mechanics and AI programs provides the user with experiences not available elsewhere. It does this by forming the community of users into a society that does things our Earth society does not. It also provides users with content and AI-based relationships that are hard to find on Earth. In all these ways, synthetic worlds provide users with emotions that can be both good and bad, much like art or any other form of constructed experience. Unlike these other forms, however, synthetic worlds powerfully validate these emotions, by creating them in a community of like-feeling humans.
Given their emotional purchase, it should be no surprise that the social environments within synthetic worlds have begun to meld into the social environment of the Earth. No frontier is truly separate from its homeland; one dramatically affects the other. The rules of the game in synthetic worlds serve only to create a certain kind of society. When that society interacts with the society of Earth, which operates under its own set of rules, the rule sets of both systems begin to change and adapt, as institutional theorists would predict. How the rules evolve will determine what role synthetic worlds will play in the daily lives of people.
-- Edward Castronova
No frontier is truly separate from its homeland; one dramatically affects the other.
-- Edward Castronova
I would argue that these processes of value creation have advanced so far, even at this early date, that almost everything known as a "virtual" commodity - the gold piece, the magic helmets, the deadly spaceship, and so on - is now certifiably real. Indeed, as I argued in the introduction, the term virtual is losing its meaning. Perhaps it never had meaning. The things happening online have always been literal human things; there was never anything metaphorical, as-if, or subjunctive about them. At first it may have been convenient in many ways to think of networked human interaction as only a model of the real thing. Now, however, and specifically in the arena of synthetic worlds, the allegedly "virtual" is blending so smoothly with the allegedly "real" as to make the distinction increasingly difficult to see. There's nothing revolutionary in this, though. It is merely a recognition that these things were always as real as anything else in the human culturesphere.
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