Archive for Sunday, December 30, 2007
Real-world politics enter virtual World of Warcraft
December 30, 2007
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SANTA ANA, CALIF. — A New Year’s Day rally is brewing in Irvine by way of Azeroth.
A group of Ron Paul supporters are using forums and a simple Web site to organize a march in the World of Warcraft computer game in support of the Republican presidential hopeful.
Azeroth is a kingdom in the mythical world of the massively multiplayer online game made by Blizzard Entertainment in Irvine, Calif. More than nine million players pay a subscription fee to play WoW.
The rally will be led from Ironforge to Stormwind by a group of players (a “guild”) named “RP Revolution.” Organizers used an online discussion board at ronpaulforums.com Wednesday to spread the message. Two days later they built a Web page for the rally on revolutioni.st, a site that claims to support Ron Paul’s beliefs, but that is careful to disclose that the candidate “does not necessarily support all the beliefs” on the site.
This is not the first time politics have intertwined with gaming. Already Machinima.com has made orcs, shamans and mages mouth the words from an actual presidential debate, complete with a Warcraft-version of CNN’s Anderson Cooper.
Both of those political presences inside the game go against advice written on GameSpy, a Web site operated out of Costa Mesa, Calif., that reviews and tracks gaming. When the virtual war game launched in November 2004, GameSpy’s Allen Rausch wrote a do’s and don’ts that included “Don’t: Bring real-world politics into the game.”
“We play World of Warcraft to get away from the real world ... So whether you’re a Republican or Democrat, blue-stater or red-stater, liberal or conservative, let’s leave the sloganeering and yelling on Rush Limbaugh’s show and in Michael Moore movies where they belong. In World of Warcraft, we should all come together for just one political purpose beating the snot out of the gnomes,” Rausch wrote.
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30 December 2007 at 8:09 a.m.
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Ragingbear (Anonymous) says…
omgwtflolololo!!!1 Vt 4 Rhon Paal! He's a lvl 70 Orcish Ranger.
lfg white house, need leader.
30 December 2007 at 8:32 a.m.
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devieh (Anonymous) says…
yep just spammers
ron paul 2008
30 December 2007 at 9:07 a.m.
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classclown (Anonymous) says…
Ron Paul the nerd's choice?
All of your White House are belong to us?
30 December 2007 at 9:20 a.m.
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snap_pop_no_crackle (Anonymous) says…
RuPaul!
30 December 2007 at 9:43 a.m.
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Ragingbear (Anonymous) says…
~~Ron Paul the nerd's choice?~~
No. It's Ron Paul, the Horde's Choice.