I have been playing a lot of World of Warcraft lately, purely for a writing assignment you understand. My first thoughts are that it was going to be relatively easy to put down, but it’s suprisingly addictive. One thought occured as I chatted to other players is that World of Warcraft is basically a social network. OK, it’s not the primary purpose of the site but it is definately a spin off benefit.
The makers of the game could easily knock up Facebook type system where they could expose players to advertising messages or simply improve retention rates. People could stop playing the game and yet still use the social site. The problem with any such social site is that it would be very insular and heavy with jargon, creating a barrier to new members, but would that matter as most people would come though the game.
Second Life is definately a social network, having not used it I do not feel empowered to comment further, however what I have read about it seems that social interaction is its primary function. Personally I am not attracted to such systems, the best social network I know of is the pub, but I doubt they are going to replicate that experience online anythime soon. I think the media are in love with Second Life more than the general public.
Maybe I will give second life a go and report back, but what’s the point when you can’t kill an orc with your trusty axe?
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I think thats what they’ve relied on really, to be honest. Because I quit for awhile, and the only reason I went back was because I had missed the friends that I had made while playing the game. The questing, and instances (although when you get up to TK and SSC, it’s nice being ranked so high up) aren’t what you miss from the game. It’s the people.
Which is my point, it’s maybe the game which first attracts you, but it’s the social aspect that will keep you there.
Thanks for the comment
It definitely is. The whole point of the game is to level up by killing stuff and doing quests. And most of that is done in Parties full of strangers or Guild Members. You’ve got to work together with other people to accomplish things.
It’s more so a new type of social networking than it is a myspace-like social networking thing. Social Networking 2.0, if you will.
The problem with WOW is that it sucks away your life. You can’t play it for 5 minutes at a time like you can with HALO. I’ve lost many people in my life to that game. Ha.
Second Life–though I’ve not played either–seems addictive. People quit their real jobs to become wedding planners for Second Life. It sounds ridiculous, but it happens. The difference, I have found thus far, between WOW and 2nd Life, is that you continuously lose money in WOW and you have the opportunity to make money in Second Life, although you can buy things as well.
You should have fun researching further.
Definitely agree with you on that one, I know plenty of people who would have stopped playing the game long ago if they hadn’t made friends there.
You get to a point in the game where you’re no longer doing pure questing and leveling and you find yourself doing more instances-with-the-guild, or even just standing around in a city chatting to the guildies.
Yup. It’s a social network.
I have been playing WoW over 3 years now. Prior to this I changed games on nearly a monthly basis. The biggest single factor keeping my interest is the social interaction. My guild members and I know each other’s personal lives as well as our game stats.
I have seen many people come and go… nearly everyone comes back eventually.
It is without question another form of social networking.
http://www.siliconera.com/2006/03/25/world-of-warcraft-as-a-resume-builder/
I think that adds to the whole idea of it. That guy hired by Yahoo was a Guild-master in WoW.
Yeah, WoW is such a time-vampire. You can’t just play for 30 minutes. lol
In a way I guess you could say it is. To me a social network is really any type of interaction between a number of individuals…