Academic interviews with dedicated WoW players

[Liara]

Hello and good morning,

As part of a seminar on virtual property (final year of law school), I'm looking for dedicated (how you define dedicated is completely up to you) WoW players who would be willing to give a written interview (via whatever viable medium they prefer). The interview will only use the name of the WoW character provided (nothing else - no names, no email/facebook/etc), and will focus on the Personhood Perspective and Labor Theory, i.e. how players view their characters (who as we know, technically belong to Blizzard), who they think the characters should belong to and why, and how they would feel if they were stripped of those characters.

The interview won't be long - I assume it would take about 15-20 minutes to answer the questions.

Oh, and of course the reason - I will be claiming that the players themselves should be the owners of the virtual property (in this case the account and all its characters), since the work that is put in along with the "relationship" they have with the characters dictate so. Having the interviews would go a long way towards helping me ascertain this claim.

Those who are interested can PM me here to work out a method of communication.
Thanks in advance (firstly for reading, then some more if you choose to assist)

Liara


Edit - As per Gimlix's suggestion, here are the questions (if you respond, please provide the name (no armory links needed) of your character of choice - otherwise I'll use the MMOChamp username by default):

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)


Thanks again to all who choose to assist!

[Liara]

Optimistic bump.

[Gimlix]

Put down question list on here, people will response faster.

[Gimlix]

Name: Gimlix

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?
If i do /played on all characters it would match to a total of: 200 days (in total of 3 years time) 200x24 = 4800 hours total

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?
Yes over the years you grow into your character and don't want to lose it, because you have been through things in real life and through game life and things you dealt with by playing your character(s), so yes i feel connected.

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?
The legal owner should remain the person who owns the account.

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?
I would feel upset and sad because i spent so much into my account but i will move on in time.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?
Yes, my childhood would dissapear.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)
A piece of art i worked hard on over my childhood.


Hope i gave you the information that you needed.

[Liara]

Thank you Gimlix!

[Ayla]

How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?
I'm at least at 2 years /played I don't care to know beyond that

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?
I'm not really sure what you're asking here. My character is a puppet, but I love my character, just like how puppeteers care for their puppets, and how their puppets have personalities. Hell, I consider [most of] my stuffed animals to be living things basically.

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?
I dont know. I accept blizzard has control, I don't think accounts should be sold, but at the same time I don't really care either way. I play by the rules, so I dont see any harm

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?
Id probably go insane. Cry for weeks, be unable to eat, work. Id slip into a huge depression, one I don't think I could recover from for a very long time. I would feel like my work was taken, Id feel like a part of me died, because it would have.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?
Small? No. Large.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)
Extension of myself mostly. Its my second life.

[Liara]

Cheers Ayla!

[timtim89]

Name - Titân

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?
I have put in total of 8615 hours of my toons I have played over the course of 6 years which equals out to 358.9 total days played plus the AFK time however much that is lol

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?
I do, I have made friends over the years that I still talk to this day. Some people only know me as my gnome or as my orc over the years we have raided/pvp with each other.

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why? I agree Blizz should be the owner of my characters on my account it is there servers we play on we agree to thier terms of service with them as well so why wouldn't they be the owners?

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?I would feel that I have wasted a massive amount of time with my life on this game and have nothing to show for it. So I think I would feel like my work would have been robbed from me if I didnt commit the infraction.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing? I would not feel as if a part of me is gone, I can walk away from the game for extened peroids of time and did not feel like something was missing in my life.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.) I feel as if my characters are a extention of my personality, even more so with which mounts I like to use titles and how you can choose to dress them. Same with chosing the name of character.

[Lochton]

Warning for next time, please do not bump your own thread.

[Temp name]

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?
Uhm.. My current main? ~10 days /played. All my mains added up? 3-400 days.

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?
My character is, to me, an extension of myself.

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?
I accepted that the character is Blizzard's the moment I made it. They are in their right to do whatever they want with it, and I, as a consumer, is in my right to stop paying them if I don't agree with what they do.

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?
I'd feel cheated yes, and I'd most likely try to appeal it as I don't feel like throwing away what is essentially a year of 24/7 work, and several 100 euros.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?
As I said, my character is in some way an extension of myself. So yes.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)
Already answered this. (It's also extremely similar to question 2, to the point of being basicly the same question)

[Trollhamaren]

Name: Amanitroll

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?
215 days 17hours, over 6 years.

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?
yes, this is not the only mmo I play, and I feel the same conecction with my characters from other games too.

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?
I am the owner, I've already payed for them.

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?
of course, and I've had this problem before with blizz, my account was hacked once some years ago while I was on vacations, when I came back my account was already banned by Blizz, it was a big problem to restore it an unbann it.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?
of course, is time and effort spent.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)
extension of myself.

[Liara]

Many thanks to everyone who replied, you have all been a tremendous help.
Feel free to keep answering, the more the merrier

[eschatological]

You can pm me with the questions as well and I'll answer. I'm a lawyer myself, and though I don't practice in IP law I obviously have a vested interest as an online game player for 2 decades now.

[Exystredofar]

Name: Memorize

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?
Across all characters roughly 9936 hours, or 414 days

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?
Yes

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?
I don't like the idea of just renting the account from Blizzard like it is now, but I don't think it would work out too well if the player was the owner.

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?
Definitely, considering the amount of time I've put into the game and everything I achieved I would be very upset.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?
Yes, although I don't know how to explain it

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)
An extension of myself

[Veggie50]

I am in need of some clarification. The "random reason" stated in these questions sounds a bit ambiguous. Do you literally mean the reason for deactivation would be random, or do you mean 'for whatever reason'. If the second, you misformulated your questionnaire so suggestively your research is completely invalid.

[Liara]

The focus isn't the reason for the loss, so much as the loss itself and what impact it would have on the player (even if the loss came from a completely legitimate reason).

[muto]

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)? I don't know I canceled my sub, so I have no way of knowing.

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"? I am the puppet master

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why? Blizzard, it's their game.

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken? Playing a game recreationally isn't work, it's play.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing? No, because the game is still in my memory.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.) a product

[Memory]

I am a jurist myself and I am interested on your approach on the topic. I would like to help, but I can't answer the questionnaire because my subscription is currently inactive and I can't answer to the first question.

[Gimlix]

Liara, i am happy that people are responding. The best luck with your project!

[Jeremypwnz]

1. How many hours have you put into your characters (overall and roughly)?

200 days on my Main, around 60 assorted days on my alts.

2. Do you feel there's more to the connection between you and your characters than just "puppeteer" and "puppet"?

No.

3. Who do you think should be the legal owner of the characters (i.e. the current situation where Blizzard owns all accounts, should the player be the owner, etc.)? Why?

Doesn't matter to me.

4. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though your work was taken?

No, though I would feel that my time has been somewhat wasted.

5. If you were to receive a message that your account has been deactivated due to *random reason*, would you feel as though a small part of you has gone missing?

No, I would just play League of Legends or something.

6. How do you view your characters? (e.g. an extension of yourself / a product you have worked on / etc.)

A product that has been polished over the years.