Virtual Local Manufacturing Communities

CHAPTER 2

The Universe of Online Virtual Worlds

In virtual worlds of all the kinds described in this book, people may work together to achieve goals, doing so through their computers and across Internet. In nearly all cases they are represented on their computer screens by avatars or characters, which are user-controlled virtual representations of humans. Enduring groups of players, typically called guilds, share private communication systems and often private virtual territory, thus simulating corporations or neighborhoods in our so-called real world. In several MMOs, guilds may set up their own crafting stations, comparable to small factories, and collectively produce virtual products of value to their avatars, such as weapons and armor, but ...