Everybody Alone Together Now
A version of "Everybody Along Together Now: Social Netowrking and Spymaster" was originally published on the Big Spaceship Think Blog. July, 2009
In late May, arcane tweets about buying weapons and assassinating people began showing up in my Twitter feed. I asked what was up and received an invite to join a spy ring and play Spymaster.
Opinions are divided on how ‘social’ social networking is. This Twitter-based spy game presents an opportunity to look at why.
The social value of Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter can be outweighed by reputation games, where people do things just to be seen. Watching and being watched can be comforting – and addictive. It drives a great deal of online game play. Despite assumptions that people play MMOs (massively multiplayer online games) like Spymaster for the social experience of gaming with others, research suggests a more solitary experience enriched by the presence of, if not the meaningful interaction with, other players.
Researcher Nick Yee identified this as an “alone together” experience, meaning we’re playing in the same space, but we’re not really playing with each other. What is the draw of playing “alone together”?
Looking at the role-playing MMO World of Warcraft, Yee observes that "players have important roles beyond providing direct support and camaraderie in the context of quest groups: they also provide an audience, a sense of social presence, and a spectacle.” He said this trio of factors “can help explain the appeal of being ‘alone together’ in multiplayer games… MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role-playing games) are in essence reputation games.”
Social networking is often motivated by a similar focus on audience, social presence, and spectacle, making it somewhat of a natural fit for MMOs. Players can engage with a game that caters to their online behavior, and game designers can access a conveniently networked mass of potential players. Spymaster quickly reached a broad audience by using the Twitter API to support game play. (Its automated tweets also ended up annoying plenty of non-players, but I’ll get to that later.)
I chose to play Spymaster because the espionage theme intrigued me, and the minimal, sleek site design stood out. Some tasks available to level-1 players include forging passports and bribing a mob boss. Performing tasks successfully earns the player experience points and money but also depletes energy and health. The size of a player’s Twitter network essentially impacts their ability to perform tasks effectively.
After a week and a half of playing, I reached level 21. My modest spy ring of 130 included 24 spymasters, meaning that of the 130 people following me on Twitter, 24 are also playing the game. The strength of my spy ring increasingly impacted my effectiveness in the game, and thus how easily I could continue to level up. Spy rings matter. I started to follow Twitter accounts set up just for playing spymaster, those of players past level 30 and attack sums 300 times mine.
The clever spy theme aside, I wouldn’t play Spymaster this persistently if the other players weren’t real people. Game play consists of one-button actions around simple strategies. There isn’t much incentive to keep playing, aside from the occasional assassination attempt on my spy ring. That’s when I get to assess the damage by reviewing the attacker’s stats; spy ring size, level, attack sum, etc. I even find myself fanaticizing about how impressive my stats are every time I level up. Reputation motives me to play, watching others and knowing others are watching me.
I do the same thing on Twitter. It’s hard not to size someone up based on their followers, the ratio of followers to those they are following, what they are retweeting, who’s responding… Yee’s assessment of why people are drawn to “alone together” experiences holds up even when applied to Twitter’s more practical potential for conversation and exchanging information. Twitter offers “…an audience, a sense of social presence, and a spectacle.”
If similar phenomena are driving participation in both Spymaster and Twitter, why was there such a backlash when Spymaster activity spread across Twitter?
Some find the tweets annoying because they are automated. I would argue that even if Spymaster tweets where written by people playing the game, non-players would still get upset because the tweets come from an in-game persona. Real life and in-game roles on Twitter may both be motivated by ‘alone together’ principles, but the standards for assessing and gaining reputation in each role are dramatically different. When these standards are played out in the same space, they create noise. What’s the solution? Segregation. Spymaster rages on, even though most non-players no longer receive tweets from the game. Tweeting activity adds a bonus to game play but is not essential to it. (I’ve turned that feature off.) Hardcore players are using Twitter accounts dedicated to Spymaster, an option not readily available for Facebook based MMOs. Many spy rings now boast tens of thousands of members. The largest is approaching one million.
Meaningful connections over social networking sites are incredibly difficult to achieve. Since social networking is influenced by “alone together” principles, successful social networking should take into consideration the three main incentives that Yee identified for participating in these experiences. Cater to an interest in audience, social presence, and spectacle. Then spend time learning what the rules are for the particular reputation system you want to play, connect or perform in. These rules differ among platforms and groups. Playing smartly to varying incentives can yield different results. That’s not to say you need to play by the rules. The noise Spymaster produced left a bitter taste in the mouths of those who had no interest in playing, but creating a lot of noise effectively recruited a large player base.
In late May, arcane tweets about buying weapons and assassinating people began showing up in my Twitter feed. I asked what was up and received an invite to join a spy ring and play Spymaster.
Opinions are divided on how ‘social’ social networking is. This Twitter-based spy game presents an opportunity to look at why.
The social value of Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter can be outweighed by reputation games, where people do things just to be seen. Watching and being watched can be comforting – and addictive. It drives a great deal of online game play. Despite assumptions that people play MMOs (massively multiplayer online games) like Spymaster for the social experience of gaming with others, research suggests a more solitary experience enriched by the presence of, if not the meaningful interaction with, other players.
Researcher Nick Yee identified this as an “alone together” experience, meaning we’re playing in the same space, but we’re not really playing with each other. What is the draw of playing “alone together”?
Looking at the role-playing MMO World of Warcraft, Yee observes that "players have important roles beyond providing direct support and camaraderie in the context of quest groups: they also provide an audience, a sense of social presence, and a spectacle.” He said this trio of factors “can help explain the appeal of being ‘alone together’ in multiplayer games… MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role-playing games) are in essence reputation games.”
Social networking is often motivated by a similar focus on audience, social presence, and spectacle, making it somewhat of a natural fit for MMOs. Players can engage with a game that caters to their online behavior, and game designers can access a conveniently networked mass of potential players. Spymaster quickly reached a broad audience by using the Twitter API to support game play. (Its automated tweets also ended up annoying plenty of non-players, but I’ll get to that later.)
I chose to play Spymaster because the espionage theme intrigued me, and the minimal, sleek site design stood out. Some tasks available to level-1 players include forging passports and bribing a mob boss. Performing tasks successfully earns the player experience points and money but also depletes energy and health. The size of a player’s Twitter network essentially impacts their ability to perform tasks effectively.
After a week and a half of playing, I reached level 21. My modest spy ring of 130 included 24 spymasters, meaning that of the 130 people following me on Twitter, 24 are also playing the game. The strength of my spy ring increasingly impacted my effectiveness in the game, and thus how easily I could continue to level up. Spy rings matter. I started to follow Twitter accounts set up just for playing spymaster, those of players past level 30 and attack sums 300 times mine.
The clever spy theme aside, I wouldn’t play Spymaster this persistently if the other players weren’t real people. Game play consists of one-button actions around simple strategies. There isn’t much incentive to keep playing, aside from the occasional assassination attempt on my spy ring. That’s when I get to assess the damage by reviewing the attacker’s stats; spy ring size, level, attack sum, etc. I even find myself fanaticizing about how impressive my stats are every time I level up. Reputation motives me to play, watching others and knowing others are watching me.
I do the same thing on Twitter. It’s hard not to size someone up based on their followers, the ratio of followers to those they are following, what they are retweeting, who’s responding… Yee’s assessment of why people are drawn to “alone together” experiences holds up even when applied to Twitter’s more practical potential for conversation and exchanging information. Twitter offers “…an audience, a sense of social presence, and a spectacle.”
If similar phenomena are driving participation in both Spymaster and Twitter, why was there such a backlash when Spymaster activity spread across Twitter?
Some find the tweets annoying because they are automated. I would argue that even if Spymaster tweets where written by people playing the game, non-players would still get upset because the tweets come from an in-game persona. Real life and in-game roles on Twitter may both be motivated by ‘alone together’ principles, but the standards for assessing and gaining reputation in each role are dramatically different. When these standards are played out in the same space, they create noise. What’s the solution? Segregation. Spymaster rages on, even though most non-players no longer receive tweets from the game. Tweeting activity adds a bonus to game play but is not essential to it. (I’ve turned that feature off.) Hardcore players are using Twitter accounts dedicated to Spymaster, an option not readily available for Facebook based MMOs. Many spy rings now boast tens of thousands of members. The largest is approaching one million.
Meaningful connections over social networking sites are incredibly difficult to achieve. Since social networking is influenced by “alone together” principles, successful social networking should take into consideration the three main incentives that Yee identified for participating in these experiences. Cater to an interest in audience, social presence, and spectacle. Then spend time learning what the rules are for the particular reputation system you want to play, connect or perform in. These rules differ among platforms and groups. Playing smartly to varying incentives can yield different results. That’s not to say you need to play by the rules. The noise Spymaster produced left a bitter taste in the mouths of those who had no interest in playing, but creating a lot of noise effectively recruited a large player base.