Study: Whyville Has Cheat Sites! Cyberbullying & Cheating in Online Worlds a Surprising Problem

Alana Semuels has an article this week in the Los Angeles Times detailing the surprising level of cyberbullying and cheating kids engage in while online. Despite chat safeguards in place in such kid-friendly worlds like Club Penguin (owned by Disney), Neopets (owned by Viacom), and Whyville (owned by Numedeon), kids often engage in cheating activities and bullying behavior. One example: account passwords are pilfered, often given by the victims in promised exchange for more virtual money or accouterments.

Even heavily restricted chat functions present levels of monitoring difficulties, as youngsters find creative ways to bypass profanity filters. Whyville flags children exchanging personal information such as their real names or phone numbers. The company blocks about 10 accounts a day due to violations.

Semuels notes UCLA doctoral student Deborah Fields and Dr. Yasmin Kafai wrote a paper on the topic for the Digital Games Research Association (DiGRA 2007). The paper is an analysis of cheat sites designed for Whyville, examining 257 sites and following one in particular over the course of eight months.

According to the paper and Whyville staff, Whyville veterans often haze newcomers by demanding rent, even though apartments there are free. Other players have figured out a combination of keyboard commands that allows them to jump into the virtual cars of strangers, which is normally allowed only through invitation. Users have claimed that elections for the Whyville Senate were rigged through stuffing of virtual ballot boxes.

Some players took advantage of an outbreak of Whypox – a virtual plague that causes avatars to sneeze and break out in boils – by selling cures that turned out to be fake.

Cheating and online thievery can go to extremes at times, such as the recent case of a teen in Habbo stealing €4000 worth of virtual furniture.

So the question arises: Are kids who figure out ways to part others of their virtual cash displaying tendencies toward larceny, or are they simply more intelligent than those who part with their cash? Certainly deception is not good, but convincing others to invest in a for-profit scheme seems a reasonable exercise. This makes for a very interesting field of study.

References:
Fields, D. A., & Kafai, Y. B. (under review). Stealing from grandma or generating cultural knowledge? Contestations and effects of cheats in a teen virtual world. Paper submitted to DiGRA07. [Online]. Available: http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kafai/paper/
whyville_pdfs/DIGRA07_cheat.pdf

Semuels, A. (2008, July 2). In virtual worlds, child avatars need protecting – from each other. Los Angeles Times. [Online]. Retrieved July 4, 2008 from http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jul/02/business/fi-kidssafe2

New Educational Videogaming Book Announced

A press release for a new educational videogame book came across the transom today. Children’s Learning in a Digital World initially seems to purport to delve into notions of negative effects surrounding violent videogames. However, the copy reads more along the lines of a much more positive take on educational videogames.

Video games, computers, and the Internet can provide opportunities for problem solving, creativity, and autonomy, and in particular, carefully constructed software can offer an alternative to traditional classroom learning. “Children’s Learning in a Digital World” is one of the first books to examine the impact of computers in both formal or school learning environments and informal learning contexts. It presents exciting and challenging new ideas from international scholars on the impact of computers, the Internet, and video games on children’s learning, as well as the social and cultural issues that affect technology use.

Here is the TOC:

Foreword: Seven Criteria for Investigating Children’s Learning in a Digital World by Richard E. Mayer

Pt. I Informal Learning with Technologies: Opportunities and Challenges

Introduction by Teena Willoughby and Eileen Wood

1 Media Literacy – Who Needs It? by Henry Jenkins

2 Good Videogames, the Human Mind, and Good Learning by James Paul Gee

3 How and What Do Videogames Teach? by Edward L. Swing and Craig A. Anderson

4 Videogame Addiction: Fact or Fiction? by Mark D. Griffiths

5 Meeting the Needs of the Vulnerable Learner: The Role of the Teacher in Bridging the Gap Between Informal and Formal Learning Using Digital Technologies by Laurence Peters

Pt. II Formal Learning with Technologies: Opportunities and Challenges Introduction by Eileen Wood and Bowen Hui and Teena Willoughby

6 Using Technology to Assist Children Learning to Read and Write by Philip C. Abrami and Robert Savage and C. Anne Wade and Geoffrey Hipps and Monica Lopez

7 Tools for Learning in an Information Society by John C. Nesbit and Philip H. Winne

8 Virtual Playgrounds: Children’s Multi-User Virtual Environments for Playing and Learning with Science by Yasmin B. Kafai and Michael T. Giang

9 Can Students Re-Invent Fundamental Scientific Principles? Evaluating the Promise of New-Media Literacies by Andrea A. diSessa

10 Domain Knowledge and Learning From the Internet by Malinda Desjarlais and Teena Willoughby and Eileen Wood

11 The Integration of Computer Technology in the Classroom by Julie Mueller and Eileen Wood and Teena Willoughby Summary and Looking Ahead