# Autobiography

LLMS index: [llms.txt](/dvw/en/llms.txt)

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Virtual worlds have such an effect on people that often they want to write about their experiences. Although most of this takes the form of what might be called “fan fiction,” a little is more personal. Some players keep logs, some keep diaries; some write essays, some write poetry. A very small few write full-blown autobiographies that cover the period of their life that they spent in (and out) of virtual worlds. As the ethnography of an individual, these are remarkable resources; as a recounting of their author’s own, private hero’s journey, they’re invaluable.

I am aware of only two [^255] such autobiographies: those of Julian Dibbell and Indra Sinha.

My Tiny Life [^256] concerns the three intense months that Julian Dibbell spent in LamdbaMOO. It begins with a retelling of A Rape in Cyberspace, then launches into Dibbell’s experiences as a player in this post-Mr. Bungle world. Although the book chronicles these goings-on very well, actually it isn’t really about them at all: Instead, what it charts is how by playing LambdaMOO, Dibbell overcame the insecurities he was experiencing about his love for his then girlfriend (now wife). The virtual world gave him an outlook on the real world that he didn’t have previously, enabling him to look at himself in new ways. From this, he developed a stronger sense of self-worth, through which he was able to overcome any lingering doubts about commitment that he still had. Dibbell doesn’t say this directly in his book, but it is hinted at throughout; it’s clear he feels genuine gratitude to LambdaMOO for what it taught him. Basically, LambdaMOO was where he finally grew up.

The picture of LambdaMOO itself that emerges is vaguely disturbing, like some ghastly reality TV experiment gone hideously awry. All you can do in LambdaMOO is create objects and talk to people. There are some elements of gameplay within individual creations, but these do not connect with one another cohesively. All activity therefore revolves around creating (for which a strict quota system exists) or talking and emoting. This doesn’t leave great scope for people to have fun: They’re pretty well limited to acquiring quota (which acts not so much as a currency as Dark Ages-like clout) or performing acts of virtual sex—both of which involve tiresome interpersonal politics. Some of what Dibbell describes should give designers pause for thought, in particular the schmoo wars (where players rose up against the “power elite” that they felt governed LambdaMOO); most of it seems incredibly shallow and petty, however. This, of course, is part of Dibbell’s point.

The book has some nice stylistic touches that help blur the lines between the real and the virtual; in particular, events that occur in real life are written like transcripts of a LambdaMOO session whereas events in LambdaMOO appear in conventional narrative form. Its main strength, however, is its content: It is the perfect riposte to anyone who tells players of virtual worlds that they should “get a life!” For this, we should all be grateful.

The second autobiographical work I’m going to mention is a much harder read, not least because it consists of over a hundred very small, choppy chapters. The Cybergypsies [^257] is Indra Sinha’s account of his time in Shades and Void [^258] (which he switched to once British Telecom closed down Shades).

Yes, Shades and Void—his experiences predate Julian Dibbell’s by several years.

Again, what the book purports to be about isn’t what it’s actually about. Its subtext is the author’s relationship with the love of his life (his wife, whom he greatly neglected while playing in virtual worlds). This time, though, the view expressed seems somewhat harsher: Ultimately, Sinha stopped playing because he realized that events he thought important in the virtual world were trifling and inconsequential when compared with events of the real world [^259].

The book consists of three main threads—a device to highlight the way that the real and the virtual are interwoven. The first of these threads concerns virtual worlds; the second concerns Reality; the third concerns computer viruses. This last one does not sit at all well with the other two: Although Shades and Reality overlap (Sinha met Shades players in real life), the viruses thread could be unpicked without affecting the integrity of the whole work one jot. Its presence serves mainly to propose an analogy: Playing virtual worlds introduces an addiction into the lives of players that can be as disruptive for them as the arrival of a virus is on a personal computer. This works if the payload that is delivered by playing virtual worlds is not considered benign, but (as someone who believes that in general it is benign) I’m not convinced by it myself.

From the preceding it may appear that Sinha is contemptuous of virtual worlds, but this is not the case. His fondness for Void, if not Shades, is apparent and sincere. Rather his attitude seems to be that virtual worlds are places you visit to find out what your problems are and where you can grow as you address these problems, but that once this is done you will inevitably come back to Reality. I wouldn’t disagree with this, except to note that you can be “master of the two worlds’; later return is possible.

Sinha does, however, have one particularly serious concern about virtual worlds that he expresses as “what we imagine, we make.” In Void, one of his friends described an incident where she and others ate another character at a feast; she further explained that far “worse” things often happened. It was okay, though, because the virtual world was imaginary, and anything done in the imagination is “safe.” Sinha’s reaction was that no, it is not safe: People use the same emotional faculties in the real world that they use in virtual worlds, and by tolerating a sickening virtual action they are also modifying what they would tolerate in Reality; they are becoming desensitized. If imaginary cruelty is considered to be acceptable, real cruelty inevitably becomes more acceptable than it was previously.

Although this is a powerful observation [^260], it is quite selective. I agree that such things do indeed occur in virtual worlds, but would counter that in the majority of cases the virtual world is set up such that positive changes in attitude greatly outweigh negative ones. Designers bear the primary responsibility of ensuring that this should be so, although the players themselves are also culpable: The cannibalistic feast in Void was enacted entirely through emotes, not some bizarre “eat person” command. Any virtual world set up (deliberately or otherwise) to change players’ attitudes in ways that society finds unacceptable is for society to deal with. As far as I know, there are no such virtual worlds in existence; that’s not to say that this will always be the case, however.

In Sinha’s book, his father-in-law gets interested in Scientology. The way that this eminently sensible man is gradually drawn in as he strives to gain different “levels” of awareness is contrasted with the way that players of virtual worlds find themselves on leveling treadmills that they somehow can’t leave. It’s an amusing analogy: virtual world designers as theocrats.

It also provides a handy link to the next topic….


[^255]: As usual, this doesn’t mean there aren’t scores more out there.
[^256]: Julian Dibbell, My Tiny Life: Crime and Passion in a Virtual World. London, Fourth Estate, 1999.
[^257]: Indra Sinha, The Cybergypsies: A Frank Account of Love, Life and Travels on the Electronic Frontier. London, Scribner, 1999.
[^258]: He calls it Vortex, but it’s Void.
[^259]: There’s no indication as to whether his wife got any more attention once he directed his energies toward Amnesty International than she did when he was playing Shades though.
[^260]: And one regularly used as ammunition against the portrayal of violence in computer games, movies, comics, rap music, and cartoons (but less so against the real violence shown in TV news and documentaries).