In the main, people just talk here. But it is not the talk of an AOL chat room. The talk in a MUD is in the service of construction — of constructing a character and a community. You interact in part by talking, and this talking is tied to a name. This name, and the memories of what it has done, live in the space, and over time people in the space come to know the person by what these memories recall.
The life within these MUDs differ. Elizabeth Reid describes two different “styles”[29] — social-style MUD and an adventure or game-style MUD. Social MUDs are simply online communities where people talk and build characters or elements for the MUD. Adventure MUDs are games, with (virtual) prizes or power to be won through the deployment of skill in capturing resources or defeating an enemy. In either context, the communities survive a particular interaction. They become virtual clubs, though with different purposes. Members build reputations through their behavior in these clubs.
You get a character simply by joining the MOO (though in LambdaMOO the waiting list for a character extends over many months). When you join the space, you define the character you will have. At least, you define certain features of your character. You select a name and a gender (no gender is an option as well) and describe your character. Some descriptions are quite ordinary (Johnny Manhattan is “tall and thin, pale as string cheese, wearing a neighborhood hat”).[30] Others, however, are quite extraordinary. (Legba, for instance, is a Haitian trickster spirit of indeterminate gender, brown-skinned and wearing an expensive pearl gray suit, top hat, and dark glasses.)[31]
Julian Dibbell broke the story of this space to the nonvirtual world in an article in the Village Voice.[32] The story that was the focus of Dibbell’s article involved a character called Mr. Bungle who, it turns out, was actually a group of NYU undergraduates sharing this single identity. Bungle entered a room late one evening and found a group of characters well known in that space. The full story cannot be told any better than Dibbell tells it. For our purposes, the facts will be enough.[33]
Bungle had a special sort of power. By earning special standing in the LambdaMOO community, he had “voodoo” power: he could take over the voices and actions of other characters and make them appear to do things they did not really do. This Bungle did that night to a group of women and at least one person of ambiguous gender. He invoked this power, in this public space, and took over the voices of these people. Once they were in his control, Bungle “raped” these women, violently and sadistically, and made it seem as if they enjoyed the rape.
The “rape” was virtual in the sense that the event happened only on the wires. “No bodies touched”, as Dibbell describes it.
Whatever physical interaction occurred consisted of a mingling of electronic signals sent from sites spread out between New York City and Sydney, Australia. . . . He commenced his assault entirely unprovoked at, or about 10 p.m. Pacific Standard Time. . . . He began by using his voodoo doll to force one of the room’s occupants to sexually service him in a variety of more or less conventional ways. That this victim was exu. . . . He turned his attentions now to Moondreamer . . . forcing her into unwanted liaisons with other individuals present in the room. . . . His actions grew progressively violent. . . . He caused Moondreamer to violate herself with a piece of kitchen cutlery. He could not be stopped until at last someone summoned Iggy . . . who brought with him a gun of near wizardly powers, a gun that didn’t kill but enveloped its targets in a cage impermeable even to a voodoo doll’s powers.[34]
Rape is a difficult word to use in any context, but particularly here. Some will object that whatever happened in this virtual space, it has nothing to do with rape. Yet even if “it” was not “rape”, all will see a link between rape and what happened to these women there. Bungle used his power over these women for his own (and against their) sexual desire; he sexualized his violence and denied them even the dignity of registering their protest.
For our purposes, whether what happened here was really rape is beside the point. What matters is how the community reacted. The community was outraged by what Bungle had done, and many thought something should be done in response.
They gathered, this community of members of LambdaMOO, in a virtual room at a set time, to discuss what to do. Some thirty showed up, the largest meeting the community had known. Some thought that Bungle should be expelled — “toaded”, as it is described, killed for purposes of the MOO. Others thought that nothing should be done; Bungle was certainly a creep, but the best thing to do to creeps was simply to ignore them. Some called on the Wizards of the space — the creators, the gods — to intervene to deal with this character. The Wizards declined: Their job, they replied, was to create the world; the members had to learn to live within it.
There was really no law that governed what Bungle had done. No real-space law reached sexual pranks like this, and neither did any explicit rule of LambdaMOO.[35] This troubled many who wanted to do something. Invoking real-space ideals about fair notice and due process, these people argued that Bungle could not be punished for violating rules that did not exist at the time.
Two extremes eventually emerged. One side urged vigilantism: Bungle was a miscreant, and something should be done about him. But what shouldn’t be done, they argued, was for LambdaMOO to respond by creating a world of regulation. LambdaMOO did not need a state; it needed a few good vigilantes. It needed people who would enforce the will of the community without the permanent intrusion of some central force called the state. Bungle should be expelled, killed, or “toaded” — and someone would do it. But only if the group resisted the call to organize itself into a state.
The other side promoted just one idea: democracy. With the cooperation of the Wizards, LambdaMOO should establish a way to vote on rules that would govern how people in the space behaved. Any question could be made the subject of a ballot; there was no constitution limiting the scope of what democracy could decide. An issue decided by the ballot would be implemented by the Wizards. From then on, it would be a rule.
Both extremes had their virtues, and both invited certain vices. The anarchy of the first risked chaos. It was easy to imagine the community turning against people with little or no warning; one imagined vigilantes roaming the space, unconstrained by any rules, “toading” people whose crimes happened to strike them as “awful.” For those who took this place less seriously than real space, this compromise was tolerable. But what was tolerable for some was intolerable to others — as Bungle had learned.
Democracy seemed natural, yet many resisted it as well. The idea that politics could exist in LambdaMOO seemed to sully the space. The thought that ideas would have to be debated and then voted on was just another burden. Sure, rules would be known and behavior could be regulated, but it all began to seem like work. The work took something from the fun the space was to have been.
In the end, both happened. The debate that evening wound down after almost three hours. No clear resolution had found its way in. But a resolution of sorts did occur. As Dibbell describes it:
29.
See Elizabeth Reid, "Hierarchy and Power: Social Control in Cyberspace," in
30.
See Josh Quittner, "Johnny Manhattan Meets the Furry Muckers,"
31.
See Julian Dibbell, "A Rape in Cyberspace,"
33.
In particular, see Dibbell's extraordinary
35.
If anything, the sexuality of the space invited adolescent responses by adolescents; see Scott Bukatman,