Let's look into the "Magic Circle" thing which is very important.
The Magic Circle in the culture of gaming:
Economic, political, and legal activity that cross the membrane between the synthetic worlds and the Earth exists to blur any real distinction between what is synthetic and what is insistently real.
These examples may be affected more generally to gaming as a collective. Games have become such a central part of living that the differences between game and real life is starting to become blurred.
Continual development in the culture of gaming may be seen in various behavior and practices. For example, when a pilot of a plane receives instructions from an air traffic controller, at that very same moment,
somewhere in the world, there is someone flying a simulation of that plane, or something like it, on a similar flight path, and that person also receiving path instructions from a controller; all of this is
occurring through VATSIM.net, a virtual air traffic simulation system. Through the website, flight simulation has adapted into a multiplayer format, and ordinary people get to interact as pilots and
interact with air traffic controllers to create a natural reproduction of actual air traffic.
The political movements that happen inside and outside games, for now, mostly concentrate on the games themselves. A gamer’s day consists of switching between the game life and real life.
But while one is sitting in front of their computer and is engaged in the synthetic game world, they are just as likely to discuss the day’s weather as they are talking about the game, whilst
chatting with a friend in-game. The distinction between labeling an act that strictly occurs in the game, and something that happens out of game (i.e. checking email about getting “gold” pieces
in the game world) becomes inconsequential; the two worlds inevitably must interact with one another.
The origin of the term was coined by Johan Huizinga, a Dutch historian, a CULTURAL THEORIST and AND ONE OF THE FOUNDERS OF MODERN CULTURAL HISTORY.
He wrote a book called Homo Ludens that "discusses the importance of the play element of culture and society."
Huizinga suggests that "play is primary to and a necessary (though not sufficient) condition of the generation of culture."
Huizinga's concept was "picked up and applied to digital games” by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman in Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals.
Katie Salen:
Iinvolved with is the Executive Director of INSTITUTE OF PLAY, an organization that promotes games as a learning tool for the 21st century.
Institute of Play has used games, play and the principles that underlie them to design schools, programs, games, events, digital platforms and products and
QUEST TO LEARN: Salen is a designer of Quest to Learn, a public school in Manhattan, New York City created out of a collaboration between Institute of Play and the New York City Department of Education,
with backing from the MacArthur Foundation and support from New Visions for Public Schools. The school began in the 2009-2010 school year with one sixth grade class, and will add a new grade every year until 2015,
when it will be a fully functioning combined middle and high school encompassing grades 6-12.
Q2L's standards-based curriculum is developed collaboratively by teachers, game designers and curriculum designers. Curriculum design mimics the design principles of games by framing every piece
of the curriculum as a mission that involves game strategies like collaboration, role-playing and simulation. The school encourages hands-on problem solving, and is designed to promote learning
of 21st Century Skills many experts say are necessary for college and career success, such as systems thinking, collaboration, and digital literacy. Not only do students play games in the classrooms,
they learn to make them in order to demonstrate their systems thinking skills.
Eric Zimmerman:
Each year Zimmerman hosts the Game Design Challenge at the Game Developers Conference.
He also won 3 IndieCade awards
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Circle_%28virtual_worlds%29https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johan_Huizingahttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_Ludenshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katie_Salenhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Zimmermanhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Circle_%28virtual_worlds%29The sources of the article keep referencing this book most of the time: Edward Castronova, Synthetic Worlds: The Business and Culture of Online Games
https://7chan.org/lit/src/Synthetic_Worlds.pdfHere's the other paper: Scientific Habits of Mind in Virtual Worlds by Constance Steinkuehler and Sean Duncan
http://www.academia.edu/261702/Scientific_Habits_of_Mind_In_Virtual_WorldsLet's get the ball rolling.