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Geek Culture / Interesting social experiment in Minecraft

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CoffeeGrunt
18
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Joined: 5th Oct 2007
Location: England
Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 17:12
http://www.minecraftforum.net/topic/1212125-closed-map-experiment/

I personally found this quite fascinating.

For a quick explanation, Minecraft is a game where you harvest resources to build tools, items and buildings from the world around you. The map is near-infinite, allowing endless wealth to be obtained from it, this ability to change the environment and trade/war with economies earned from harvesting makes PvP also very popular.

However, what happens if you put such a PvP area into an enclosed space, thereby limiting the resources available? Also, no players are alerted to this fact, and are left to freely continue believing that the limited resources available to them are as infinite as they believe.

The results are staggering.
Van B
Moderator
23
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Joined: 8th Oct 2002
Location: Sunnyvale
Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 17:52
That is pretty interesting stuff - it reminds me a little of the experiments they've done, taking a bunch of volunteers and sticking them in a prison - making a handful of them prison guards and the rest prisoners. These types of experiment tend to tell us something about the human condition, and it's pretty cool to see distinctive results from an experiment with a videogame.

It never ends well, but we learn stuff, that's the main thing.

Health, Ammo, and bacon and eggs!
Dark Frager
16
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Joined: 16th Mar 2010
Location: The Void.
Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 18:16
Wow, that's pretty damn cool. I wish I could have been part of that, it looked very fun.

I think we should write messages with signatures.
Diggsey
20
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Joined: 24th Apr 2006
Location: On this web page.
bitJericho
23
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Joined: 9th Oct 2002
Location: United States
Libervurto
20
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Joined: 30th Jun 2006
Location: On Toast
Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 18:51
I'd love to play on a server like that, it makes SMP into an actual game rather than an infinite sandbox.

Shh... you're pretty.
Neuro Fuzzy
19
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Joined: 11th Jun 2007
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Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 20:54
Although if you notice in the last pages, it looks like it's a fake and is a copy from a 4chan board with added prose and fake pictures. (read the posts before telling me I'm wrong xD)

Also:
http://imgur.com/a/aVNoY

Libervurto
20
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Joined: 30th Jun 2006
Location: On Toast
Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 22:33
@Neuro
I just see a bunch of people being sceptical without any evidence to back it up. One person alludes to something on 4Chan that is "pretty much this" but gives no link or explanation, that's not evidence or reason to doubt this is authentic. Why would it be fake? The principle is still valid even if it's fake so what would be the point in lying? Lies are meant to deceive and I don't see what deception could be being implemented here.

Irrational scepticism is just as harmful as irrational belief.

Shh... you're pretty.
Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 22nd Aug 2012 23:58 Edited at: 23rd Aug 2012 00:02
yeah, my first reaction was "Hah, that's stupid, anything can be called fake by a few people".

BUT... the gold/iron on the surface, the map delete "strip mine", the UTTERLY MASSIVE NONSENSICAL dip in the terrain, the lack of anyone else coming forwards who was in the 'experiment'/the lack of transparency in it, the non-flowing lava with one side open etc. It all points to a fake.

I tried to verify the 4chan thing and got the post everyone is referring to http://pastebin.com/8FfWce8R http://i.imgur.com/QO4B1.png
The 4chan guy may have the idea first but it obviously had nothing to do with the prose.

Anyways, why/how would they do something like that without having other videos, reports, stories, screenshots etc. of it? Once those more concrete points are out of the way you start noticing the smaller (arguable) inconsistencies. It seems stupid no-one got into the griefers base. Why didn't the wood on the top of [that one building] get used for sticks?

I made some estimations of how long it would take to dig the massive pit out. I estimate its dimensions conservatively at 176x176x30. If it takes one second to mine a block on average (VERY conservative, I'd guess it's more like 4-5 seconds after accounting for mining delays and realistic timing), that's 258 man-hours of digging. Over the course of two months, that's 4.3 man-hours per day. If it was just the two griefers digging, and the experiment ran every day (unlikely), they'd have each had to have put in 2 hours of straight digging. Since that's silly (they wouldn't have any time for griefing), maybe everyone else helped too? But if the area underneath their base was so popular, why did it never get raided? Plus, why the square shape? Wouldn't they realize circles would be better?

Libervurto
20
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Joined: 30th Jun 2006
Location: On Toast
Posted: 23rd Aug 2012 00:52
Quote: "1. The gold/iron on the surface, 2. the map delete "strip mine", 3. the UTTERLY MASSIVE NONSENSICAL dip in the terrain, 4. the lack of anyone else coming forwards who was in the 'experiment', 5. the non-flowing lava with one side open"

1. They ran out of picks, so that was probably uncovered by digging out the dirt around it.
2. I've seen people mine like that on regular servers.
3. That is right outside the main faction's base, so maybe they imposed rules on where to mine or killed anyone who got too close. Also, you can see at least two staircases leading out of the mine which makes it look authentic to me.
4. That one is a bit strange although they might simply not take part in the forum.
5. I don't see any lava that isn't flowing.

Quote: "6. Anyways, why/how would they do something like that without having other videos, reports, stories, screenshots etc. of it?
7. It seems stupid no-one got into the griefers base.
8. Why didn't the wood on the top of [that one building] get used for sticks?"

6. Why would you expect that level of documentation? It's hardly a scientific experiment.
7. They were all on at the same time and that looks pretty easy to defend.
8. Looks like it's made of wooden steps and slabs, which can't be made into sticks. (I actually made a mod that let you reclaim the wood back into planks, with some wastage.)

Regardless I'd really like to play this if anyone wants to do it on their server.

Shh... you're pretty.
Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 23rd Aug 2012 02:09
Ah, you're right about the wooden slab and the lava flow (w/o being zoomed in and w/ the aliasing it's hard to see - it was a point far away).

Quote: "3. That is right outside the main faction's base"

It's right outside EVERYONE's base

Quote: "6. Why would you expect that level of documentation? It's hardly a scientific experiment."

With the level of livestreaming and video recording going on, this makes no sense. Out of thirty people you're going to have more than one person who posts stuff!

CoffeeGrunt
18
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Joined: 5th Oct 2007
Location: England
Posted: 23rd Aug 2012 03:14
It appears that the giant chasm was actually the base of the Dwarves faction.

However, this is entirely possible, and it's not exactly a troll - why would anyone fake it?

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