For a true social revolution to ocur within an MMO people need to both be able to express themselves Socialy and Anti socially. To funcion in society one must be able to thrive in a social and an anti social environment. A highly social person doesent wither on the vine simply because they are in an anti social environment, self expression will inevitably and continualy persist no matter what the environment. Only in a Persistent world can social transformations take place. I remember in early everquest when twinking was consitered taboo and you where looked down apon, but as the game and community progressed twinking became not only exceptable but celebrated in some cases lol. The same with east commons tunnel rats that spent all there time trading, it went from taboo to becoming an ingame zone called the bazaar. Everquest was not just great because of game content, it was great because of persistent and revolving social developments. MMOs arent just fun they can also be the gateway to push social barriers. In order to Evolve Society a Paladin may have to become a Dire Lord, because a great leader doesnt just lead the good, they also rule the unsavory. It would be cool if social developments influence game mechanics, for instance a server is pvp or non pvp based on how many people have a certain option selected, if 51 percent of people have pvp selected on a server then the server becomes pvp, it would be cool if players affected the factions as well. lets say 80 percent of gnome players have iksar set to friendly then it affects the npc factions and iksars can rome akanon and vice versa. If a person is a ks'er and 20 people have them selected as one, then there name turns red or something. Traditionally in an MMO if you dont like the current social scene you play a different game, it would be cool if the community could instead influence and change social aspects to create a game community that is relevant and current.
Nah. Just shame them out, KS their sorry a*se and take their stuff.
Seriously though, while the idea, like communism, may sound good in theory, it would be open to abuse. What would stop a zerg guild deciding to negatively influence others by deliberately manipulating the system to make a rival guild leader red KOS through block voting for example?
