The events within EVE Online and subsequent discussion of them invite the question of whether different expectations apply within online and offline community and the relationship between these.
Perhaps the possibility of betrayal shows that the community is genuine, involving real-world vulnerability.
Betrayal is more controversial: the embedded encoded rules permitted the behavior and the License Agreement did not prohibit scamming. By stealing a character’s virtual goods, you are also stealing the time and real-world money they used to acquire those goods. Virtual theft can arguably be treated as an extension of traditional theft. The actions of the Guiding Hand had two potentially immoral dimensions: virtual theft and betrayal of trust. Many point to the fact that the betrayal crosses to the real-world as the actions necessitate making false friendships. This deliberate engineering and betrayal of trust has produced vigorous discussion among the EVE Online community. According to Istvaan Shogaatsu (leader of the Guiding Hand) the operation succeeded because of “a number of insidiously engineered events meant to engender trust” (posted on Eve Online discussion board). Guiding Hand, evidently, consider their behavior a successful in-game strategy that does not contravene the rules of the game and is thus ethically permissible. In 2004–05, the Guiding Hand Social Club scammed a rival organization of in-game assets valued at over $US15 000 and assassinated its leader. In EVE Online, no rules (implicit or explicit) prohibit scamming. Corporations are self-governing and elect or appoint their own leaders. Such enhancements enable further exploration of the world and ultimately characters can form alliances or corporations with other users. Characters begin with minimal resources and abilities that can be increased by completing missions or by mining virtual resources. EVE Online is a paid science-fiction-based role-playing game, with real-time interaction via avatars. Like the community of LambdaMOO, the community of EVE Online faced a contest over norms and rules. This evolution expands the possibilities of virtual wrongs, which in turn prompt and intensify the development and discussion of internally generated norms and codes of conduct, yielding further research prospects which themselves can become problematic. MUDs like LambdaMOO have evolved into extremely rich and complex, real-time 3D virtual worlds (Second Life) and role-playing games ( World of Warcraft). Townley, in Encyclopedia of Applied Ethics (Second Edition), 2012 Modern Virtual Wrongs: EVE The human behind the character is ever present. The social aspect of gameplay that is necessary to succeed means that the players are never just a character. Players can interact via textual chat functions and/or using audio devices. 10 The difficulties of numerous adventures in WoW stimulate player-to-player interaction, making the game an effective social tool. ‘… the game is built to facilitate extensive in-game socialising … You can also add players to a friends list, so you can keep track of nice and helpful players for grouping or just chatting’. Players are also encouraged to socialise with other players in their realm. For example, the existence of different realms allows the user to choose whether they engage in player-versus-player combat. Players can choose the way in which they play the game. 8 ‘As a massively multiplayer online game, World of Warcraft enables thousands of players from across the globe to come together online – undertaking grand quests and heroic exploits in a land of fantastic adventure.’ 9 This game is based on questing through a fantasy world and battling creatures in a friendly social environment. The character then adventures in a chosen realm. In WoW gamers are expected to create their character based on one of the ten races and develop it by choosing professions and then questing. Angela Thomas-Jones, in The Host in the Machine, 2010