NETWORK SOCIETY: The community of StarCraft players as an example of a virtual community.

• Authors: Przybyszewska, Dominika

Abstracts

EN

Along with the development of the Internet, more and more virtual communities are beingformed, whose members remain in close, and even intimate relations. Among thebasic characteristics of virtual communities are its aspaciousness, asynchronicity, acorporeality,astigmaticity and anonymity. What is important, the membership in a virtualcommunity is most often intentional. One of such groups is the community of gamers,which is, thanks to the dynamically developing e-sport, more and more frequently talkedand written about. It has all the characteristics of a virtual community. Its members communicate with each other by means of Internet forums, communicators and e-mails. Onecan observe the existence of a certain kind of relationships, a sense of belongingness andsolidarity. They share the same passion, which is to play, usually in a specific networkgame. What distinguishes them from other Internet users is their specific slang. They alsoconverse on subjects other than games, and meet in the real world – which contradicts theanonymity initially assigned to them. Events, competitions (including all kinds of tournaments,and even world championships) and rallies are conductive to establishing evencloser relationships between the gamers, which last even after their adventure with thespecific game is over.

Keywords

EN

players; games; gaming community; Virtual community

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Gdański
• Journal: Miscellanea Anthropologica et Sociologica
• Year: 2015
• Volume: 16(2)
• Pages: 183-199

Contributors

author

Przybyszewska, Dominika

Identifiers

DOI

10.5604/20842937.1172790