Radiks Family--Are You A College Class?

I've seen an assortment of posts by the Radiks family lately, and they all follow a very similar theme... open ended questions meant for observations/research on Second Life as a virtual world, etc. etc. So, if you're a class, or a group of people studying us, why weren't we told about it? I was under the impression LL was going to tell us when classes were going to be observing us. I have some ethical issues with not being told about this. I'm no guinea pig.

LL did tell us about this months ago when the Pitts were studying Sl. ...and yes they are a class.

Even though you claim not to be a guinea pig I have heard rumours about you and duct tape

it would be nice to 1. know about this up front and 2. be able to opt out if they're flying around in game doing research. i'm looking at you LL.

these things make me feel like a new kind of monkey in a cage

This coming from someone who really DESERVES to be caged

I agree - it's pretty shitty to treat your customers as something which is there to be studied.

And as for the questions they pose here; they look like simple essay questions: post your homework elsewhere, Radiks!

I think SL is fascinating and deserves to be studied.

Not in this way, though!

When medical studies are carried out on subjects, they are compensated for their time and inconvenience. We get naff-all out of this, and at present the forums resemble some kind of lab ...

Yeah, lack of disclosure was handled very poorly. Posts are interesting though and do heighten the general IQ of these forums..

But they're not interesting! They're vacuous, empty, open-ended questions that have no definitive answer.

there has been information on this site about these studies before you joined so did yo u m=not look into Sl before you hit the connect button? Secondly every research group has a certain last name that only they will have ...so you know who to avoid if you don't like it.

Normally they resemble some sort of bear pit - a lab can only be an improvement

Seriously - the Radiks' approach seems better than previous efforts like the Fraggles or the Pitts. They seem to be an older group of students and have given this more thought.

Of course the best way to learn is to be in world - however at least people can choose whether to read or participate in a Radiks started thread.

Radiks family,

I believe you have been contacting members of SL who are involved in my Brigadoon and Live2Give project.

Please contact me either inworld or email me via this forum as soon as possible. I need to know exactly how the content of any interviews with my project members will be used. Is this for a term paper, research paper, publication, or something else? Will we have access to the finished paper/publication? Can you guarantee anonymity?

Doing observational studies on an innovative place like SL is admirable. But full disclosure of your intentions and your privacy position is...well...*standard procedure* when interviewing human subjects. And I haven't seen that.

And just as a reminder, *all* the content on both of my project blog sites are licensed under the Creative Commons License:

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/

Thank you in advance.

The open ended questions that have no (readily apparent) answer are most often the questions worth asking. The attempt to answer such questions brings to light other questions that can, and often, are answered.

As far as whether the subject matter of the question suits your personal liking, for research, it really doesn't matter. Research is about finding answers to all questions, across a wide and diverse range. Personally, I could care less about mutations in RNA that occurs during cell division, but someone in the medical field, and certainly those in the medical field who deal with cancer, care quite a bit about those questions.

I agree whole heartedly with the Radiks coming here and performing research. They are learning about online worlds and virtual systems asking questions about something they really don't know about (as such we tend to find these questions rather "basic". I wish I could cross post from a previous thread in which I addressed some of these issues.

Common arguements in opposition to their presence here are:

"I am not the subject of some research experiment, I am human, treat me as such"

I have yet to see a Radiks (student) treat anyone inhumanely or even with disrespect. Asking questions is just that, asking questions, much like what a journalist would do except they are doing it for a grade. How is that inhumane? As far as your participation in an experiment, you already are. Second life is an experiment in virtual worlds, and started as an experiment in virtual reality. You're participating and paying for participating in that environment. Which is, in essence, an experiment in network technologies, networking, build interfaces with that environment, etc...
Additionally, they, the students, are participating in an experiment regarding the educational value within a virtual online community.

The second common arguement I have seen in the forums is that of, "They (the students)have already made up their minds long before they ever started in second life."

While yes, that may be true, when has being close minded been a crime? Look at some of the posts from our own residents! Part of a collegiate education is LEARNING to do research which, I might add, is not an easy task. The students, as undergraduates, are learning how to conduct research in an unbiased, objective manner. To fault them for not yet having mastered that skill is like faulting a child for not being able to drive a car. They are not graduate or postgraduate students, they are undergraduates. As such, they are still learning how to do accurate and unbaised research, don't fault them for skills they are still learning and have not yet mastered.

A third common arguement is, "They ask dumb / stupid / inane questions"

To that, I absolutely agree, some of them are silly. However, understand that most of them have never experienced an online world of any kind, while many of the residents have been playing SL and participating in online worlds (Everquest, DAoC, Ultima Online, etc...) for a long time. As such, some of their questions are somewhat bland. How about taking the time to explain what they 'should' be asking, or why their question doesn't really pertain? Of course, noone is under any such obligation, but instead of being so critical of them, just don't participate.

Jessica

Hi, I'm the professor of the Radiks campus students, and I have notifed my students of the "policy" we were given upon admission into your great community. AFAIK, the students have followed this policy to a tee.

The policy we were given was that the IF the students were talking to people in an "observational way" (i.e. for something like an assignment or interview, or so forth), they were to notify residents that they were in a class, and that whenever (if ever) a conversation turned into something that they thought they might like to use in a paper (for me ONLY to read - never to be posted online), that they would again remind the person that they were "Radiks" and that they were in a class.

(I have the specific text of the policy, but since it was in context of a private email sent only to me, and I don't have the permission of the person who sent it to me to post it, I can't post that here in this forum. I did however post the exact text into our homework assignments so the students would know the policy upon starting the assignment.)

We have had a few people interested in publishing some of the students' work, and in that case I have asked the students to RE-ASK anyone that was mentioned in their paper if it's OK to post their name & comments - and to get me this approval in writing.

We find the community fascinating for studying issues of virtual life, and how the boundaries between the real and the virtual are becoming blurred and intertwined.

The quality of the research that I have received this year (with Second Life) has been light years beyond the work that I received last year (without Second Life). For that fact alone, I appreciate the community letting us participate!

Right now, I have to go to class. We are watching the movie GATTACA today and talking about issues of determinism, genetic engineering, and "playing God" - a fascinating conversation. I'm sure the students will see elements of "Playing God" in other MMORPG communities, and I can't wait to hear them try to draw parallels between the movie and their experiences online.

If anyone is interested in seeing our assignments, or our course wiki, the site is here:

http://trumpy.cs.elon.edu/metaverse

-megan
(Professor Radiks)

Hey, Professor, welcome, and Kudos to you for being so open with information on what you're doing.

Wow...
Thats fantastic.
While I can sympathize with not wanting to be an unwitting guniea pig, the assignment is very interesting!
Where were the Professor Radiks when I was in college??

Kudos to the Professor for addressing the issue...

However, you need to search your student's posts on this forum. None that I seen have stated that they are students studying anything. They've been like "Hey, I'm a newbie and I was wondering..." posts.

Misleading.

Dear Professor, with all due respect:
There is no "virtual" anything. There is no boundary to blur.
Ultimately, systems are made of people, by people, for people. That is an invariant with all kinds of systems, be they mechanical, electronic, in vibrant colours or plain old text.
SL is a tool that interconnects people, and in so being, it is real.

*cries* I wanna take the class!

The homework (2 - 5) from the class looks like a lot of fun! It's not the typical essay or paper.

I wish we had a class like this when I was in college. The only thing that was even close was a class I took on Horror and Film. If any of the students wants to interview me I would be more than happy to!

Yes, but Eggy, you can't be a robot in real life, you can in SL. The things that *happen* in SL are not real, noone is arguing that the system that makes SL operate is not real, it is, of course and abides by all the physical laws. However, inside SL, it allows for a much greater form of self-expression (in some ways) than the real world does, in other ways it is more limited (communication comes to mind) and I believe that expression is what they are studing.

Jess

Thank you Professor.

I would like to point out that while I haven't observed what is happening inworld, here in the forums most of the Radiks have made no attempt to identify themselves as students rather than residents, and have not explained what they intend to do with any responses they collect.

Ah ha! You just became someone's essay subject.

Thanks for the disclosure, Megan. That's exactly what I wanted to know. Hope to see you inworld sometime.

Shhhh, you're breaking the fourth wall!

It's nice to make introductions. I've not really seen it on the Forums, but inworld, several of the Radiks have done so with me, and they were quite friendly.^_^

The Professor (Radiks) is in tha hizzouse, y0!

Skool is in session.