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Croaker wrote:
Background:
In my sociology class on NTNU in Norway we have a course where we make a blog with all sort of topics where we look at them in a sociological way. I decided to write about Virtual Popstar when I noticed the class stratification on this game. My friend (@MossPiglet) wanted me to post this here. I had to translate this from norwegian to english, so sorry if my grammar is not that academic. Feel free to comment your thoughts on this, constructive criticism is always appreciated. Have a wonderful day!
"Class stratification on Virtual Popstar
On August 27, 2020, I joined an online community called "Virtual
Popstar". This online community has been around since 2012 and is still
going on today. My group of friends has recently been "influenced" by
a mutual friend of ours, who made everyone a user on the site. At an early age,
I have always been curious about some "alternative" online
communities, and now it happened to be Virtual Popstar's turn. I created a user
to take part of this, something I did more or less for a joke. The graphics are simple and in many ways outdated, and do not look like the game has had major changes since 2012. The game
reminded my group of friends of a similar online community that we had played
earlier with the name goSupermodel. This online community lasted from around
2007 before it was shut down in 2016. My thought was that Virtual Popstar would
be similar to goSupermodel, but quickly some barriers were clarified that made
me take out my sociological glasses; it was a class stratification on Virtual
Popstar.
About the game:
The main point is to become a virtual pop star. You have to "climb up" in
this virtual class society, and achieve the most status by having a lot of
things e.g. in the form of fans, currency, and clothing. You get benefits
according to how high on the ladder you are considering the amount of fans. Because the more fans you manage to acquire, the higher level you will be able to climb. There are certain things you can not do with other users who play if you are not a set level; get
clothes from others, comment in the "guestbook" on their profile, and
other things.
The game uses English as a written language, and if you write another language, such as
Norwegian, this must also be translated into English. The game has several
rules that you must maintain, so if you do not keep the rules you get a notice, and possibly punishment.
Here is an overview of the number of fans you must achieve for each level:
Bathroom Singer = 0
Playback star = 50
Karaoke star= 300
Street musicians = 1500
YouTube star= 10000
National star = 50000
International star = 500000
World Famous= 1000000
Living Legend = 2000000
Minister of Pop = 3 million
Prince / Princess of Pop = 5000000
King / Queen of Pop = 10000000
King of Kings / Queen of Queens = 20000000+
The fans are not real people, but a kind of digital form of "cultural capital",
where if you have a high level you will get more benefits. You can also lose
fans on a daily basis by not spending money on a virtual "bodyguard",
and the disadvantage of the "scandal" that occurs without this
bodyguard affects your "reputation".
Limited opportunity to increase their own social capital?
You can not speak in any of the forums until you are at least a "YouTube Star";
Some of these forums are general, swapping and selling clothes, searching for
friends, role-playing games, contests and much more. Something I find
interesting is that you do not get access to report bugs in the forum
"bugs" until you are a YouTube star, so you have to climb up 4 levels
before you can get help. My friends and I have experienced several times that
the games where you can get both "fans" and pop dollars do not work,
which has made it difficult to level up. I (as a Street Musician) have not had
the opportunity to report this since I have not been a YouTube star or higher.
There is also no possibility to send a message to other users, so that they can
report this further.
The most important thing for me althought was not to become famous in this online
community, but to talk to others who use the platform. Before you become a
YouTube star or higher level, you get to be content with gaining insight into
what is happening in the forums, even if you can not comment yourself. Funny
enough, I got a notification from a user who points out how some "Street
musicians" could not post in the forums, where she tagged me. I could not
communicate further with her since I was still a street musician, but sent her
a friend request so I could send a message when I had leveled up. On October 1,
I leveled up to YouTube Star after being on Virtual Popstar for a little over a
month. I used the opportunity to report in the forum "bugs" that the
games did not work, but mostly got the answer that "these errors are well
known, and most likely will not be fixed by reporting them" by other
users. I contacted the user who had discovered the difference between being
below and above the YouTube star, where she commented that the difference after
being a YouTube star has almost "no restrictions within the game"
except for some clothes you can not buy before a certain level. Furthermore,
she made it clear that not being allowed to comment in the forums was a
response to someone having spammed the forums, and it was therefore set a
limit.
The Importance of Cultural, Social, and Economic Capital in Virtual Popstar?
Pierre Bourdieu believed that a class consists of individuals with approximately equal
positions within the social space. A room where one can place depending on how
much the individuals have within the economic, social, and cultural capital.
Cultural capital is shown through knowledge, ideas, language, and habits. If
you spend a lot of time on the game (habit), and develop greater awareness
(knowledge) about how to get to a higher level (status) then you will get
benefits later. Social capital is linked to social ties, and the resources
available by participating in the social network. When you reach a higher level
and gain access to forums, you can become friends with other players, and
increase social capital. You can write in guest books, make yourself visible,
and most people will be friends on Virtual Popstar with active users at a high
level. Economic capital is about resources in the form of money and other
benefits that can be obtained on behalf of income and equity. As you level up,
you will get more money, and thus strengthen your financial capital, by earning
more by doing the same tasks that you have done before via. games or the like
The increase in economic capital means that you can acquire more things
(clothes, faster vehicles to perform tasks) that strengthen the cultural
capital.
When you become part of Virtual Popstar, you quickly notice in the start-up phase that
there is a clear difference between being below or above the YouTube star
level. The game is divided into a kind of class society, where you have
different privileges depending on what level you are in. Furthermore, we can
analyze how important the value of cultural, social, and economic capital
becomes in such a class society, where the differences for what you are able to
do and not are so clear. "
If you read all of this, you are a real MVP. Just wanted to add that at the end. Love you!
Background:
In my sociology class on NTNU in Norway we have a course where we make a blog with all sort of topics where we look at them in a sociological way. I decided to write about Virtual Popstar when I noticed the class stratification on this game. My friend (@MossPiglet) wanted me to post this here. I had to translate this from norwegian to english, so sorry if my grammar is not that academic. Feel free to comment your thoughts on this, constructive criticism is always appreciated. Have a wonderful day!
"Class stratification on Virtual Popstar
On August 27, 2020, I joined an online community called "Virtual
Popstar". This online community has been around since 2012 and is still
going on today. My group of friends has recently been "influenced" by
a mutual friend of ours, who made everyone a user on the site. At an early age,
I have always been curious about some "alternative" online
communities, and now it happened to be Virtual Popstar's turn. I created a user
to take part of this, something I did more or less for a joke. The graphics are simple and in many ways outdated, and do not look like the game has had major changes since 2012. The game
reminded my group of friends of a similar online community that we had played
earlier with the name goSupermodel. This online community lasted from around
2007 before it was shut down in 2016. My thought was that Virtual Popstar would
be similar to goSupermodel, but quickly some barriers were clarified that made
me take out my sociological glasses; it was a class stratification on Virtual
Popstar.
About the game:
The main point is to become a virtual pop star. You have to "climb up" in
this virtual class society, and achieve the most status by having a lot of
things e.g. in the form of fans, currency, and clothing. You get benefits
according to how high on the ladder you are considering the amount of fans. Because the more fans you manage to acquire, the higher level you will be able to climb. There are certain things you can not do with other users who play if you are not a set level; get
clothes from others, comment in the "guestbook" on their profile, and
other things.
The game uses English as a written language, and if you write another language, such as
Norwegian, this must also be translated into English. The game has several
rules that you must maintain, so if you do not keep the rules you get a notice, and possibly punishment.
Here is an overview of the number of fans you must achieve for each level:
Bathroom Singer = 0
Playback star = 50
Karaoke star= 300
Street musicians = 1500
YouTube star= 10000
National star = 50000
International star = 500000
World Famous= 1000000
Living Legend = 2000000
Minister of Pop = 3 million
Prince / Princess of Pop = 5000000
King / Queen of Pop = 10000000
King of Kings / Queen of Queens = 20000000+
The fans are not real people, but a kind of digital form of "cultural capital",
where if you have a high level you will get more benefits. You can also lose
fans on a daily basis by not spending money on a virtual "bodyguard",
and the disadvantage of the "scandal" that occurs without this
bodyguard affects your "reputation".
Limited opportunity to increase their own social capital?
You can not speak in any of the forums until you are at least a "YouTube Star";
Some of these forums are general, swapping and selling clothes, searching for
friends, role-playing games, contests and much more. Something I find
interesting is that you do not get access to report bugs in the forum
"bugs" until you are a YouTube star, so you have to climb up 4 levels
before you can get help. My friends and I have experienced several times that
the games where you can get both "fans" and pop dollars do not work,
which has made it difficult to level up. I (as a Street Musician) have not had
the opportunity to report this since I have not been a YouTube star or higher.
There is also no possibility to send a message to other users, so that they can
report this further.
The most important thing for me althought was not to become famous in this online
community, but to talk to others who use the platform. Before you become a
YouTube star or higher level, you get to be content with gaining insight into
what is happening in the forums, even if you can not comment yourself. Funny
enough, I got a notification from a user who points out how some "Street
musicians" could not post in the forums, where she tagged me. I could not
communicate further with her since I was still a street musician, but sent her
a friend request so I could send a message when I had leveled up. On October 1,
I leveled up to YouTube Star after being on Virtual Popstar for a little over a
month. I used the opportunity to report in the forum "bugs" that the
games did not work, but mostly got the answer that "these errors are well
known, and most likely will not be fixed by reporting them" by other
users. I contacted the user who had discovered the difference between being
below and above the YouTube star, where she commented that the difference after
being a YouTube star has almost "no restrictions within the game"
except for some clothes you can not buy before a certain level. Furthermore,
she made it clear that not being allowed to comment in the forums was a
response to someone having spammed the forums, and it was therefore set a
limit.
The Importance of Cultural, Social, and Economic Capital in Virtual Popstar?
Pierre Bourdieu believed that a class consists of individuals with approximately equal
positions within the social space. A room where one can place depending on how
much the individuals have within the economic, social, and cultural capital.
Cultural capital is shown through knowledge, ideas, language, and habits. If
you spend a lot of time on the game (habit), and develop greater awareness
(knowledge) about how to get to a higher level (status) then you will get
benefits later. Social capital is linked to social ties, and the resources
available by participating in the social network. When you reach a higher level
and gain access to forums, you can become friends with other players, and
increase social capital. You can write in guest books, make yourself visible,
and most people will be friends on Virtual Popstar with active users at a high
level. Economic capital is about resources in the form of money and other
benefits that can be obtained on behalf of income and equity. As you level up,
you will get more money, and thus strengthen your financial capital, by earning
more by doing the same tasks that you have done before via. games or the like
The increase in economic capital means that you can acquire more things
(clothes, faster vehicles to perform tasks) that strengthen the cultural
capital.
When you become part of Virtual Popstar, you quickly notice in the start-up phase that
there is a clear difference between being below or above the YouTube star
level. The game is divided into a kind of class society, where you have
different privileges depending on what level you are in. Furthermore, we can
analyze how important the value of cultural, social, and economic capital
becomes in such a class society, where the differences for what you are able to
do and not are so clear. "
If you read all of this, you are a real MVP. Just wanted to add that at the end. Love you!
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