A scholarly article on piracy that uses RB forum threads!

[samsonlonghair]

If you don't email him, I will.

[Luke]

You guys are so silly. Obviously this was written by Busom Jack.

[dsheinem]

If you don't email him, I will.

already did

[samsonlonghair]

I already did too.

Couldn't be Busom Jack. Not enough exercise tips.

[dsheinem]

I already did too.

[J T]

I read the article. Now I'm going to hazard a guess:
Could the author be... JT?

My sources tell me that JT did not author this paper.

It's possible it was Mega-Dan. In this thread he says he teaches Criminology at a college:

viewtopic.php?f=17&t=636&p=4691&hilit=criminology#p4691

[General Chaos]

I'm here to solve the mystery for all of you, and post for the first time in a LONG time.

*drum roll*

I'm the author of the article!

A few words about the context and other issues surrounding the article:

At the time I was quite heavily into the DS homebrew scene and that's primarily what prompted my interest in the topic. As an active member of Racketboy at the time, I also thought it would be convenient to explore this forum community's attitudes toward piracy. For the most part I stopped posting around the time I collected threads to ensure that I didn't lead authors or create biases. My goal was to be an unobtrusive observer. I tell my students "research what you know," and I felt that I knew the community fairly well at the time, though of course it's entirely possibly I misinterpreted some of what was said. Such is the nature of qualitative research.

My rationale for remaining anonymous as the researcher was also to avoid the Hawthorne Effect (i.e., people changing their behavior because they know they are being observed). Hopefully I represented the community's views on piracy and the retro subculture at least fairly accurately, but I do of course welcome input. I haven't been active on the forums but I have extremely fond memories of when I was, and still read articles here regularly.

The other article that someone located is a presentation on the same subject. In both the article and presentation my goal was to move away from what has typically been a somewhat black and white representation of piracy and piracy communities, and also represent what I believe is a more mature community in Racketboy. As I see it, there are plenty of gray areas, particularly when it comes to retro gaming and communities that aren't exclusively oriented around piracy but intersect with the issue regularly.

If anyone is interested, I'm currently working on a couple of gaming related projects, one looking at content in survival games and one examining representations of prison in new media (specifically games).

I appreciate the thoughtful remarks that have already been posted and though I'm not sure how often I will check this thread (though I will certainly follow it), if anyone has specific questions, comments, threats, etc., please feel free to email me at my university account:

steven.downing@uoit.ca

Edit: Sorry; the other article is actually a piece I wrote about social control in communities where piracy is discussed/confronted. I framed Racketboy as a forum community that does not prohibit piracy discussion but also does not encourage it. Gamefaqs (if that could even be called a community) and some DS piracy websites were used to represent the other realms of the spectrum.

[dsheinem]

I'm here to solve the mystery for all of you, and post for the first time in a LONG time.

*drum roll*

I'm the author of the article!

Thanks for posting! I did wonder where you'd gone at the time, now I know

[flojocabron]

aw man! You seem like a cool dude.

I was so ready to bust out my pitchforks with my buddies!

[General Chaos]

Thank goodness the pitchforks will remain sheathed (do you sheath pitchforks?) for now.

To answer a couple of questions posed in this thread:

I'm not sure what to make of the changing landscape of what is considered retro. Obviously digital distribution and always-on DRM is also changing the retro community, especially with respect to collecting. This saddens me a little, but I'm also curious to see if a new type of collector will emerge with respect to indie games and the "swag" offered through crowd funding like Kickstarter. I don't have anything in the works but it would be interesting to look specifically at how crowd funding, indie development, etc. is potentially transforming the piracy landscape (at least when it comes to PC gaming). I don't have a clue how it is, if it is at all, but perhaps so.

I also don't know how relevant my discussion is today. Things move fast and most publications are at least a few years behind the latest social trends, but I believe the tension between collector, true gamer, and other "statuses" will remain, at least in the retro gaming scene. At one time I even found myself a bit submerged in the obsessiveness of collecting and felt the need to scale it back at some point. I continually get the itch to dive back in though, especially when browsing the articles here.

Oh, and Luke, my reference to you as "the preacher" was not meant derogatorily. I truly don't have much of a moral/ethical position on the piracy debate at all. My interest is in the communal dynamics surrounding it.