Ludium II Asks What Role For Government In Synthetic WorldsLudium II Asks What Role For Government In Synthetic Worlds

Indiana University's Synthetic Worlds Initiative has announced Ludium II, its second conference bringing together experts from academia, industry, and government to create a consensus platform that answers, "What policies should real world governments have with regards to synthetic worlds?" SWI hopes that, through Ludium II, the members will help provide legislatures and administrators some answers as to how to respond to "the critical public issues that will be raised by these unique social technologies." "Real world governments around the globe," says SWI's release, "are beginning to grapple with their implications in the areas of taxation, intellectual property laws, consumer rights, addiction, violence, and more. Should synthetic worlds be controlled by developers, or by governments, or both? What about the rights of users? What general norms should legislatures and courts follow?" To create the platform, all the members of the conference will play a specially designed game called CONVENTION to help the disparate groups to come to consensus. Designed by Studio Cypher LLC, the game has attendees play as delegates of a political party convention who must agree upon a common platform, and, SWI hopes, "will lead the group to a set of policy recommendations believed by most participants to be important, sensible, and feasible." The consensus platform will be published both as an open letter, and will be sent to all political candidates and office-holders in the U.S. after the conference. The conference will be held in Bloomington Indiana on June 22-23. Registration begins April 23rd, with a call for participation set for the same date. For more information on the conference or its associated game, visit the Synthetic Worlds Initiative website.