Another Endless November: AOL, WoW, and the Corporatization of a Niche Market

Authors

  • Ray Op'tLand University of Calgary

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4101/jvwr.v2i3.660

Keywords:

MMORPG, AOL, World of Warcraft, WoW, Disneyization, McDonaldization

Abstract

The entrance of World of Warcraft (WoW) into the massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMO) market has drastically altered conceptions of how popular a virtual world could be. Currently servicing over 12 million monthly subscribers (Woodcock, 2008), it has vastly exceeded expectations, and has brought with it more new users to persistent virtual worlds than any other product before it. However, while there has been much academic work exploring developments within the game itself (Bainbridge, 2007; Duchenault, et al., 2006; Castronova, 2007), the processes by which this explosive growth has occurred have been under-explored. The growth of World of Warcraft relative to the MMO market can only be explained via its extrinsic characteristics of the game and how these characteristics interact with processes of standardization and diversification with relative to the market as a whole.

In this paper, I propose that the process that enabled WoW to rise to its current position as market leader amongst MMOs is remarkably similar to that employed by America Online (AOL) in the early 1990

Author Biography

Ray Op'tLand, University of Calgary

Faculty of Communications & Culture, MA Student

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Published

2009-10-12

Issue

Section

Peer Reviewed Research Papers