A virtual plague is a process in which a behavior-affecting property spreads
among characters in a Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG). The MMOG
individuals constitute a synthetic population, and the game can be seen as a
form of interactive executable model for studying disease spread, albeit of a
very special kind. To a game developer maintaining an MMOG, recognizing,
monitoring, and ultimately controlling a virtual plague is important,
regardless of how it was initiated. The prospect of using tools, methods and
theory from the field of epidemiology to do this seems natural and appealing.
We will address the feasibility of such a prospect, first by considering some
basic measures used in epidemiology, then by pointing out the differences
between real world epidemics and virtual plagues. We also suggest directions
for MMOG developer control through epidemiological modeling. Our aim is
understanding the properties of virtual plagues, rather than trying to
eliminate them or mitigate their effects, as would be in the case of real
infectious disease.Comment: Accepted for presentation at Digital Games Research Association
(DiGRA) conference in Tokyo in September 2007. All comments to the authors
(mail addresses are in the paper) are welcom