Posted by Juggynaut on Friday, November 21st, 2008 - 25 Comments
Last week, President-Elect Obama appointed two net neutrality advocates to co-chair his FCC Transition Team. One of them, Kevin Werbach, who is an assistant professor of legal studies and business ethics, also happens to play a game that you all might be familiar with, World of Warcraft. Checking out his personal blog reveals not only his Armory Page, but also a few interesting tidbits about his experience with the game.
According to the armory link given on his website, he is a level 70 Tauren Shaman specced Resto. Now, at only level 70, it seems like he’s been a little too busy outside of the game to do much leveling since WotLK came out, but we’ll forgive that. In a blog post from 2006, he writes about his experience of being in guilds, “Joining a guild transforms the experience of playing a game like WoW. The guild becomes the reference point for your in-game experience, and group activities — planning raids, exchanging information, sharing resources, chatting — become as much a focal point as the content created by the game developers.”
If his armory page didn’t convince me, that post (from over two years ago) defnitely told me that Werbach gets the MMO thing. I’ve had people ask me if I’ll ever “beat” World of Warcraft, which really shows the difference between those who play and those who don’t. Sure, I may kill Malygos or eventually Arthas, but leveling and killing bosses is just part of the experience. The rest is about the interaction you have with other players and the experiences you have along the way.
I, for one, and happy to see that people who have a better understanding of how the internet and games work are making their way into positions that may actually affect policy. What are your thoughts?
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By mokahasfun on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:12 pm
FIRST
By Talonni on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:33 pm
An insightful and intellectual blog post. Nicely done but it just seems a bit out of place.
Thanks for the information, very interesting.
By cocopuff on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:36 pm
2nd
By PopeSeanPaul on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:41 pm
And this is why I voted for Obama. Finally people in the white house who understand gamers!
By Shaun on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:42 pm
I told my friend about this guy this morning and he didn’t believe me
Obama’s techy-ness (sure, that’s a word) bodes well for geeks like us 
By PatrickD on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Forget this guy…I want a link to Obama’s armory profile.
By Henry on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:51 pm
AWESOME
By Robinwolf on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 2:59 pm
It’s cool what i heard on twit about obama maybe bringing in a CTO type person that would literally have the job of technology affairs in the white house. I could see that as a huge inroad to the future. Someone who understands technology of all kinds and get explain it to the people that do not. A lot of bad policy has been made just because someone didn’t understand what they were even signing (cough DMCA cough).
By Shadowlink on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Tubes!
By Lansing on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 3:50 pm
It’s nice to see that such a high profile person can admit to playing online games, I wonder who else will come forward.
I wonder if he will ask is guild members for tips on going to war lmao
By Mcmanus on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 6:06 pm
Ok… woohoo.. so and so play wow…
The real question is what is up with the Everquest ads on a World of Warcraft site:
http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/5491/woweqkr6.jpg
By lishuss on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 6:09 pm
this is actually kind of cool and the blogpost linkified is actually a very good read.
cool little tidbit
By Mr.Vincent on Friday, November 21st, 2008 at 8:22 pm
I just heard about this on my realm (Medivh) and I was thinking “I bet PL has something on this.” And sure enough, Juggy comes through. Very interesting.
By Deathadder on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 2:00 am
AANNNDDD He’s horde. Smart guy
By lol on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 8:01 am
im pretty sure obama does too hes definatley a undead mage
By braindead on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 11:56 am
omg he’s on my server haha im gonna message him
By Gene on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Might I once again jump in with a For the Horde!
Interesting, but one can only see so many celebrities and elected officials being outed as WoW players before it loses its novelty.
By zedic on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 4:25 pm
“By lol on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 8:01 am
im pretty sure obama does too hes definatley a undead mage”
LOL id love to see that… undead mage ftw!
By kiflet (anvilmar) on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 4:57 pm
zomg, hope that i can continue gameplay without allowing my career to go to hell in a handbasket!
ps — tell albrecht that his AU fraternity brother says hi and that i cry myself to sleep bc he never writes
By Lilliah on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 6:23 pm
Nice article, Juggy. I always appreciate what u write.
also
@PatrickD, who said “Forget this guy…I want a link to Obama’s armory profile.” haha, enjoyed that.
By Borsch on Sunday, November 23rd, 2008 at 1:13 am
Heh, funny that a politician (specifically one working directly for the president-elect) openly admits to playing a game that most people in the higher positions would have locked up in a secret room and deny that they play at all. I do have to ask one question outside the scope of this article: Why when I clicked on the “Episodes” tab did this article appear on it, since this seems more like a blog entry? Just thought I’d ask.
-Borsch
By David on Sunday, November 23rd, 2008 at 2:57 am
he should get obama and everyone to play and start a guild called “the white house”
By Domenic on Monday, November 24th, 2008 at 2:23 am
Not only did he take the time to get to 70 but check out his gear. Nice epics!
By Jeff on Monday, November 24th, 2008 at 11:23 am
Who better to ‘take over the asylum’ than the ‘lunatics’…?
LOL @ “The White House” Guild… has “NookDis” already gone, then…? The queue to pwn DaPrez would be long & distinguished…
By Mark on Thursday, January 15th, 2009 at 11:53 am
Well, hes now level 72 and was last on 1-14-08, maxed out his 2 professions and has the Leroy Jenkins name so he went outta his way to get an achievement so that shows he likes achievements.