Writer and designer Ken Eklund takes Web 2.0 to very different place, creating an alternate reality in which people can "play."
The price of gas has risen over the past few weeks to $7 per gallon.
The situation is so dire that gas stations will no longer accept credit cards -- cash only -- and accusations are flying in the media about governments stealing oil.
The cause of this panic? An oil crash that began at the end of April.
The situation is being documented in a blog, World Without Oil, which also links to other blogs covering the crisis.
The the site has also set up a toll-free number (1-866-WWO-TSOC) where callers can receive live updates and leave messages explaining what's going on in their area.
Well, not exactly....
There's no panic right now, but San Jose writer/designer Ken Eklund has created an alternate reality in a blog documenting what the world would be like following a sudden oil shock.
But what qualifies this as a game is that he's asking everyone to join in. Anyone can register on the site and contribute to the news, and many players have gone so far as to set up their own blogs documenting the mock crisis.
Presented by Independent Television Service Interactive and funded by PBS, Eklund writes on the web site that the game's purpose is to get people thinking about a potential oil crisis and how to deal with it, or as he puts it in a tag line - "play it before you live it."
Cohesion in the user-generated material is attained with the help of a group of game masters (similar to the GMs in pencil and paper role-playing games like Dungeons and Dragons) who are also characters in the game.
This idea takes the concept of the social web, Web 2.0, to an interesting place, but the people behind the game have an even deeper purpose in mind.
"By playing it out in a serious way, the game aims to apply collective intelligence and imagination to the problem in advance, and to create a record that has value for educators, policymakers, and the common people to help anticipate the future and prevent its worst outcomes," the World Without Oil website explains.
That documentation, which will be complete when the game wraps up at the end of May, 2007, will be thorough. The site includes a variety of media including many blogs, podcast recordings of phone messages left by players and even videos documenting this mock crisis.
Participating in the project is easy. The site has a submission form where players input the URL of the media they've created and specify the type (blog, video or audio) and, if so desired, create a name for their character. A very unique form of role-playing.
