Includes bibliographical references and index.

Machine generated contents note: Contents -- Glossary of EVE Online Jargon -- Introduction -- Marcus Carter, Kelly Bergstrom, and Darryl Woodford -- 1. EVE Online for the Uninitiated -- Kelly Bergstrom and Marcus Carter -- 2. EVEOnline Is Hard and It Matters -- Christopher Paul -- 3. Virtual Interstellar Travel -- William Sims Bainbridge -- 4. Universes, Metaverses, and Multiverses -- Kjartan Pierre Emilsson -- 5. The Digital Grind: Time and Labor as Resources of War in EVE Online -- Oskar Milik -- 6. The Russians Are Coming! Stereotypes and Perceptions of "Russianness" in EVE Online -- Catherine Goodfellow -- 7. The Art of Selling Trust -- Chribba -- 8. We Play Something Awful: Goon Projects and Pervasive Practice on Online Games -- Richard Page -- 9. The Accidental Spymaster -- Keith Harrison -- 10. The Evolution of Player Organizations: A Goonswarm Perspective -- The Mittani (Alexander Gianturco) -- 11. RIP Vile Rat: Makeshift Memorials in EVE Online -- Martin R. Gibbs, Marcus Carter, and Joji Mori -- 12. Imagined Capsuleers: Reframing Discussions about Gender and EVE Online -- Kelly Bergstrom -- 13. The Social System in EVE Online -- Mantou (Zhang Yuzhou) -- 14. Do EVE Online Players Dream of Icelandic Spaceships? The Role and Mechanisms of Co-creation in CCP's Success -- Jedrzej Czarnota -- 15. EVEOnline as History -- Nick Webber -- 16. On the EVE of Preservation: Conserving a Complex Universe -- Kristin MacDonough, Rebecca Fraimow, Dan Erdman, Kathryn Gronsbell, and Erica Titkemeyer -- Contributors -- Index.

"EVE Online is a socially complex, science-fiction-themed universe simulation and massively multiplayer online game (MMOG) first released in 2003. Notorious for its colossal battles and ruthless player culture, it has hundreds of thousands of players today. In this fascinating book, scholars, players, and EVE's developer (CCP Games) examine the intricate world of EVEOnline--providing authentic accounts of lived experience within a game with more than a decade of history and millions of "real" dollars behind it.Internet Spaceships Are Serious Business features contributions from outstanding EVE Online players, such as The Mittani, an infamous member of the game's community, as well as academics from around the globe. They cover a wide range of subjects: the game's technicalities and its difficulty; its projection of humanity's future in space; the configuration of its unique, single-server game world; the global nature of warfare in its "nullsec" territory (and how EVE players have formed a global concept of time); stereotypes of Russian players; espionage play; in-game memorials to Vile Rat (aka U.S. State Department official Sean Smith, murdered in the 2012 Benghazi attack); its gendered playing experience; and CCP Games' relationship with players; and its history and legacy.Internet Spaceships Are Serious Business is a must for EVE Online players interested in a broad perspective on their all-consuming game. It is also accessible to scholars, game designers seeking to understand and replicate the successful aspects unique to EVE Online, and even those who have never played this notoriously complex game.Contributors: William Sims Bainbridge, National Science Foundation; Chribba; Jedrzej Czarnota; Kjartan Pierre Emilsson; Dan Erdman; Rebecca Fraimow; Martin R. Gibbs, U of Melbourne; Catherine Goodfellow; Kathryn Gronsbell; Keith Harrison; Kristin MacDonough; Mantou (Zhang Yuzhou); Oskar Milik; The Mittani (Alexander Gianturco); Joji Mori; Richard Page; Christopher Paul, Seattle U; Erica Titkemeyer, U of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Nick Webber, Birmingham City U. "-- Provided by publisher.

Description based on print version record.