Online Gaming Research SurveyFollow

Dear EQ Player,

I'm an academic researcher into online massively multiplayer computer games, specifically looking at drivers of customer retention and loyalty for my PhD. As part of my research I'm conducting a large scale web-based survey you are invited to participate in.

The link to the survey is here:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=Zg3mDH06S9wcipjayRpTJg_3d_3d

While I'm sure you'll may have concerns regarding unsolicited postings, for your information, regarding the nature of the survey, the research ethics protocols my survey operates under require all participants to be 18 or over and information obtained in this study will be kept strictly confidential and anonymous. Disclosure of data obtained through this research will be reproduced and published specifically for academic purposes, in a variety of forms (academic journal articles, etc.) and for a variety of audiences, related to the broad nature of the research. The protocols having gained approval from Newcastle Business School's Ethics Committee.

Any and all feedback is gratefully received, and if you any feedback, or questions, please post them in reply.

I would also be very grateful if you could re-post that link to the survey as far and wide as possible to your guildmates, friends and other MMO-Gamers that you may know.

Kind Regards

David Grundy
Senior Lecturer
BA (Hons) Business Studies Programme Leader
www.newcastlebusinessschool.co.uk

I just read http://msulr.law.msu.edu/back_issues/2006/3/Westbrook.pdf and found it interesting. Although I don't agree with bits and pieces of the paper it is nice to know there's some legitimate research going on out there and not just a bunch of RMT people trying to figure out how to corner the market for plat sales.

I bing'd "The Presence of Stigma Amongst Users of the MMORPG RMT: A Hypothetical Case Approach" but only found some links that were behind locked servers. Is there any way I could read your articles without having to subscribe and pay to read them? I'd also enjoy reading what you wrote about international finances; especially if there's anything about virtual worlds and virtual money.

Nice to see someone out there taking that step forward to actually ask the people that play the game, what makes them tic, rather than assuming they know what makes us tic or to try telling us, the gamers, what we are going to like. Not sure if this is worthy of a PhD or not, but hey, it sure looked like it would be put to good use if the data collected was analyzed.

Oh hey you didn't have the option of a person with the marital status Soon to be divorced and sleeps on the sofa a lot - just kidding LOL.

Edited, Jun 14th 2009 1:52pm by tripodvi

What Jophiel Jonwin said.