Ernest Cline's book Ready Player One (2011) [1] explores a dystopian world in which the only escape from the harsh world is the fully immersive, full-dive virtual reality world of the OASIS. While the OASIS itself was originally designed as a multi-player VR (virtual reality) console and game, the society of Ready Player One (RPO) has turned it into an integral part of the livelihoods and culture of its people. With the blending of virtual and real life in the story, New Materialism asks the question of whether or not the OASIS has Thing Power or Agency, and how this assemblage acts on its relationship with the humans that use it.
What is New Materialism and Thing Power?
New Materialism is a theoretical lens of thinking that revolves around the idea of the power of things. It challenges the idea that humans are the only power on the planet with the ability to act upon other things. In Jane Bennett's Vibrant Matter [4], she goes into a deep discussion about the agency of inhuman things, including living and non-living ecological factors, the power of intangible things and the idea of assemblages- interconnected factors that act together, but that can be fluid and change independently. New Materialism focuses on the importance of ecological agency, which promotes concern for out environments outside of their direct contribution to humanity.
--To read more about New Materialism, check out Jane Bennett's Vibrant Matter here! [5]
What's the Relationship Between the OASIS and the Ecology of RPO?
In RPO, the OASIS is the peak of technology for a world thrown into food scarcity, drought, and other environmental peril. When it was first created, no one in the world was at all concerned about it, but as the outside world became harder and harder to live with, people found their escape through the OASIS. In the game/world of the OASIS, people could go anywhere, do anything, and be anyone, and that is exactly what people did. Even those who lived in the Stacks (trailer homes stacked on top of each other where lower income families had to live) could afford and run away to the world of the OASIS. Over time, the OASIS also became a way for people to network, advertise, and even generate income from, driving more and more people to spent more time in the idealized world. In short, the OASIS gained its initial power through the strain of the ecological climate of the world, and as the OASIS adapted to the growing user-base, the user-base adapted to further exploit the OASIS.
What is the OASIS power as an assemblage?
Within the world of RPO, the OASIS is the livelihood of the majority of the population. It even hold the political power to influence elections of the physical world and has a valid school system in place. That being said, the OASIS is an assemblage and requires the efforts of its factors in order for its power to remain true. The OASIS may be the hub for most of the worlds activities, and its existence allows for people to gain income, entertainment, and exercise no matter their living conditions, it is limited by a few things. Humans are the main factor in this assemblage that changes the most dramatically. Firstly, humans created the OASIS and without people to log on/in to the OASIS it would be nothing but a collection of servers and technology in a desolate environment. Secondly, there is a singular person who holds control of the OASIS (or at least there is supposed to be) originally this is its creator, Halliday, and by the end of the book (spoiler alert) it is Wade. This single person hold the power to shut down the entire system with the literal push of a button and is the one person above every rule and regulation in place inside the OASIS. There are also other nonhuman factors that make up the OASIS, such as: accessibility to the technology, time to go online, interest in the world/game, electrical availability. To put it simply, without people being able to play the game, the game would have no power over the people, BUT the world of RPO has reached the point that without the OASIS it could definitely collapse.
Why Does it Matter?
Ready Player One offers an interesting look into what an interdependent assemblage made by humans could be, how it forms, and what that means for the factors (both living and nonliving) after the assemblage has solidified into its own power. By granting agency to both the factors and the assemblage itself, the OASIS shows the power of Things on humans and gives an example how how New Materialism could be useful theory to apply to our own technological future.
Wanna Nerd Out?
- Check out This Article by Daniel Friedman on why the OASIS would be terrible (?!) game [8]
- Or watch This video by Fine Brother's Entertainment to watch elderly people play and reacting to VR Chat: the closest thing to the OASIS that currently exists in our world [9]. Caution for possible adult content.
Resources:
[1] - Cline, Ernest. Ready Player One. Broadway Books, 2011.
[4] - Bennet, Jane Vibrant Matter: The Political Ecology of Things. Duke Universtiy Press. 2010.
Comentarios