Government Spying & Cartoon Weaponry

Juan Cole, writing for Salon.com has taken up the issue of the US government taking an interest in online games in pursuit of terrorists. Basically saying the idea is ludicrous, Cole said:

Indeed, the journalists and security experts examining this issue do not seem to have grasped the difference between real actions and virtual ones. Learning to make your avatar do the tango or shoot a gun at someone in "Second Life" in no realistic way translates into knowledge that would help you carry out those actions in the real world. Likewise, nothing you could do with a gun in a virtual world would teach you how to, say, fire accurately or under pressure in the real world. Even the Internet war-game sites -- known in geek terms as MMORPGs, or massively multiplayer online role-playing games, which include "Worlds of Warcraft" -- would probably just make most terrorists overweight and addicted to the Internet.

It's a thought-provoking article and worth the entire read.

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