Jamie Woodcock

Spectres of Marxism: A Comment on Mike Savage's Market Model of Class Difference:

This article is a critique of Mike Savages ‘From the “problematic of the proletariat” to a class analysis of the “wealth elites”’. It first rejects the notion of the ‘problematic of the proletariat’ – the importance of a dividing line between the working and middle class – instead situating the argument within contemporary debates on class analysis. The critique introduces the broader context of neoliberalism and financialization, alongside a consideration of class globally. It stresses the importance of exploitation for understanding class and inequality, rather than moving to the notion of ‘advantage’, as proposed by Savage, which expels an understanding of power. While the focus on elites in class analysis is welcomed, it is argued that there is a continuing interdependence between classes and that race and gender must also be considered.

Gamification: What it is, and how to fight it

‘Gamification’ is understood as the application of game systems – competition, rewards, quantifying player/user behaviour – into non-game domains, such as work, productivity and fitness. Such practices are deeply problematic as they represent the capture of ‘play’ in the pursuit of neoliberal rationalization and the managerial optimization of working life and labour. However, applying games and play to social life is also central to the Situationist International, as a form of resistance against the regularity and standardization of everyday behaviour. In this article, the authors distinguish between two types of gamification: first, ‘gamification-from-above’, involving the optimization and rationalizing of work practices by management; and second, ‘gamification-from-below’, a form of active resistance against control at work. Drawing on Autonomism and Situationism, the authors argue that it is possible to transform non-games into games as resistance, rather than transferring game elements out of playful contexts and into managerial ones. Since the original ‘gamification’ term is now lost, the authors develop the alternative conception as a practice that supports workers, rather than one used to adapt behaviour to capital. The article concludes with a renewed call for this ‘gamification-from-below’, which is an ideal form of resistance against gamification-from-above and its capture of play in pursuit of work.

Fighting games and Go: exploring the aesthetics of play in professional gaming

This paper examines the varied cultural meanings of computer game play in competitive and professional computer gaming and live-streaming. To do so it riffs off Andrew Feenberg’s 1994 work exploring the changing meanings of the ancient board game of Go in mid-century Japan. We argue that whereas Go saw a de-aestheticization with the growth of newspaper reporting and a new breed of ‘westernized’ player, the rise of professionalized computer gameplay has upset this trend, causing a re-aestheticization of professional game competition as a result of the many informal elements that contribute to the successes, and public perceptions, of professional players. In doing so we open up the consideration of the aesthetics of broadcasted gameplay, how they reflect back upon the players and the game, and locate this shift historically and culturally within the last two decades of computer games as a creative industry, entertainment industry, a media form, and as an embodied practice.

Precarious workers in London: new forms of organisation and the city

This paper discusses precarious workers in London. The aim is to consider the particular challenges and possibilities for resistance in the context of London. It addresses the theoretical questions of precarity and its significance in post-Fordist capitalism. The innovations of the Operaismo—in terms of workers inquiries, the concept of class composition and the strategy of refusal—provide the theoretical basis for the paper. The paper draws on two examples of recent struggles on university campuses, that of casual teaching staff and cleaners, which highlight different points. The first is that a method inspired by the tradition of the workers inquiry can provide an important starting point for a campaign, combining knowledge production and a project of organisation. This is illustrated with the use of surveys as a starting point for a campaign at SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies), University of London. The second example draws on the experience of the cleaners campaigns at the University of London. The history of the dispute is considered along with the use of the London living wage and alternative forms of trade unionism. This paper argues that the particular pressures for precarious workers in London need to be considered, but could also be posed as potential demands from workers, drawing on Henri Lefebvres notion of ‘the right to the city. The conclusion of the argument is a call for further research that is attentive to the new forms of organisation that are emerging from workers struggles and to how a consideration of urban demands could provide important opportunities for developing this further.

‘It’s like the gold rush’: the lives and careers of professional video game streamers on Twitch.tv

ABSTRACT This paper explores the lives and careers of video game live broadcasters, especially those who gain their primary real-world income through this practice. We introduce the dominant market leader – the platform Twitch.tv – and outline its immensely rapid growth and the communities of millions of broadcasters, and tens of millions of viewers, it now boasts. Drawing on original interview data with professional and aspiring-professional game broadcasters (‘streamers’), we examine the pasts, presents, and anticipated futures of streamers: how professional streamers began streaming, the everyday labour practices of streaming, and their concerns and hopes about the future of their chosen career. Through these examinations we explore the sociotechnical entanglements – digital intimacy, celebrity, content creation, and video games – that exemplify this new media form. Live streaming is an online practice expanding in both production and consumption at immense speed, and Twitch and its streamers appear to be at the forefront of that revolution.

Doing good online: the changing relationships between motivations, activity and retention among online volunteers

Advances in Internet technology are making it possible for individuals to volunteer online and participate in research-based activities of nonprofit organizations. Using survey data from a representative sample of such contributors, this study investigates their motivations to volunteer for five online volunteering projects using the Volunteer Functions Inventory. We explore relationships between these six categories of motivation and actual recorded measures of both volunteer activity and retention. We also use quantile regression analysis to investigate the extent to which these motivations change at different stages in the volunteer process. Our results show that volunteers’ activity and retention tend to associate significantly and positively with the motivations of understanding and values, as well as significantly and negatively with the social and career motivations. We also find the importance of motivations changes significantly across the stages of volunteer engagement. In some cases, especially the understanding motivation, the changes observed for activity and retention are markedly different.