Tamika Lofton

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Wiki Article #1: Simulating Detroit, A City With Cars and Crime but No Races

SimCity 1989 History behind the game

SimCity was originally developed by Will Wright. The thing that inspired the idea for SimCity was a feature from the game Raid on Bungeling Bay which allowed Wright to create his own maps during development. Other development plans came from theories of urban planning and system dynamics which Jay Wright Forrester developed and his books laid the foundations for the simulation. Maxis developed the first version of this game for the Commodore 64. There were many versions following the 1989 version of this game. The content of this game was to allow players to be the mayor of their city, giving them a feeling of power and control over everything. This game became popular because it allowed players to build a city and have control over the city, it was appealing to its audiences. The game was based off of real cities and attempts to recreate the general layout of these cities. The goals were to focus on time scenarios where things could possibly get worse than what it was or things could be accomplished and the cities could be in good living standards. The scenarios were all based off of true events which makes things more interesting because the player/mayor was able to create a plan to fix everything.

Simulating Detroit, A City With Cars and Crime but No Races Article summary

To me the topic of the article seems to be about the car industry and crime in the city. The articles talks and points out the relations between the car industry and the Motor City. This point is made by expressing once the car industry in the Motor City goes into a recession, the city of Detroit also experience a recession as well, which increases crime. The game seems to be based off of this and the player(s) gets to help/rebuild the city of Detroit from its recession with a 10 year time frame to do so before crime gets worse than what it is. The author’s main argument is about the Motor City fighting to overcome the recession/hard times to get things back on track. Crime is another main focus and the author expresses that race is not the significant factor it’s the crime being committed by all.

Importance of Simulating Detroit, A City With Cars and Crime but No Races and SimCity

The author demonstrate the importance of social, cultural, and political aspects of the game in the article by simply stressing that race is not an important factor of crime, when things go wrong in a city but that it becomes social problem because of the recession, this shows players what is needed to maintain a city when funds are low and crime is high and critical thinking measures to come up with a plan to turn things around. This also allows players to get a glimpse of what things were possibly like during the actual time that the event took place in the city. Culturally video games and technology are the biggest thing in society now and the article talks about a historical moment and put that into a video game informing players about some key points of history about the cities and the relations between the different cities the game focuses on. Politically players are able to use their own ideas and develop plans and figuring who needs to be involved and what they need to do to reconstruct the city differently and not let history repeat itself.

Simulating Detroit, A City With Cars and Crime but No Races The Debate

The post generated some debate because people stated how the author leaving out race was an issue. 3 of the comments in particular all related to how the game uses Detroit and how race should be related especially with Black America history. Everyone felt that the crime part of the article and the game was about race and that the author just ignored that part. I honestly have not played this game but I will say that I have to agree with the comments somewhat and the author because it does seem as if the author tried to ignore the race issue and not use that to associate with crime and me being from Detroit I can agree with the author because when the city is in a recession everyone starts committing crimes it is not just African Americans it’s all races in Detroit because people are angry and upset and the resources for people to live in the city is not there so the author has an excellent point about its about crime and not race, but at the same time when things like this hits the media it’s the minorities who they show doing wrong so I can understand the few comments that were made.


Works Cited:

Sample, M. (2012, February 14). Simulating Detroit, A City with Cars and Crime but No Races. Retrieved June 12, 2015, from http://www.playthepast.org/?p=2474

(n.d.). Retrieved June 12, 2015, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SimCity_(1989_video_game)


Wiki Article #2

Explanation of Anonymous, SOPA, and PIPA

The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and PIPA were U.S. bills used to expand the ability of U.S. Law enforcement used to fight online copyright infringement and online trafficking in counterfeit goods. The purpose of it is just what its name entitles which is to get a handle on counterfeiters, piracy, and intellectual property. SOPA and PIPA works to target foreign websites and domains which infringes on the U.S. copyright and intellectual property laws. These bills standpoints are to make efforts to prevent piracy and internet crimes. Both of these bills were judged for the language and description which is broadly interpreted. From the article on this another discussion was brought up and argued that the two bills would slow things down and forbid tech start-ups and new companies because it would be much harder and it will be able to create new sites and how much restraints it would place on the “open” Internet. The article states three things the legislation will do, it will not stop the piracy that is being targeted, the wide language will allow abuse by those with power or that are in control of this, and lastly the legislation will regulate and enforce censorship on the internet. Anonymous are groups of hacktivist, “Anonymous originated in 2003 on the imageboard 4chan”. “They represent the concept of many online and offline community users simultaneously existing as an anarchic, digitized global brain” The members aka known as "Anons" can be distinguished in public by the wearing of stylised Guy Fawkes masks”. According to Wikipedia the group is an “internet gathering” with a very loose and decentralized command structure” that put all their attention on their ideas instead of directives. Anonymous has no leadership, anyone can join the group. Anonymous launched distributed denial-of-service attacks on other groups who they’ve had issues with such as the government, religious groups, and corporate websites.

Anonymous Relation to Movements to Protect Online Piracy

Groups such as anonymous are very invested in the internet, they express their ideas and comments. When using the internet so much information is being transmitted to others which allows them to share reactions to the information they have come across and possibly add to it. From previous research in the class stated that the internet is an information highway that is always going through changes whether it’s being updated or someone is simply adding to it. Some content on the internet becomes restricted due to numerous reasons and the group anonymous was not happy about when it occurred. The article from Quinn Norton talked about the year when anonymous took on the cops and others, when Tunisian government placed restrictions on the internet, anonymous took a stand and launched the distrusted denial-of-service attack on government websites as they leaked information about what was occurring in Tunisia. Information was shared with people in Tunisian and they gave them methods on how to help with the outbreak. Once anonymous plans became successful they were then known as freedom ops. Anonymous began to attack anyone who placed restrictions on them being able to post their ideas on the internet. I feel anonymous has a right to react to restrictions place on internet use because it’s no such thing as privacy on the internet and the internet is a big communication tool that allows people to post things and share information and allow feedback and response from people all over. Anonymous main purpose to me seems that they do not support restrictions being placed on the internet and that they feel it is an open communication tool, also it seems that they may not support the prevention's to protecting online privacy.

Edward Snowden Correlation to the Readings

The readings illuminate the events surrounding Edward Snowden because the government wants regulate how and what the internet can be used for. Edward Snowden had access to classified documents and programs he felt needed to be shared with the public. The documents show how the government was watching and recording activities of the citizens without them knowing. I would like to say it still seems as if the government is still regulating citizen activities and whatever it is the government do they always try to hide it from the people. I think Snowden did a good thing similar to the anonymous group by collecting information and sharing it with the public and informing them of government actions. The government think they are doing citizens a favor and are protecting them but if you ask me they are not protecting us from everything. The government main focus for monitoring what citizens do because they are trying to catch acts of terrorism. Even though it was a cost to the U.S. Snowden made sure he passed along information and allow people to see what the internet was precisely being used for and how people rights were taken away.


Work cited

Anonymous (group). Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation. n.d. Web. 2 July 2015.

Harvey, Jason. "A technical examination of SOPA and PROTECT IP." Blog.Reddit. n.p. 17 January 2012. Web. 2 July 2015.

Norton, Quinn."2011: The Year Anonymous Took On Cops, Dictators, and Existential Dread." Wired. n.p. 11 January 2012. Web. 2 July 2015.