What server are they doing this on?

In the meantime.. Oh, nothing else is happening.

Think I will be the first to say. Well "Duh" of course Jeffe and Probolsky are downplaying this. 1st not WoW players. 2nd) Did not think of it first.

It should be amusing (irony) to see how many players show to support a politician. I have a feeling most gamers are like myself in thinking that politicians want to either take away, control, or tax to death our pastime. I do not trust respect or trust them, but this is my failing I suppose.

Well I for one have not made up my mind yet on presidential candidates or even which party I will be voting, but from what I have heard Ron Paul is for preventing the federal government from making/influencing domestic policy. So out of the candidates, I would say he is the safest vote if you don't want federal video game legislation, because he will not be pushing or approving any laws on domestic policies.

There is not going to be alot of people that will show up to march, but there is going to be quite a few people that will show up to watch the march. A few of those who will watch will end up trying to grief the marchers, just you wait. I heard this event is getting alot of attentsion in the WOW comun., the hardcore greifers will come.

I wonder how the political analysts will react to the griefers that might show up.

"screw that, I'm just gonna run around everyone else."
^ My point exactly about griefing.

Is this endorsed by Paul's campaign, or is it an independent thing?

@me

I bet it's an independent thing.

This has gankfest written all over it. :-D

It's interesting that almost all Republican "analysts" are just bashing Ron Paul and saying he isn't viable despite his overwhelming fundraising so far. What it comes down to is that the Republican establishment doesn't want him, because he actually maintains some of the conservative standards that the Republican Party left behind sometime around the Reagan era. Now the Republican Party is an Old Boys' Party, and Paul is an outsider. It's unfortunate that Paul's voice is being discounted by the Republican Elite, because it's important to the overall conversation on what Republicanism is supposed to be about - a tool of the Religious Right, or a force for conservative small gov't? Maybe somewhere in between.

Note, I'm not a Paul supporter (although he does make me curious). I'm just annoyed at all these Republicans trying to deny his obvious influence.

And yeah, if you don't know anything about the Internet, it's hard to authoritatively say that something happening on the Internet will or won't be influential. As it is, a march on a WoW server doesn't seem like a typical way to gain influence, although some average WoW'ers might do a google on Paul.

I quit playing WOW about a year ago, but if the servers are in a similar state to that time, then this march will cause major lag, choppiness, maybe even crash the continant server...

[...] Source: Political Analysts Pooh-pooh Ron Paul WoW Rally Bookmark it: [...]

"I totally fail to see how the march will round up other voters. Actually I fail to see how grassroot activism influences people."

Usually the idea is to spread information or interest, targeting those who haven't yet made up their mind on an issue. Activist organizations frequently attract the people they want to influence even without much effort--kind of like political blogs (which totally have no influence on the nation's politics or political discourse at all--thanks for the info, Probby).

The WoW march, though? By and large a lolzfest. Ron Paul is meme and all.

I'm sad this isn't on a PvP server. A friend and I speculated putting bounties on the heads of marchers. We'd like to see this "Free Market" thing in play.

@ Tom, It gets people involved butthose people are the people willing to be involved. That's where I lose it.

And franckly, Ron Paul is quite a nutjob too.

It will be inconsequential because they are supporting a candidate who garners about 5 to 6 percent of national support.

If it was a candidate in shouting distance this would have lot more coverage and might be a bigger story.

Netroots activism for presidential politics has not been able to make enough of an impact to effect the elections. Dean in 2004 had his momentum, but it wasn't enough. Ron Paul really has no momentum but has convinced people to donate a lot money. Thats it. He has absolutely no chance to win.

While he has more support and money than Kucinich, their campaigns are essentially the same. While the individual may not be popular enough to win, the message they stand for is bigger than their campaigns.

Nochanceron, a lvl 6 BE female mage, has just ganked her first Ron Paul supporter. I will be flying to the barrens to pick off fellow lowbies. Any 70 hordies wanna join me? Send me a tell, online right now.

@kurisu

char name and level plz.

This rally sounds like a deathmarch to me.

I hope the Horde stomps this group. Not because I disagree with them, it's just what we Horde do. We stomp things.

Also: with 25 mins left before the event, it would be smart to enter the queue for the server now. there's a 400 person queue last check

I saw a lvl 5 gnome named Gamepolitics at the head of the march. Hopefully getting some primo screenshots! My dwarf, Novoteforron, was getting flames and ignored. I actually had a decent convo with someone eventually.

Interesting idea, maybe even innovative. What intrigues me is if events like this continue, will it shake up politicians who still blindly believe video gaming is exclusively a children's activity..?

No one plays WoW anymore. They got the word out to people with no shutins and people who play job games. Essentially people who already know about RP. Turn out was good because RP supporters have no life. Just try posting something bad about him somewhere public and in a matter of hours it will be swarmed by what would appear to be a large group of people when it's really just some forum buddies with sock puppet accounts. It took the entire Ron Paul voter base to do this and they couldn't even crash a server.

This whole thing's about the funniest thing in US Politics since W.J. Bryan.

Woah, brownshirts on WoW.


Though the WoW population must be the perfect target. They'd never actually READ what Ron Paul stands for or what the fuck any of it means.

Personally, I don't see why some of you are complaining about this. If I were paying $15 a month to play a game, of course I am going to bring some elements of real life into it. After all, it is taking real life time to commit the $15. I don't support Ron Paul as he come across as a nut to me, but I am glad to see this show of gamer devotion. If this does not get the message that gamers are voters too, then I don't know what will.

Ok this is to anyone who actually went to this thing. How much fire did they come under? Now I know that the server is not a PVP server so the fire I am talking about is spam in the General chat and characters named Votehiliary, ObamaFTW, XxxLegolasObamaXxx.

Too bad this didn't happen on a PVP server, I would of loved to see a ton of horde waiting for the Alliance to show up at Ratchet.

Statements like this bother me: "It will be inconsequential because they are supporting a candidate who garners about 5 to 6 percent of national support."

I will assume that the author (Evan) did not mean that one shouldn't vote for Ron Paul, or any candidate, based on current performance. (I would not vote for Ron Paul. There are some things we need government for. OTOH, 5 percent is nothing to sneeze at, especially without party backing and with little starting funds. Given Census estimates of 230mil voting adults in 2006, that's about 11.5mil "angry" people.)

At any rate, one votes for a candidate who best represents your interests, not the one most likely to win. That's why it's called a representative democracy. The elected represent you not by proxy, but in responsibility. You, in turn, should pick the one best able to generally reprsent you.

It's not a popularity contest.

"It’s not a popularity contest."

That's precisely what it is.

Why do you see huge rallies with cheesy music, balloons, fireworks, etc. Why do they spend much more on 'image' than actual policies? Because it's all about popularity. Being the popstar of the week on the particular week the election is on.

Plus voting for a candidate with only 5% of the vote might make you feel good but is going to change zip.. you might as well have stayed at home. Much better to pick between the two or three candidates likely to win and pick one of those (OTOH it's pretty much a shoe-in for Hillary at the moment so you might not make a difference anyway).

@Terrible Tom -

Agreed. at least someone seems to be on my page

I don't understand hardly any of you. You all bitch and moan that no one takes games seriously, no one takes gamers seriously as a class of people. Yet, here stands a testiment to a group of people TRYING to be taking seriously, and you just f*ck with them to make them difficult. Maybe politicians think games are for kids because you people act like freakin children.

Rome wasn't built in a day. Of course the WoW rally won't be a deciding factor, but it was innovative and did something no one else had done before, and all you do is complain (most of you, anyway) about how stupid it is blah blah blah. For the love of god, grow up and step outside yourselves. You don't have to agree with Ron Paul (personally, I think he is the least of a multitude of evils but) and look at the intent of whats going on. You have a group of people trying to be taken seriously in a new medium for political change, and you gank them, say how stupid it is ...

I'm impressed with the Turn out. I'm on Mal'Ganis and 400+ Queue is nothing major for me, but that says there must have been a huge turnout for it, and I'm glad. I'm a huge believe in the mentality that if you aren't part of the solution, you are part of the problem.

Def. applies to this situation.

I think part of the reason no one takes gamers seriously is because right now, gamers don't deserve to be taken seriously.

In going thru the Yahoo Dashboard just now, I find that their "Buzz" quantity, which is a measure of how many people are bringing up information on a particular candidate, shows Ron Paul with the highest "Buzz" numbers in something like 31 states. Granted, it is only people looking for information, and the poll numbers don't match the "Buzz" numbers, but the actual numbers are far more for Ron Paul than anybody else, plus he is also second in "Buzz" numbers in several other states. There is a lot of interest in Ron Paul, and what they call a revolution may be catching on. He is the only constituttionalist running, and the interest in that so far is being underestimated. This is not a Ross Perot phenomenon, it appears to be a real grassroots movement.

LordDax,

What? I rolled a charater to propose my differing political opinion by using the game mechanics to do so. WoW isn't real-life. What you are proposing is both that video game space should be held to same "rules" as real life, and the people who play the game and break no rules should have their right to real-life free speech taken away?

"conscientious respectful and openminded adult"

Yes, because your post just drips with all of that.

I think people should be allowed to act childish and what not. There shouldn't be a law requiring people to act intelligent and mature. If there was there would be a huge amount of people that would be in a lot of trouble, myself included. I do wish some people would act more mature a lot of the time but its as easy as not blessing them with the energy to grant a response.

But I do agree that the people who wish games and gamers to be taken seriously should look a bit further into their actions because there are times where I do see a great deal of behavior that I would classify as hypocritical.

People have the right to say anything they want to but saying things such as Ron Paul is not a real candidate is pretty foolish because you literally have nothing to back up that claim. Polls aren't a accurate or even legitimate way to predict the outcome of the actual voting process and the mainstream media really only tells you what they WANT to tell you. They claim they have "fair and balanced coverage" or they are "unbiased" but that is impossible.

Honestly, what do you even care what they have to say? You shouldn't even give a shit what I think either. Have you lost the ability to read into presidential candidates? Look at his grassroots supporters, look at the records he has set and look at how those records were achieved. Look at his platform and look at the bills he sponsors in congress. He is literally running off the same platform he always has(see 1988 Libertarian bid and his 10-terms in Congress).

I hate the mainstream media with a passion. They are the worst place to gain information and knowledge and yet they are for whatever reason trusted by a large portion of individuals. Untrustworthy, inconsistent, self-important and theoretically irrelevant.

Until we start treating the mainstream media as what it is, a whore, then its going to continue to have a death grip on American culture. Sorry to be so crude but you fuck whores for personal gain. It is as simple as that, fuck them, give them a little change and get what you need out of them. Money is their substance and the brain-dead misinformed public is their oxygen.

the1jeffy -

Alright, I stand corrected. MSM are more like talentless crack whores that have yet to lose their teeth.(This makes the crack whore completely worthless as well)