I have written this code of ethics to remind researchers of the precarity of digital sociation as we investigate explicitly virtual worlds in the form of online live-action roleplaying games. “Remind” is the operative word, as this code of ethics should be used to step back from the online field—with all of its exciting potential—and refamiliarize oneself with the harms, morals, and people at stake when conducting research online, even if that research is seemingly more detached from the “physical world” by virtue of not only occurring within a digital game but also incorporating a form of creative detachment from the physical world: roleplay. Though the subjects of O-RPGs in ethnography may be doubly separated from the offline world—first by technology and then by roleplay—it is important that their offline, online, and imaginary selves are kept safe throughout the course of study. Thus, I suggest that researchers regularly return to this document prior to, during, and following their fieldwork in order to practice the following:

  1. Contextual Sensitivity: Prior to fieldwork, we should identify virtual games that are open to observation by researchers, especially ones that, while perhaps publicly available, are run by private individuals primarily or for particular individuals. While some online game designers host servers themselves, many O-RPGs (such as Garry’s Mod, Roblox, or Rust) allow individual users to make servers and invite the public to them. Keep in mind who the field site is meant to serve (children, private friend groups, queer people), and the risks research may pose to private individuals on that server.
    • It is unwise to enter a video game with little prior knowledge. Thus, it would be to the researcher’s, the research’s, and the informants’ advantage if the researcher learns about the game beforehand and plays it in a non-ethnographic context so as to not enter the game completely unaware of its culture. This ignorance can lead to misinterpretation of the game’s events and thus mischaracterization of its players.
  2. Humility and Gratitude: Prior to fieldwork, we should recognize that the stories created online are created for (and often by) the players. While we should take note of these stories, we should strive to do more than simply regurgitate the stories that players create, analyzing them as cultural objects derived from social processes. It is not the researcher’s place to lift the narratives created by communities as their own, and we should remember that we are lucky to be allowed to share in the narrative.
  3. Transparency and Reflexivity: During fieldwork, we should identify ourselves as researchers when interacting directly with informants and be mindful of our role as researchers. In many ways, the city streets of a virtual world like World of Warcraft may be no different from the streets of Chicago, and when observing, it may be inconvenient, perhaps even detrimental to authentic observation, to tell every pedestrian that we are observing them. However, when participating—interacting directly with informants—we need to make our roles clear. This may be a tricky task because we are in a world of pretend and make-believe, so our claim to be a “researcher” may be taken as an extension of that make-believe. It is acceptable, necessary even, to play the game as a player would, but in doing so we should privilege the players’ actions over our own, remembering (and reminding our informants) that we are researchers first and foremost.
  4. Safety: During fieldwork, we should perpetually renegotiate consent, especially in a dynamically changing environment like a video game. Within roleplaying worlds, some actions may be deemed more public or private than others (for instance, chat logs vs actions in the game’s main hub), and so as the privacy of play changes, we must be mindful of our informants’ desire to keep some information more or less off-the-record.
  5. Mindfulness and Sensitivity: During fieldwork, we should recognize our informants’ tripartite roles: as offline persons, as online players, and as characters within an online world.
    • While our informants may be playing an online game, behind their avatars are people who have joined the game for a variety of reasons. Be mindful that the actions online are the product of an offline body’s decisions, and thus research that interrogates an avatar is ultimately interrogating a physical person.
    • Our informants are also online people, and for them the experience of online roleplay may differ from offline roleplay. The virtual space may be interpreted differently by informants; thus, it is essential to know what the virtual space means to them.
    • Our informants are also playing characters. The character they play may obfuscate their offline realities, may be seen as extensions of their offline realities, or may be created in opposition to their offline realities.

    We may only ever be privy to one of these roles, and so we must be mindful of the missing gaps in our knowledge of our informants. For example, I have played an O-RPG with a gender dysphoric man (offline reality) who acts as a server host (online reality) and plays as a woman in an attempt to experiment with his gender (online character). Recognizing these three roles gives us a deeper understanding of the players in order to avoid mischaracterizing them, but it also shows the risks (e.g., a player’s gender identity) at stake when playing roleplaying games.

  1. Transparency and Flexibility: During fieldwork, we should signal shifts in our research methodology. This is to say, roleplaying worlds offer many opportunities for co-play, social experimentation, and interviews (both formal and informal). What we are doing in the field site should be known to the players so as to not deceive them about our intentions.
  2. Objectivity and Contextualization: Following fieldwork, we should make conclusions based on the general experiences of our informants and avoid describing only the most sensationalist events we have witnessed. We must also recognize that O-RPGs contain many unique servers, and that our conclusions may only apply to a limited selection of experiences.
  3. Security: Following fieldwork, we should anonymize those who we have interacted with online. The server name and player names, while potentially anonymous at face value, can often be connected back to the people in the offline world who inhabit these virtual spaces.