This simple online game comes from the Spanish collective, exgae. The game purports to be an “experiment of procedural rhetorics”, “The goal is to provide a simplified interactive rendition of theories and propositions about knowledge capitalism (es. Negri, Lessing, Wark). It’s a game you cannot lose. Even if you stop playing the game always tend to a dynamic equilibrium between market and Common. The basic assumption is that there will never be a complete privatization of shared knowledge and without a strong opposition (represented by the player’s action) the forces of the market will indefinitely exploit the innovative ideas emerging from the society.”

It feels a little like PacMan as designed by CreativeCommons, and in some ways seems more like a rhetorical slide show than game where the interactions cause unexpected outcomes, but nonetheless a fun experiment. What might have made this game truly amazing is if it were an interface to an actual aggregation of content, such that each yellow globule, instead of representing an abstract bit of “content”, represented a real essay or mp3 file that was either freed into a Creative Commons zone like ccMixter – OR – shunted away into RIAA hell, based on whether or not the player was successful in saving it.

The Free Culture Game can be played online at:
http://www.molleindustria.org/freeculturegame-eng