At 9pm on February 1st in the Taiwanese city of Xinbei, a 23-year-old gamer named Chen Rongyou was found dead in his seat at an internet cafe, after buying two-eight hour sessions of online time. When discovered by police, he was stiff with rigor mortis, and his arms remained outstretched in front of him, with one hand reaching for the keyboard and another hand reaching for the mouse. more ›

The Guardian brings us this little nugget today: A former prisoner at a labor camp in Jixi reports that prisoners are being forced to mine "virtual gold" online for up to 12 hours at a time, in addition to their daily physical labor. If you're unfamiliar with the term "gold farming", it basically refers to the building up of online currency (like weapons, credits, character levels, whathaveyou) with hours of play, which is then sold for real money to gamers. From the Guardian: more ›

Finally, someone got the idea to use gaming to help students instead of shoving them into oft dangerous internet addiction camps. Zhonghua Vocational School, here in Shanghai, has begun the first ever "Online Games" class. The thought is that these kids can learn the valuable skill of working in a group, as well as boost their self confidence, if they play World of Warcraft with proper guidance and supervision. While I'm not entirely sold on the curriculum (there's got to be more educational realms than Azeroth - all it's ever taught me is how annoying Chuck Norris jokes can get), at least its nice to know someone's recognizing that banning these things outright is probably not the way to go. more ›

According to a statement released by Netease earlier today, the General Administration of Press and Publication has suspended government approval for their operating World of Warcraft. As if WoW players didn't have enough problems earlier this year, the GAPP cited “gross violations of regulations” as the reason behind suspending NetEase’s operating rights to the massively popular online game. more ›

Photo by Aether Woo more ›