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So it turns out more of ye didn't know about the WoW pandemic than did. 56% didn't know.
It's honestly a pretty interesting thing. In 2005, a new raid and boss were introduced, and the boss had a debuff called Corrupted Blood.
It's honestly a pretty interesting thing. In 2005, a new raid and boss were introduced, and the boss had a debuff called Corrupted Blood.
The debuff was contagious, killed lower level players quickly (few seconds) and should only have been an issue when fighting this new boss, and in the specific area. But there was a bug that meant that pets carried the effects of the debuff outside of this.
And once out in the world, the corrupted blood spread quickly. NPCs (non player characters, the preprogrammed actors for players to interact with) in the game could catch it, but not die, so they effectively added as asymptomatic spreaders.
Players acted in much the same ways as real people are acting now - some tried to heal others, some stood guard to warn people that an area was not safe, and some people maliciously tried to spread it further.
WoW instituted a voluntary quarantine but some people didn't avail of it because they didn't take the pandemic seriously.
In the end, they had to reset some servers along with releasing patches (small software fixes) to stop the spread.
It was a fascinating accidental case study in the sociological side of an epidemic or pandemic, since many acted like they would do in real life.
It was a fascinating accidental case study in the sociological side of an epidemic or pandemic, since many acted like they would do in real life.
Because epidemics and pandemics are a social problem - people's perception of risk, understanding of science, faith in media and govt., etc. all play into how much they will change their behaviour in response to a pandemic. And then that has a real impact on the spread.
I though this incident was well known now because comparisons between this and #covid19 were drawn early in 2020.
Here's an article from WaPo which talks in detail about the incident, some studies which happened, and relevance to covid-19. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/04/09/world-warcraft-experienced-pandemic-2005-that-experience-may-help-coronavirus-researchers/%3foutputType=amp
Here's an article from WaPo which talks in detail about the incident, some studies which happened, and relevance to covid-19. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/04/09/world-warcraft-experienced-pandemic-2005-that-experience-may-help-coronavirus-researchers/%3foutputType=amp
It's a very interesting incident to read about, and if you didn't already know about it, do give that article and the Wikipedia page a look, or even read the Lancet paper which arose from the incident - https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(07)70212-8/fulltext
I don't have a SoundCloud to promote so...
Wear a mask. Stay home as much as you can. Remember how your govt. treated you during this pandemic when you visit the polling station next time.
Play video games, they're awesome.
Wear a mask. Stay home as much as you can. Remember how your govt. treated you during this pandemic when you visit the polling station next time.
Play video games, they're awesome.
