The idea is simple. The ramifications are not.

Twitch Plays Pokemon (http://www.twitch.tv/twitchplayspokemon) is, by some rough measure, a digital public sphere. The essential idea is that we hook up a Gameboy emulator up to the game streaming service Twitch, and allow the comments entered to control the buttons. In the parlance, it was super-effective.

Only 90’s kids will remember this.

Almost overnight, thousands of people were playing. It was madness. But it worked.

You must watch (at least) watch this particular moment (1:28) to even begin to understand. Reading http://www.joystiq.com/2014/02/22/twitch-plays-pokemon-its-history-highlights-and-bird-jesus/ is probably a good idea too.

Why do I think this is so amazing and note worthy?

• It was an online system where anyone is welcome to participate
  • anyone could join twitch and send commands
  • twitch is free to join
• There was a common good (winning the game) which the moderates, or average player, wanted to produce
  • Of course, there were trolls too
• There was a main forum for discussion in the chat stream where commands were put
  • There were also many private or alternative forums, such as reddit
• If someone wanted to try to affect the public good, then they had to participate
  • but they could not do it alone
  • they needed cooperation from others
• There was rational discussion on how to strategize best.
• At times the discussion was not civil, but that did not dominate. Good strategies were favored. Tough situations were overcome (there were certain areas which were notoriously hard to navigate)
• There were disasters and unfavorable outcomes, such as the release of certain pokemon by accident or use of an incorrect evolution stone, to which the community responded with unity.
• There were debates & protests on Democracy and Anarchy, and governments were tried and toppled
  • The game, as they Joystiq article mentions, was originally just an anarchy mode where every command entered in the chat is executed
  • Eventually, after much discussion and requesting, a democracy mode was added where players voted in elections for the next move
  • The mode was rather unpopular with some people, who chose to obstruct progress by voting for the equivalent of a ‘no-op’
• Complex culture emerged
  • A religion http://helixpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Church_of_Helix, or two http://helixpedia.wikia.com/wiki/Disciples_of_Dome. ( http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/helixpedia/images/c/c0/19gx2claqgb7bpng.png/revision/latest?cb=20140317034921 )

Twitch Plays Pokemon is, of course, of almost zero real consequence. But what is amazing is that Twitch Plays Pokemon did it. The game was beaten. It took much longer than it would take a single player, but just as in real society, one person can’t call the shots. So in that regard, it is a pure success. To date, several other pokemon versions have also been beaten.

What are we to take from all this? Should we mirror real democracy after this? Perhaps we can let laws be written and passed in such a manner, ships launched, troops deployed, emergency services dispatched, and tax cuts granted?

Probably not. That sounds like a horrible fucking idea. Twitch did some really horrible things, whose real world equivalents would be irreparable.

But to the credit of Twitch Plays Pokemon, what I do think it illustrates is that an online public sphere, when it’s interests are aligned can actually get shit done. And maybe, with more close analysis on how certain subgoals were accomplished in Twitch Plays Pokemon, we can learn something about how to create a functioning internet democracy.