For The Win

For The Win by Cory Doctorow (TOR Teen Books) ISBN: 978-0-7653-2216-6

Plot Summary

The story details a number of (eventually) intersecting plots revolving around MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games).  In China, Matthew has recently left his job as a goldfarmer for Boss Fong to strike out on his own.  Wei-Dong (aka Leonard) Goldberg is a Los Angeles high school student who enjoys gaming with Chinese players like Matthew. Mala is a little girl from Dharavi who is hired to kill gold farmers in-game.  While the book uses several characters, the real story is of a much larger scope.  The book details the rise of in-game goldfarming as an emerging market.  Children are paid a slave wage to help middle class greenhorns level their characters, so they can impress or play the game with their friends.  The games also hire workers at a pittance to improve game play or to fight goldfarmers in order to maintain an equilibrium.  The main thrust of the plot is that the online workers unite (creating the organization the IWWWW - the International Workers or the World Wide Web or the Webblies) demanding better pay from the game manufacturers.  When striking and making demands do not work, the IWWWW works to disrupt the in-game economy (which has formed an important piece of the world economy).

Critical Evaluation

Doctorow explains the global economy, unions, child labor, and turks (a form of crowd sourced employment) through the concept of goldfarming in MMORPGs (Role playing games often require the player to collect some form of money in order to increase the abilities of their character; often this requires repetitive hack and slash missions.  When people work only to buff or level their character they call it "gold farming"). Often in books that describe video games, it’s clear that the authors have never gamed; Doctorow clearly has. The in-game descriptions are among the most compelling and realistic I’ve read (rivaled only by the bizarre psychological video game that appears in Ender's Game): 

The Walrus's Garden was a tricky raid, because it was different every time you ran it, the terrain regenerating for each party.  As the spellcaster, Wei-Dong was supposed to keep the lights on and the air flowing so that no matter what came, they'd see it in time to prepare and vanquish it.  First came the octopuses, rising from the bottom with a puff of sand, sailing through the water toward them.  Lu, the tank, positioned himself between the party and the octopuses, and, after thrashing around and firing a couple of missiles at them to aggro them, went totally still as, one after another, they wrapped themselves around him, crushing him with their long tentacles, their faces crazed masks of pure malevolence.

Once they were all engrossed in the tank, the rest of the party swarmed them, the four of them drawing their edged weapons with a watery clang and going to work in a writhing knot.  Wei-Dong kept a close eye on the tank's health and cast his healing spells as needed.  As each octopus was reduced to near-death, the raiders pulled away and Wei-Dong hissed into his mic, "Finish him!"  The gweilo fumbled around for the first two beasts, but by the end, he was moving efficiently to dispatch them. (Doctorow, 2010, p. 21).

Doctorow's descriptions are loaded with the jargon and strategic understanding of a hardcore gamer.  He deftly describes the role of a tank and of a healer, making it sound perhaps even more exciting than it actually feels to play a game.

Unlike Little Brother, For The Win is focalized through several characters in third person narration: two little Indian girls (Mala and Yasmin), a young Jewish boy living in LA who wishes he were Chinese (Leonard Bernstein/Wei Dong), a Chinese boy named Matthew, and several others.  It hops the globe: Dharavi, Los Angeles, Shenzen.  By prominently including people from various ethnicities and genders as heroic characters, Doctorow achieves a realistic portrayal of both gaming and the nature of work around the world.  Featuring powerful characters from every country involved and of each gender ensures that the book will speak to a wide swath of readers whether or not they are gamers.

Reader’s Annotation

A bunch of kids around the world spend all of their time playing video games, but the consequences mean the difference between their having a meal to eat or their family surviving.  Doctorow uses the world of video games to explore the idea of sweat shops in an increasing global society.
 

Information about the author

From the author's webpage: 

One sentence: Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction author, activist, journalist and blogger -- the co-editor of Boing Boing (boingboing.net) and the author of the bestselling Tor Teen/HarperCollins UK novel LITTLE BROTHER. His latest young adult novel is HOMELAND, his latest novel for adults is RAPTURE OF THE NERDS.  

One paragraph: Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction author, activist, journalist and blogger -- the co-editor of Boing Boing (boingboing.net) and the author of young adult novels like HOMELAND, PIRATE CINEMA and LITTLE BROTHER and novels for adults like RAPTURE OF THE NERDS and MAKERS. He is the former European director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation and co-founded the UK Open Rights Group. Born in Toronto, Canada, he now lives in London.  (Doctorow, 2013).

Genre

Speculative Fiction/Video Games/Social Justice

Curriculum Ties

The book uses videogames as a stand in to explain the nature of unions, strikes, the global economy, recession and crash cycles.  It could be tied into discussions of the Arab Spring or social justice.

Booktalking Ideas

1) Read the section I quote from above about the raid of the Walrus's Garden.
2) The multicultural aspect of the novel may be appealing, so discussing the Chinese, Indian, and American characters might be appealing.
3) Wei-Dong's journey to China on a cargo ship inside of a shipping crate is fun and stands out.
4) Connecting the striking and protesting to real world protests.

Reading Level/Interest Age 

8th grade and up

Challenge Issues

Language, sex, violence.

I would openly greet any patron who presented a challenge to the work, giving them ample time to detail their complaint.  I would listen attentively.  To respond to these challenges I would have some reviews of the work on hand.   I would be prepared to explain that as a public institution libraries "cannot limit access on the basis of age or other characteristics" (ALA, 1999).  I would have copies of the library's collection policy on hand.  I would be prepared to politely discuss that parents can control what their children are exposed to by coming to the library with them and examining books they check out.  If the Teen Advisory Group had written reviews of the book I'd have them handy.  While it may be of little comfort to certain parents, I would also be prepared to discuss my staunch support of intellectual freedom and abhorrence of censorship.  As a last resort, I would be sure to keep copies or a reconsideration form on hand.

Why did you include this book in the titles you selected?

I appreciate the way that Doctorow uses his narratives to educate about contemporary politics.

References

American Library Association. (1999). Strategies and tips for dealing with challenges to library materials. Retrieved from http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned/challengeslibrarymaterials/copingwithchallenges/strategiestips

Doctorow, C. (2010). For the win. New York: TOR.