Posthuman Blues

(Well, so much for making a conscious decision to place PB in hibernation.)

Computer characters mugged in virtual crime spree

"A man has been arrested in Japan on suspicion carrying out a virtual mugging spree by using software 'bots' to beat up and rob characters in the online computer game Lineage II. The stolen virtual possessions were then exchanged for real cash." (Via Future Feeder.)





What makes this inversion of real/"unreal" especially interesting isn't that real-world money is being stolen in a virtual environment, but that the perpetrators are anthropomorphic bots. From the perspective of the avatars getting "mugged," the assailants would seem like soulless, single-minded androids.

Could there be autonomous bots -- perhaps something along the lines of "The Matrix's" "agents" -- operating in meatspace? If so, could we recognize them as such?