The Fixed World
A Constitutional Architecture for Persistent Virtual Worlds
Abstract
Persistent virtual worlds are commonly treated as software systems whose identity is inseparable from the implementations through which they are executed, rendered, stored, and operated. This paper argues that this conflation is architectural rather than necessary, and proposes a model in which a world's identity is defined constitutionally through its geography, mechanics, economy, and permissible state transitions.
Once this distinction is made, implementations become replaceable, rendering becomes external, accessibility becomes architectural rather than retrofitted, and preservation shifts from maintaining software to preserving the constitution that defines the world itself. Development likewise changes direction: rather than continually redefining the world through new geography and mechanics, it improves the means through which an unchanged world is inhabited.
The result is a virtual world capable of accumulating continuous shared history while remaining independent of the software through which successive generations experience it.