This makes a lot of sense:
Is QAnon the Most Dangerous Conspiracy Theory of the 21st Century?
“It’s a collaborative fiction built on wild speculation that hardens into reality.”
Perhaps the best explanation I’ve heard for the movement’s popularity comes from Adrian Hon, the chief executive of the gaming company Six to Start and a designer of alternate reality games or ARGs. Unlike video games, alternate reality games aren’t played on a console — they use the world as their storytelling platform. There’s no one particular medium. The story takes place in real time and seems to exist in the world. So game designers hide clues and puzzles in websites, apps and even newspaper advertisements. It’s a bit like a networked treasure hunt that turns the world around you into a game.
For Mr. Hon, that phenomenon resembled the dynamics governing QAnon. In a viral Twitter thread and follow-up post, he argued that “QAnon pushes the same buttons that ARGs do, whether by intention or by coincidence. In both cases, ‘do your research’ leads curious onlookers to a cornucopia of brain-tingling information.”
What are some of the most striking similarities you see between alternate reality games and QAnon, besides being sprawling and complex?
Alternate reality games incorporate the internet and websites, real world interactions, advertisements in newspapers, smartphone apps, any medium we can get ahold of in order to produce the most immersive story possible. I saw the parallel with QAnon for two reasons. QAnon is a uniquely 21st century conspiracy theory. There have been others but QAnon was born on forums like 4chan and 8chan, and the way that people interact with it initially is so purely online. But the effects bleed into the real world much like an alternate reality game.
But specifically what caught my eye is that almost everyone who discovers QAnon uses a phrase like, “I did my research.” I kept hearing that and I couldn’t get it out of my head. This research is, basically, typing things into Google but when they do, they go down the rabbit hole. They open a fascinating fantasy world of secret wars and cabals and Hillary Clinton controlling things, and it offers convenient explanations for things that feel inexplicable or wrong about the world. It reminded me specifically of how people get to alternate reality games. Through these research rabbit holes.
There’s a phenomenon you mention in these games called “This is Not a Game.” Can you explain that?
“This is Not a Game” is the idea that the game is more enjoyable for players if we try and avoid to break the suspension of disbelief as much as possible. This came to the fore with a game called, The Beast. Microsoft was behind it but nobody knew for a long time in. It started with a cryptic message on a movie poster, which, if you Googled it, led you a fake blog, which led to other websites and email addresses and more. Those playing knew it wasn’t real but the design made every effort to seem like it was.
And you note that, in order to prolong the suspension of disbelief, you never admit any designer error, you just add to the story line with more complexity like it was the plan all along?
Sometimes as a designer you will change something in the game on the fly based on how people are playing it. Sometimes their instincts and suggestions add depth to the game and so you quickly rewrite. You can see that happen with QAnon. New theories and tangents appear at dead ends.
In your piece you suggest that alternate reality games “reward active discovery, the drawing of connections between clues, the delicious sensation of a hunch that pays off after hours or days of work.” How does QAnon do that?
There are a certain type of people who are attracted to alternate reality games and they are quite devoted. They like puzzle solving in the same way people like murder mysteries or crossword puzzles. As game designers we encourage that mind-set. We provide extremely difficult tasks that only 1 in 1,000 people could solve. And we do that because that one person who
can solve it will feel like a hero because this weird talent they have is put to use. Alternate reality game designers like to reward its community for niche skills.
This is at play in QAnon. Many people feel alienated and left behind by the world. There’s something about QAnon like ARGs that reward and involve people for being who they are. They create a community that lets people show off their “research” skills and those people become incredibly valuable to the community.
Unlike lots of immersive games, QAnon blurs the lines between the writers/creators/players. Why is that important?
In a classical game or story you have a very distinct difference between those writing or designing and those playing. With QAnon you have this figure [Q] who has a stable identity and plants the seed frequently. But there’s just so many theories involved in the greater QAnon universe that are only tangentially related to the figure of Q. And you see this —
QAnon has absorbed every other conspiracy theory. What would happen if Q stopped posting content forever? Would it die out? Maybe. But maybe not. And the reason it’s unclear is because so many people in the community have essentially built out their own theories and story lines and generated their own massive followings.
Do you think that this feeling of community makes QAnon that much more resilient?
There’s a real Darwinian process in these communities. Just tons of people with ideas and so many forums with up-voting and sharing. Nine hundred and 99 out of 1,000 theories are utterly bonkers but one might hit, maybe because it is slightly harder to disprove or a bit more compelling and it will immediately win out. It’s a collaborative fiction built on wild speculation that hardens into reality...
