摘要：INF ORM ATIONand communication technologies (ICTs) have received am-ple attention as potential tools for democratic innovation. Without enteringall too deep in the discussion on this utopian claim, it should (at least for now)be noted that the emerging virtual communities were seen as one of the pro-mising areas for new (democratic) practices to take place. Although criticalvoices were soon to be heard, they usually focused on retorting the utopia-nism. This article wants to take these analyses one step further, by not (just)arguing for ordinariness in stead of newness (including the "normal" presenceof disciplining and surveillance (Lyon, 1994)), but by analysing the extraordi-nary quasi-authoritarian power relations in two specific virtual communities,both Multi User Domains/Dungeons (MUDs).
