The world of EVE Online is in a constant state of transition. With over 200,000 players, and up to 35,000 online in the same universe at the same time, the game has developed a social structure unlike another other in the realm of MMOs.

It's to the point where the developer CCP is currently in the process of drafting a democratic council for the virtual realm and recently appointed an in-game economist. Where rogue players can walk away from online heists with merchandise valued at thousands of dollars in real-life currency.

To learn more about what CCP has in the works, and also just what's happening with the upcoming White Wolf MMO it has in development, I spoke with communications director Valerie "Pann" Massey, community manager Mike Read, and director of North American marketing Peter Gollan.

Shack: What can you say about the player committee you're in the process of putting together?

Valerie Massey: Right now, we've spent a lot of time working, just a very small team of us, working on just a foundation document. I don't know if you know this or not, but Iceland is the home of the very first parliament in the world. Hundreds of years ago, they were the first ones that did it. So it's kind of fitting that CCP eventually would bring that to [EVE].

Even before EVE launched, there were conversations where the guys knew eventually it would come to where we needed to have some kind of player government because of the very political nature of the game. We had an early iteration of it probably within the year after EVE launched where corporations--we took different sizes, small, medium, and large and then [we] also had a couple of independent players--would form this committee and we rotated them out, I believe it was every six weeks. It's been a long time.

What we want to do now is something similar but on a larger scale, democratic to where the players would actually get to vote. That's what we've been working on, the voting system, the ground rules, what the community will do.

I think there's some misconception where people believe that they would be able to come in and actually make decisions about the company. That's not going to be the case, it's gonna be focused on the EVE universe.

We've made the internal document, now we have the company at large making comments on it so we can make sure that everybody is on the same page with where we want to go. Probably closer to Fan Fest we'll get to talk more about it.

Shack: I know people have been confused about how it will operate. I've heard some wonder if the committee will be at the studio, constantly looking over the shoulders.

Valerie Massey: That's partly why we needed to step back and not talk about it too much until we had all our ducks in a row, so that we don't continue to perpetuate rumors and cause misconceptions.

Shack: How will voting stay democratic, especially as members of the larger corporations could easily sway the results?

Valerie Massey: That's one of the things that's still under review so we can make sure we have the best processes in place and that everybody, at least on our side, is in agreement about that. There are a lot of ways to do it. We want to make sure that everything is on the level and fair.

I promise you that there is no concern that the players have that we haven't had ourselves, that's why it's very important for us to take our time and do it right.

Shack: I think it's pretty interesting that you're forced to face a lot of real world concerns with these decisions about EVE's virtual world.

Valerie Massey: That's one of the amazing things about EVE. From the political system to the economic system, it does parallel the real world a lot.

Shack: Speaking of the economic system, how is the appointment of the in-game economist working out?

Valerie Massey: DrEyjoG [Dr. Eyjo Gudmundsson], he's doing great. His first report will probably released, I'm thinking, some time in October (Ed. Note: The first report is now available). I've seen some of the preliminary things he's studied, it is so far beyond me--I'd be good to balance a checkbook. The things that this guy knows and understands, they blow my mind.

A lot of his focus is not only on the in-game economy, but also to work with academia. He's had a lot of interest, to the point where we don't go out and look for it, we've got universities approaching us. There's so much potential there to study how a product can go over in a virtual society, virtual banking.

Turn the page to learn about CCP's plans to improve game performance, as well as upcoming features and content.