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Georgeism of the precursor to Monopoly or Monopoly itself aside: it seems pretty obvious that the world described by Monopoly game is not a fun one. The lucky o

Georgeism of the precursor to Monopoly or Monopoly itself aside: it seems pretty obvious that the world described by Monopoly game is not a fun one. The lucky one gets to charge all the other players rent for just existing which he can then use to charge even more rent. Maybe you think I’m being too literal here. But the concept of “monopoly” is the same.

pessimizer 3y ago
That's the point. You can start everyone in the same place with the same resources, operating by the same rules, and eventually one player through an accumulation of luck and skill will own all of the other players. It's no way to run a society. edit: Monopoly was originally called "The Landlord's Game" for a reason. Do you want to play the landlord's game?
- misnome 3y ago
  And this is literally true, OP your interpretation is exactly how it was designed: > Monopoly is derived from The Landlord's Game, …… as a way to demonstrate that an economy that rewards individuals is better than one where monopolies hold all the wealth ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_(game) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_(game) ) The less outright-capitalistic part didn’t survive in the rules.
  - avgcorrection 3y ago
    I thought it would be too tedious to write out everything about the Landlord’s Game since it was shared here a few months ago. Which is why I only winked at it by mentioning Georgeism (it’s there, literally in my comment). The history aside, the game Monopoly describes the concept of monopoly quite well and how it is a bad thing.
    - pessimizer 3y ago
      I think we were confused by what you thought you were being "too literal" about. It's called Monopoly because the winner is the one that gets the monopoly, and because The Landlord's Game originally had a second phase called "Prosperity." "Monopoly" and "Prosperity" go well together. I'm still confused, actually. The game is not a depiction of Georgism, it's a depiction of the world as it is. The solution is Georgism, which Magie thought would lead to Prosperity.
      - avgcorrection 3y ago
        > I think we were confused by what you thought you were being "too literal" about. Are you sure that you’re not being very literal yourself? (See my last paragraph here.) > It's called Monopoly because the winner is the one that gets the monopoly, and because The Landlord's Game originally had a second phase called "Prosperity." "Monopoly" and "Prosperity" go well together. Ok? > I'm still confused, actually. The game is not a depiction of Georgism, it's a depiction of the world as it is. The solution is Georgism, which Magie thought would lead to Prosperity. “Georgeism of the precursor to Monopoly or Monopoly itself” means that the designers were motivated by that particular ideology. And if the game is a critique of something then it makes sense that the game itself won’t represent that reality but will represent the critique of the status quo which will motivate said ideology as a solution to the problem of the status quo.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- nameless_prole 3y ago
  Leave it to America to turn that game into a massive commercial succuss, while somehow using it to teach people the exact opposite message.
  - TeMPOraL 3y ago
    It's worse than that - the game was, and remains to this day, an world-wide commercial success, despite that anyone who played it a couple times hates the experience; what's more, most people hate it for generic reasons like "playing it with my family sucks", not realizing it's the game that's structurally anti-fun, nor that this was intentional, nor that it's because it's mirroring the real aspects of the American economy. Talk about tricking everyone into participating in a direct, visceral lesson, and somehow failing to actually teach anyone anything.
    - avgcorrection 3y ago
      Are everyone necessarily being tricked? I wouldn’t go full Occupy Wallstreet mode if someone at work asked me whether I liked Monopoly or not. I would just say the usual thing about the snowball effect.
      - TeMPOraL 3y ago
        What I mean is: approximately everyone played Monopoly an had a bad experience. That bad experience was by design, and meant as a lesson, demonstrating how certain economic ideas lead to bad outcomes. Approximately nobody connected the dots here.
        ipaddr 3y ago
        Many love the game. One of the most requested games. What forms your everyone has a bad experience idea? Just something you noticed?
        TeMPOraL 3y ago
- wahnfrieden 3y ago
  People will say landlords do work too. They’re busy, right? However none of the work they do is necessary as owner and can be contracted out to management. If they do labor, such as maintaining a property, sure that’s value producing labor, but is only coincidentally occasionally shared with the role of raw ownership (landlording)
paulddraper 3y ago
> the world described by the Monopoly game is not a fun one Hell, it's not even a fun game :/
Shawnj2 3y ago
The version of monopoly we have wasn’t designed to be fun, it was originally created to criticize capitalism and point out that it’s unfair and was spread among groups opposed to capitalism. Ironically a guy ripped off the game from these groups and claimed it as his own, renamed it Monopoly, changed some of the rules to turn it into a real game that people would actually want to play, and made a fortune off of it.

pessimizer 3y ago

That's the point. You can start everyone in the same place with the same resources, operating by the same rules, and eventually one player through an accumulation of luck and skill will own all of the other players. It's no way to run a society. edit: Monopoly was originally called "The Landlord's Game" for a reason. Do you want to play the landlord's game?

misnome 3y ago
And this is literally true, OP your interpretation is exactly how it was designed: > Monopoly is derived from The Landlord's Game, …… as a way to demonstrate that an economy that rewards individuals is better than one where monopolies hold all the wealth ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_(game) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_(game) ) The less outright-capitalistic part didn’t survive in the rules.
- avgcorrection 3y ago
  I thought it would be too tedious to write out everything about the Landlord’s Game since it was shared here a few months ago. Which is why I only winked at it by mentioning Georgeism (it’s there, literally in my comment). The history aside, the game Monopoly describes the concept of monopoly quite well and how it is a bad thing.
  - pessimizer 3y ago
    I think we were confused by what you thought you were being "too literal" about. It's called Monopoly because the winner is the one that gets the monopoly, and because The Landlord's Game originally had a second phase called "Prosperity." "Monopoly" and "Prosperity" go well together. I'm still confused, actually. The game is not a depiction of Georgism, it's a depiction of the world as it is. The solution is Georgism, which Magie thought would lead to Prosperity.
    - avgcorrection 3y ago
      > I think we were confused by what you thought you were being "too literal" about. Are you sure that you’re not being very literal yourself? (See my last paragraph here.) > It's called Monopoly because the winner is the one that gets the monopoly, and because The Landlord's Game originally had a second phase called "Prosperity." "Monopoly" and "Prosperity" go well together. Ok? > I'm still confused, actually. The game is not a depiction of Georgism, it's a depiction of the world as it is. The solution is Georgism, which Magie thought would lead to Prosperity. “Georgeism of the precursor to Monopoly or Monopoly itself” means that the designers were motivated by that particular ideology. And if the game is a critique of something then it makes sense that the game itself won’t represent that reality but will represent the critique of the status quo which will motivate said ideology as a solution to the problem of the status quo.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
nameless_prole 3y ago
Leave it to America to turn that game into a massive commercial succuss, while somehow using it to teach people the exact opposite message.
- TeMPOraL 3y ago
  It's worse than that - the game was, and remains to this day, an world-wide commercial success, despite that anyone who played it a couple times hates the experience; what's more, most people hate it for generic reasons like "playing it with my family sucks", not realizing it's the game that's structurally anti-fun, nor that this was intentional, nor that it's because it's mirroring the real aspects of the American economy. Talk about tricking everyone into participating in a direct, visceral lesson, and somehow failing to actually teach anyone anything.
  - avgcorrection 3y ago
    Are everyone necessarily being tricked? I wouldn’t go full Occupy Wallstreet mode if someone at work asked me whether I liked Monopoly or not. I would just say the usual thing about the snowball effect.
    - TeMPOraL 3y ago
      What I mean is: approximately everyone played Monopoly an had a bad experience. That bad experience was by design, and meant as a lesson, demonstrating how certain economic ideas lead to bad outcomes. Approximately nobody connected the dots here.
      - ipaddr 3y ago
        Many love the game. One of the most requested games. What forms your everyone has a bad experience idea? Just something you noticed?
        TeMPOraL 3y ago
wahnfrieden 3y ago
People will say landlords do work too. They’re busy, right? However none of the work they do is necessary as owner and can be contracted out to management. If they do labor, such as maintaining a property, sure that’s value producing labor, but is only coincidentally occasionally shared with the role of raw ownership (landlording)

paulddraper 3y ago

> the world described by the Monopoly game is not a fun one Hell, it's not even a fun game :/

Shawnj2 3y ago

The version of monopoly we have wasn’t designed to be fun, it was originally created to criticize capitalism and point out that it’s unfair and was spread among groups opposed to capitalism. Ironically a guy ripped off the game from these groups and claimed it as his own, renamed it Monopoly, changed some of the rules to turn it into a real game that people would actually want to play, and made a fortune off of it.