Alter Ego: Avatars and their Creators (Hardcover)

~ Robbie Cooper (Author), Julian Dibbell (Introduction), Tracy Spaight (Afterword)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Alter Ego is a cool concept book, presenting the phenomenon of the contemporary avatar-the virtual characters gamers choose and design to engage in 3D worlds online. Portraits of gamers from the United States, Europe, China, and Japan (including leading figures of the gaming world) are paired with digital images of their alter egos, graphically dramatizing the gap between fantasy and reality.

With an introduction by one of digital culture's leading observers, and a glossary of relevant terms, each of the seventy pairs of images are accompanied by detailed gamers' profiles. Sometimes hilarious and always visually exciting, Alter Ego also serves as a guide to the new world of the avatar and is a serious contribution to the debate about the future of society in the digital age.

Robbie Cooper is a photojournalist. Born in London in 1969, his essay about Somalia was awarded the United Kingdom's leading young photographer's prize in 1992 (the Ian Parry scholarship). He now works regularly for magazines including Esquire, GQ, Geo, Libération, and the The Sunday Times Magazine.

Julian Dibbell is a contributing editor of both Wired magazine and the website Feed. Author of My Tiny Life: Crime and Passion in a Virtual World (1999, described as "quite simply the best book written about the dynamics of online life"), he writes regularly for The New York Times, Rolling Stone, The Village Voice, and TIME magazine on topics such as hackers, online communities, music pirates, and the philosophical questions of the digital age. He lives in South Bend, Indiana.

About the Author

Robbie Cooper was born in 1969 in London and studied photography at Bournemouth College of Art. He won the Ian Parry scholarship in 1992 for his work in Somalia and has been been widely published, including in Liberation, The Sunday Times Magazine, Geo, GQ and Esquire. His work has been exhibited at galleries in London, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Berlin and Paris.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: Chris Boot (May 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1905712022
• ISBN-13: 978-1905712021
• Product Dimensions: 12.2 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #590,791 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Alter Ego, June 23, 2007

By	K. Chu - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"Alter Ego" is a clever, fascinating idea... presented very well with Cooper's photographs and the short bios by Spaight. It's an awesome coffee table type of book that my friends always pick up first. It sometimes surprises me that there are still a lot of people who are totally unaware of the virtual world phenomenon/culture, so this book is a eye-opening introduction to all that.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exceptionally Entertaining, June 8, 2007

By	Jonathan Wood "MMORPG.com" - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Alter Ego is an exceptionally entertaining read for anyone interested in the world of MMORPGs and their ability to provide us with our own digital alter-egos.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Coffee table book for a gamer or digital culture scholar!, December 17, 2007

By	Jill Walker Rettberg (Bergen, Norway) - See all my reviews

What fun this book is! The front cover is a "hologram" just like on the covers of some of the books I had as a kid in the seventies, where moving your head a little morphs the photo of two World of Warcraft avatars into a photo of the couple who play them. The entire book is devoted to photos of avatars alongside their players, with brief facts given about each player and avatar. A perfect coffee table book for a gamer or digital culture scholar!