Informing our own choices: A proposal for user-generated classification

New media are distrusted media, and computer games are the contemporary currency in new media. Computer game content, like other popular media content, is regulated in different jurisdictions by one of three general models: the open market in which consumption decides the availability of product, industry self-regulation in which industry bodies decide, and government regulation in which government or quasi-governmental bodies decide. Arguably, these models represent the twentieth century state of the art and fail to keep pace with changes in the aesthetics and technologies associated with interactive entertainment. In a networked economy, alternative models exist to serve content gatekeeping functions, and they serve to close the lags and limitations that plague existing models. These alternatives include innovations such as user-generated classification and dynamic meta-tagging. This paper examines current classification approaches and their limitations, and presents alternative approaches with a hypothetical game title.