Abstract:
In accordance with the present invention, a method for creating a system of self-organizing colonies of players engaged in turn based games and other social activities performed within a web browser is provided. The approach described here partitions the game site population into distinct colonies with the appropriate activities and design such that the players create a community environment. Playing online games and chatting are examples of social networking activities; therefore, an invention that combines self-organizing capabilities to these activities will enhance the social experience. Essentially, the notion becomes a game within a game where the players change aspects of the rules governing the site and the games themselves. In particular, tests have demonstrated that game players create their own distinct communities just as thermodynamic theory predicts.

Description:
REFERENCES CITED  
     Related U.S. Application Data  
       [0001]     Provisional Application 60/723,963 filed on Oct. 6, 2005.  
       PRIORITY CLAIM  
       [0002]     This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application 60/723,963 filed on Oct. 6, 2005, entitled “Self-Organizing Turn Based Games and Social Activities on a Computer Network.” 
     
    
       [0000]     OTHER PUBLICATIONS  
         [0000]    
       
          Ashby W. R. (1962): “Principles of the Self-Organizing System,” in: Principles of Self-Organization. von Foerster H. &amp; Zopf G. W. (eds.) (Pergamon, Oxford), p. 255-278.  
          Eigen M. and Schuster P. (1979): The Hypercycle: A principle of natural self-organization (Springer, Berlin).  
          Lendaris G. (1964): “On the Definition of Self-Organizing Systems,” IEEE Proceedings 52, p. 324-325.  
          Nicolis G. and Prigogine I. (1985): Self-Organization in Non-Equilibrium Systems (Wiley, New York).  
          Turing, A. M., (1950): “Computing Machinery and Intelligence,” Mind, 59:433-460, reprinted in E. A. Feigenbaum and J. Feldman eds. (1960): Computers and Thought (McGraw Hill: N.Y.). See also http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/TuringArticle.html (Dec. 8, 1998).  
          Winston Patrick Henry (1984): Artificial Intelligence, 2nd ed. (Addison Wesley: Reading Mass.).  
          Bigus Joseph P., Bigus Jennifer, and Bigus Joe (2001): Constructing Intelligent Agents Using Java, 2nd ed. (Wiley: New York).  
       
     
       FIELD OF THE INVENTION  
       [0010]     This invention relates to the improvement of online turn-based, browser games and the social networking activities such as online chat rooms. A more evolved player community results by applying the principles of self-organizing systems to a social networking framework.  
       BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
       [0011]     Turn-based gaming (sometimes known as turn-based strategy) is a term of art used within the online Internet community. Players agree to a game, set up the initial state of the game, and agree upon a timeout period. Each participant plays in turn according to the game rules. Once each player has taken his or her turn that round of play is over, and any shared processing is performed. This procedure repeats to the next round of play. The cycle continues until a winner is declared.  
         [0000]     Internet Games  
         [0012]     Internet games are games that are played online via the Internet. They are distinct from video and computer games in that they are normally platform independent, except those games that rely on client-side technologies (often called ‘plug-ins’). Normally, all that is required to play Internet games are a web browser and the appropriate plug-in (frequently available for free via the plug-in maker&#39;s website). A game played within a browser is often called a browser-based game.  
         [0013]     There are many different plug-ins used to play online games. The Java virtual machine (JVM), Shockwave, and Flash are examples of plug-in technology. There are specialized tools used to create games employing these technologies. Games that require plug-ins are usually based on the client-side; that is, much of the processing is done by the player&#39;s computer instead of the server hosting the game.  
         [0014]     Server-side games occupy the opposite side of the software spectrum. They process game play on a server instead of the player&#39;s computer. Server-side games are typically not as visually appealing as client-side based games, but easily compensate with more advanced functionality. The server can apply complex rules, compute scores, and record all manner of player interactions. Furthermore, it is easier to implement multiplayer games with server software.  
         [0000]     Browser Limitations  
         [0015]     The elusive goal of online gaming is to create a dynamic, responsive interface that allows players to interact as if they were playing cards at the kitchen table. It is hard to attain the real-time responsiveness one needs to support a social function like chatting with all the advantages that client-server computing brings. The problem essentially boils down to limitations of the Internet as viewed by Web browsers.  
         [0016]     Though rich in content and media, the Web tends to be a traditional one-way broadcast medium, like radio and TV, with the largest number of people being passive information consumers. Sharing or publishing information from the client side is another matter. People currently use Web browsers to find and read information. Publishing information is relatively rare but the requirements are growing. The rapid acceptance of web logs indicates need. Web logs (frequently called blogs) follows a bulletin board technique where the users post a message to a server that eventually gets added to a common Web page for others to view. Most online gaming sites that try to incorporate social networking features like chatting adopt a blog approach. Unfortunately, the delays inherent to blogging fall well short of the dynamics of human conversation.  
         [0017]     The problem with browsers supporting chat rooms and responsive server-side games is the fact that the Web was not designed to support real-time, peer-to-peer communication. Web technology essentially follows a pull model. Web browsers send HTTP requests (GET, POST) to the Web servers and receive contents in response. The model of push feeds contents directly from Web servers to Web clients. RSS, for example, is a push protocol for headline news. Generic push, however, has never come to be a protocol for the Web. For many people, push went quiet during the last few years when systems like Marimba and Castanet disappeared.  
         [0018]     Instant messaging (IM) comes closest to approximating human conversation responsive enough for online games. Web browsers were not designed to synchronize real-time events and manipulate communication sockets in the way that instant messaging applications do.  
         [0019]     Many domain experts have come to the conclusion that Web browsers and IM are incompatible because IM essentially follows a push model. Some Instant Messaging systems do have browser interfaces. For example, there is ICQ in Internet Explorer. However, such IM implementations within a browser are essentially coupling the IM program together with the browser via remote-procedural calls from within a specific operating system (Windows, Linux, etc.). They do not operate on, and exchange the contents and media of, Web browsers.  
         [0000]     Self-Organization  
         [0020]     The study of order creation within open thermodynamic systems gave rise to the notion of self-organizing systems (SOS) and dissipative structures [Nicolis and Prigogine, 1989]. Ecology provides illustrations of how a SOS perspective differs from standard approaches. Scientists are interested in how spatial and temporal patterns such as patches, boundaries, cycles, and succession arise in complex, heterogeneous communities. Early models of pattern formation use a ‘top-down’ approach, meaning the parameters describe the higher hierarchical levels of the system. For instance, individual trees are not described explicitly, but patches of trees are. Or predators are modeled as a homogeneous population that uniformly impacts a homogeneous prey population. In this way, the population dynamics are defined at the higher level of the population, rather than being the results of activity at the lower level of the individual [Ashby, 1962; Eigen and Schuster, 1979; Lendaris, 1964].  
         [0021]     The problem with this top-down approach is that it violates two basic features of biological (and many physiochemical) phenomena: individuality and locality. Modeling a rodent population as a group of rodents with some growth and behavior parameters (so-called lumped parameter models), differences that might exist between individual rodents become ignored. Some are big, some are small, some reproduce more, and some get eaten more. These small differences in the micro-scale can lead to larger differences in the macro-scale. For example, changes in the population gene frequencies, individual body size, or population densities might have cascading effects at still higher levels of organization.  
         [0022]     Humans also self-organize information while surfing the Web. Harvesting hyperlinks within HTML pages of interest create valuable information than can be further utilized. Google capitalizes on this SOS behavior to create high quality Web searches. Hyperlinks to information that have the high frequency among a world-wide population reveal a measure of relevance. Google gages importance of underlying information by finding the most frequently cited hyperlinks related to a given phrase.  
       SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
       [0023]     In accordance with the present invention, a method for creating a system of self-organizing colonies of players engaged in turn based games and other socialization activities performed within a web browser is provided. Most web sites catering to online gaming are monolithic in nature servicing many thousands up to several million players simultaneously. The approach described here partitions the game site population into distinct colonies with the appropriate activities and design such that the players create a community environment. In the aggregate, the total gaming population using the same machinery described here may be in the millions, the size of the individual colonies will be restricted to a few hundred.  
         [0024]     Playing online games and chatting are examples of social networking activities; therefore, an invention that combines self-organizing capabilities to these activities will enhance the social experience. Essentially, the notion becomes a game within a game where the players change aspects of the rules governing the site and the games themselves. In particular, tests have demonstrated that game players create their own distinct communities just as thermodynamic theory predicts. Self-organization in the colonies can become manifested in several ways. Selecting a colony might be based on player characteristics. Possibilities for segregation are: 
        Available games 
            games of chance versus strategy     card games or board games    
            Competition versus sociability     Demographic factors such as age     Common interests like sports, hobbies, or politics     Referral based membership     Paid versus free membership 
 
 Players can adjust the rules of the colonies. Possible examples: 
    Maximum time between turns     Specific game rules or variations in games     Tournament rules     Available shops/portals/blogs     Maximum number of players allowed within a game room     Limits on player behavior 
 
 The ability to fashion online communities represents a powerful attraction to Internet users. The game play becomes more intimate where users get to know each other as in any other social club. 
       
 
     
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0039]      FIG. 1  is a schematic of the invention comprising of a web server, an image server, and a database server transferring chat room content to a plurality of client web browsers.  
         [0040]      FIG. 2  is an illustration of a world map that provides a gateway to a plurality of settlements and colonies that self-organize.  
         [0041]      FIG. 3  is a schematic of the components supporting a self-organizing colony comprising of desktop, colony map, avatar controls, messaging system, and rules engine.  
         [0042]      FIG. 4  is a screen shot of the user&#39;s desktop.  
         [0043]      FIG. 5  is a schematic illustrating how the desktop provides access to a plurality of game rooms.  
         [0044]      FIG. 6  is a screen shot of a typical game room environment.  
         [0045]      FIG. 7  is a screen shot of a colony map.  
         [0046]      FIG. 8  is a schematic illustrating how the colony map provides access to a plurality of chat room environments.  
         [0047]      FIG. 9  is a screen shot of a chat room environment that includes avatars, a virtual conference room, the message input field, and a scrolled chat session transcript.  
         [0048]      FIGS. 10   a ,  10   b , and  10   c  are three screen shots demonstrating the sequence of events for avatar movement: a) entering a chat room, b) examining available locations for movement within said chat room, and c) executing a move to the selected location.  
         [0049]      FIGS. 11   a  and  11   b  are two screen shots illustrating how the virtual environment can be populated with new objects such as adding furniture to a house scenario.  
         [0050]      FIGS. 12   a  and  12   b  are two screen shots illustrating an avatar shopping: a) within a chat-enabled furniture store, b) reviewing transactions of said purchases to include spit-screen views of a bank account and a store&#39;s pricing catalog.  
         [0051]      FIG. 13  is a screen shot of a chat room environment with game play that includes a mixture avatars and chatbots.  
         [0052]      FIGS. 14   a  and  14   b  are two screen shots of the interface for customizing avatars.  
         [0053]      FIG. 15  is a screen shot of a visual rolodex that maps the avatar specifications to individual users.  
         [0054]      FIGS. 16   a  and  16   b  are screen shots demonstrating the two step process of posting a private note to another player.  
         [0055]      FIGS. 17   a  and  17   b  are screen shots demonstrating the two step process of reading a public note.  
     
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT  
       [0056]      FIG. 1  is a diagram that describes the software architecture of this system. The system includes components on the server side  100  and the client side  101 . The server side components comprise of a database server  102 , a web server  103 , and an image server  104 . The diagram represents software functionality as opposed to physical computer hardware. The server-side components could reside on a single computer running all three software services or split across two or three computers linked by an intranet. The database  102  stores information regarding the state of game and chat environments. Typically, this data is stored in SQL relational tables. The database server also stores settings of self-organizing rules, player information, and player messages. The web server  103  provides the communication linkage to a plurality of client browsers  101  by way of the Internet  106  via a network protocol such as HTTP or HTTPS. The image server  104  transforms and composites image combinations. These combinations include the game room graphics, avatars, conversation balloons, non-avatar objects, and chat room backgrounds and foregrounds.  
         [0057]      FIG. 2  is an illustration of a world map  200  that provides a gateway to a plurality of settlements  201  and colonies  202  that self-organize. Users within their web browsers  105  view the world map  200  which is an HTML image map. The server  103  directs users to the appropriate online communities when they activate icons or hot spots on the map. In  FIG. 2 , a settlement icon  203  and a colony icon  204  serves up the settlement and colony environments, respectively. The distinction between a settlement and a colony is that the former is early in the process of self-organizing. Settlements are pre-colonies that eventually transform into distinct colonies.  
         [0058]     Individual users can become members of more than one colony. Each member has a home colony, but they can move between colonies through passports (permissions granted within the database server).  
         [0059]      FIG. 3  is a schematic of the components supporting a self-organizing colony comprising of desktop  301 , colony map  302 , avatar controls  305 , messaging system  306 , and rules engine  307 . The desktop  301  provides a gateway to a plurality of game rooms  303 . Similarly, the colony map  302  provides a gateway to a plurality of chat rooms  304 . Users can customize the visual characteristics of their avatars using the avatar control  305  component. The self-organizing colonies support integrated messaging capabilities throughout the environments such as the desktop  301 , the game rooms  303 , and the chat rooms  304 . The messaging system  306  supports both electronic mail [Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) to user&#39;s external e-mail addresses]  308  and instant messaging  309 . The rules engine  307  is the module that allows users to impose their collective preferences into the online self-organizing colony environment  202 . The preference information is stored in the database  102 . The effect of the parameter settings and modified rules governing user behavior are what provides each colony  202  its unique character. To continue the metaphor of local government, the rules engine and its settings are like local laws or ordinances enacted to govern behavior of its citizens.  
         [0060]     A screen shot of the user&#39;s desktop  301  is shown in  FIG. 4 . This screen forms the center of the gaming environment within a self-organizing colony  202 . The games currently available are shown as icons on the desktop. For example, one enters the backgammon game room by activating the icon image of a backgammon board and dice  400 . Each game icon on the desktop is associated with a specific game room  303 .  FIG. 5  is a schematic illustrating how the desktop  301  provides access to a plurality of game rooms  303 . The icons are arranged in a manner resembling a car dashboard. Underneath each game icon is the number of turns awaiting the player in open boards of that particular game type. As an illustration, in this sample screen shot, the icon label  412  shows that the user has one turn among five active boards within the Gold Card game room.  
         [0061]     The desktop  301  is active in the sense that views within each browser  105  changes dynamically without reloading the entire HTML page. For example, the icon label  412  will change within the affected user&#39;s browser  105  when the turn information requires updating. The methodology, commonly called Ajax, involves embedding certain Javascript constructs such as (XMLHttpRequest objects within game boards and inside chat room interfaces. The Javascript can both send and receive XML messages which allows for a duplex communication channel. The net effect is asynchronous communication between a client browser and a Web server. In other words, with the web flow engine, online games and chat rooms support a push from within a client browser.  
         [0062]     The Waiting Room  401  is like a game room except here users post their preferences for games they desire to play. Other users can enter that room and claim game challenges. Button controls include Refresh  402 , FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)  403 , Help  404 , and Logout  405 . Refresh activates the HTTP request to the web server  103  to reload the HTML page. FAQ loads HTML instructions with overview questions and answers to assist new users. Help activates game rules in effect with this particular colony. Logout eliminates a user from the active list and returns a validation screen to re-login at a future time.  
         [0063]     To the right of the game icons is a Who&#39;s Online region  406  and Point Leaders region  407 . These scrollable windows list of game players presently active and the game point leaders of this colony, respectively. The lower part of the desktop  301  addresses the messaging system  306 . Private Notes  408  on the lower right involve instant messaging between two users within the colony. Public Notes  410  on the lower left allow users to both post and view general interest comments or announcements to a bulletin board. These Public Notes are visible to everyone in a colony. The user&#39;s desktop  301  also includes his associated avatar image  411  and other cumulative statistics related to that user such as points earned during the month, total points, balance, and the like.  
         [0064]     The colony map  302  is activated when users activate the colony map icon  409  (shown here for colony “Atlantis”) on the desktop  301 . This screen forms the center of the role-playing activities within a self-organizing colony  202 . The function of the colony map is to provide access to the various chat rooms  304 .  FIG. 7  is a screen shot of a typical colony map. For example, activating the “Shop  1 ” icon  700  allows a user to enter a storefront chat room  304  like the one shown in  FIG. 8 .  
         [0065]      FIG. 6  is a screen shot of a typical game room environment. Although this particular illustration involves backgammon, the look and feel remains the same for all of the game rooms. On the right is the game board  600 . This is where players make their moves for a specific game with an opponent. Each game has its own unique characteristics for making moves which depend on context and state of the game. Captured in this instance are a Roll Dice button  601  and a current scoreboard marquee  602 . On the left is the Open Games region  605  that indicates the active games within the backgammon game room  303 . Three games are shown here with three different opponents. A line highlighted in bold  604  signals that it is the user&#39;s turn for the game indicated. In this instance, the user&#39;s turn awaits in a backgammon game with ‘mutt’ that has a timeout set for October 4th. Game Notes  603  is the portion of the interface were two players can view and send notes posted to each other regarding this particular game board  600 . After a player has taken his turns and posted/read the various Game Notes  603  within the game room  303 , activating the Close button  606  returns focus back to the desktop  301 .  
         [0066]      FIG. 8  is an illustration of the web server  101  supporting different types of chat rooms providing environmental context. Most any virtual space in which participants can interactively communicate and meet with each other can become a chat room. Potential meeting places could be an office, a house, a lounge, a hospital, or a museum. A storefront chat room  304  is one example shown in  FIG. 8 .  
         [0067]     An enlarged view of a chat room is shown in  FIG. 9 . The environment shown here is a typical conference room  900  with multiple participants. The avatar labeled ‘mitch’  908  corresponds to a user who entered the conference chat room  900  through interactions with his client browser  105 . An avatar is a graphical image representation of a user interacting within a chat room environment. The Names button  905  toggles the avatar name plates  909  with its associated user for easy identification. The server software  100  records the coming and going of avatars into a chat room, movement within a chat room, conversations between avatars, and scenario changes as described later. The composite of all the information described above is used to generate a chat room scene such as the one shown in  FIG. 9 . Here, three users are interacting together while viewing the same common chat room view  900  rendered in their respective client browsers  105 .  
         [0068]     When avatars engage in conversation, text appears within a balloon  907  in a fashion resembling comic books. The user inputs his remarks through a scrollable text widget  903 . After inputting those text remarks, the chat snippet is sent by activating the “Post” button  902  to forward the information to the web server  101 . The web server processes this information and displays the results into the common chat room image. It positions a balloon containing those remarks over the avatar representing the user who sent them. Each avatar can send comments in conversational form and the balloons adjust accordingly. The image server  104  adjusts the optimal placement of the balloons to make viewing the entire conversation between avatars possible. It avoids overlapping balloons and will truncate as needed. In addition to balloon text, a conversation transcript is recorded in the message log region  901 .  
         [0069]     Text balloons are ephemeral to mimic spoken conversation between humans. The server side software  100  removes the balloons after a set period of time by way of a software timer. Text balloons with a shelf-life gives the invention special appeal beyond typical comic book presentations. For humans in real life to participate in conversation, they must be there to witness it. Similarly, the software in accordance with the present invention imposes the same dynamic on users represented as avatars. Users can see and experience the specific conversations within a chat room only if they were viewing it in real time. In other words, the avatars/users have to be in the chat room at the time the events transpire in order to share the experience.  
         [0070]     The message log  901  records the time, avatar identifier, and chat text at the same time the balloons appear within the chat room scene. These lines do not disappear in the same manner as the balloons. After a set number of lines are recorded, but oldest lines are scrolled out of view. The message log  901  helps users who read slowly or like to catch up on conversations while they were momentarily distracted. There are alternate embodiments of this invention where a full and complete transcript is recorded to be read by others who were not witnessing the events in real time. Chat Rooms used for depositions, court proceedings, business conferences, town hall meetings are examples where the addition of a permanent record proves useful. In such instances, the message log  901  becomes a scrollable text widget (not shown) and the database  102  tables are modified to store all the chat text traffic for a given chat session.  
         [0071]      FIGS. 10   a ,  10   b , and  10   c  are three screen shots demonstrating the sequence of events for avatar movement.  FIG. 10   a  displays an avatar entering a chat room. Typically, a user navigates to a specific chat room through the colony map  302 .  FIG. 7  is a typical example which illustrates a “Shop  1 ” icon  700 . Activating this icon or others within the HTML image map, fires a popup window containing the associated chat room  304 . The act of entering a chat room is recorded in the message log region  903 . When a user triggers the “Move” button  904 , the chat room will display available movement locations (or “hot spots”) within a chat room as shown in  FIG. 10   b . An avatar can move to “Chair  4 ”  1001  since the spot is available (not currently occupied with another avatar). A user activating this hot spot  1001  executes the avatar movement as shown in  FIG. 10   c . The avatar moved to the chair and assumed a sitting posture  1002 .  
         [0072]     Avatar activity is not necessarily the only dynamic components in a chat room environment. The screen shot in  FIG. 11   a  illustrates a sparse house interior as if the occupant had just started decorating. The interior shown in FIG  11   b  is populated with additional furniture. Another embodiment of this invention is to add, remove, alter, and/or transform the contents of a chat room using the same technique of asynchronous, event-driven Javascript communication employed for displaying avatar movement and conversation balloons. The screen shot in  FIG. 12   a  illustrates an avatar shopping within a chat-enabled furniture store. One item on the showroom floor is a bed  1200 .  FIG. 12   b  illustrates a user reviewing transactions of his bed purchase to include spit-screen views of a bank account and a store&#39;s pricing catalog.  
         [0073]     Avatars do not necessarily represent actual human players in all cases. An alternate embodiment of the instant invention is to have avatar activity supported by server side software components  100  directly. Automated avatars that can conduct software-driven chatting are frequently called chatbots.  FIG. 13  is a screen shot of a chat room environment with game play that includes a mixture avatars and chatbots. Chatbots can be used for answering routine questions, targeted advertising, and adding ambiance to a given chat room. For example, the cashier  1003  in  FIG. 10   a  is a chatbot who welcomes customers as they enter, takes their orders, announces specials of the day, and the like. Chatbots can readily interact with human-driven avatars using standard AI techniques such as variations of the Eliza program. 1      1 Eliza is the best known Artificial Intelligence program in the world. It is also one of the oldest. Created in the early 1960&#39;s by MIT scientist Joseph Weizenbaum and named after Eliza Doolittle, its mission was to attempt to replicate the conversation between a psychoanalyst and a patient. The origins of the “imitation game” actually date back to the very beginnings of computer theory with Alan Turing (1950).    
         [0074]      FIG. 13  illustrates another embodiment of the invention that offers additional ways for players to interact with a game while self-organizing within a chat room. In this instance, players are dividing themselves into teams to compete in a trivia game. The trivia question  1301  (which can include in-game advertising related to the question) appears within the confines of the chat room  304 . In other words, this embodiment combines gaming with chat (or other similar social activities) using positioning around tables to organize the team structure.  
         [0075]      FIGS. 14   a  and  14   b  are two screen shots of the interface for customizing avatars. The user can select from a palettes of features and accessories using tabs. Examples include head shape, eyes, nose, mouth, hair, and clothing. The combinatorics of the options allow for a huge number of possibilities.  FIG. 15  is a screen shot of a visual rolodex  413  that maps the avatar specifications to individual users within a colony. It serves to illustrate how avatars become just as visually unique as the players themselves.  
         [0076]      FIGS. 16   a  and  16   b  are screen shots demonstrating the two step process of posting a Private Note to another player. Activating a user&#39;s ID anywhere within the site brings up the associated Player Card  1601 . Selecting the name ‘mick’  1600  within the Who&#39;s Online region  406  demonstrate one example of this technique. An alternate method would be to use the rolodex  413 . The Player Card  1601  opens a popup window with the Compose Note tab  1602  on top. The user adds text to the Subject textbox  1603  and the Message scrolling textbox  1604 . Activating the Post Note button  1605  sends a private note to the player associated with that particular card. In the alternative, a private e-mail (using the player&#39;s e-mail address provided during registration) is sent by activating the Send E-mail button  1606 .  
         [0077]      FIGS. 17   a  and  17   b  are screen shots demonstrating the two step process of reading a Public Note. The process is analogous to sending a message described above. In the Public Notes region  410 , one can read messages of general interest in the Group Notes tab  1700 . Selecting a specific message  1701  activates the Player Card  1703  open to the View Note tab  1703 .  
         [0078]     The rules engine  307  in  FIG. 3  forms the heart of the self-organizing colony. The parameters and operational characteristics that govern how a given colony  202  runs day to day are recorded and acted upon by the rules engine. From a software point of view, the rules engine is a controller object within the server-side software  100 . Each colony starts off with default settings as settlements  201 . Preferences, attachments, and other behavior develop as players interact. The preferred embodiment of this invention combines the games, role-playing, and socialization aspects of the online community. Players of each colony record their preferences through periodic elections or polls or town hall meetings (chat room activity). Town officials from the membership are elected who have limited permissions such as the ability to moderate the Public Notes  410 , suspend specific user activities, and the like. Capturing user preferences through colony participation is the preferred method of self-organizing.  
         [0079]     The rules engine  307  applies the aggregate preferences to the dynamics of a given colony&#39;s operation. As an illustration, Colony  1  may become a competitive gaming site where most of the games might be strategy oriented and the timeouts are relatively short. The number of chat rooms may be few. Instead, Colony  1  focuses its resources on points, tourneys, and tournaments. In the alternative, Colony  2  may be more relaxed with more games of chance and generous timeouts. The bulk of peoples&#39; time might be devoted to chatting resulting in more chat room environments. The ability for the structure of colonies to change based on user input should generate a diverse universe of colony types.  
         [0080]     Alternate embodiments of this invention is to employ rules engines based on sophisticated software technology such as expert systems, data mining of user participation, and machine learning. In other words, the rules engine can adapt to user participation patterns. The rules engine may tune its rules by analyzing player interactions with the site. For example, if a specific game seems to have fallen out of favor, the colony&#39;s rules engine may substitute another game of a different type. These changes can be in addition to direct user input or completely based on anecdotal evidence or any weighting of the two.  
         [0081]     This invention does not lay claim to inventing the technology for rules engines per se. There are many references to rules engine construction for all manner of experiments in artificial intelligence research [Henry, 1984; Bigus, 2001]. This invention improves social networking and game play through the application of rules engines in creating self-organizing colonies.  
         [0082]     This invention relates to the improvement of online turn-based, browser games and the social networking activities such as online chat rooms. A more evolved player community results by applying the principles of self-organizing systems to the gaming framework.  
       CONCLUSIONS, RAMIFICATIONS, AND SCOPE  
       [0083]     This invention encompasses building social networks of people using self-organizing system software. Examples of social networks include playing turn-based games and communicating (chat, e-mail, messaging, etc.). The encapsulated idea is to build communities from the bottom up instead of the top down. By way of comparison, most popular Internet companies like Yahoo, MySpace, and Pogo (Electronic Arts) build their membership from the top down. Their user communities ultimately grow too large to sustain cohesiveness. Observations of actual biological communities form the basis of self-organization theory; consequently, employing a more natural approach to human behavior should prove superior.  
         [0084]     A compact disc has been included with the specification. It contains working software that demonstrates the functionality described above. The software application already generates commercial revenue. As expected, new users have noted the uniqueness of the approach described here compared to other alternatives currently available on the Internet. Members pay to play games and chat using this invention on multiple colonies of up to 500 members each.  
         [0085]     Although the description above contains many specificities, these should not be construed as limiting the scope of the invention but as merely providing illustrations of some of the presently preferred embodiments of this invention. Thus the scope of the invention should be determined by the appended claims and their legal equivalents, rather than by the examples given.