Julian Dibbell (/dɪˈbɛl/; born February 23, 1963) is an American author and technologyjournalist with a focus on social systems within online communities.[1]
Dibbell was born inNew York City. He grew up inClaremont, California and resides inChicago, Illinois. His uncle isrock criticRobert Christgau, and Dibbell has also published music criticism.[2] He is a non-resident fellow of theStanford Center for Internet and Society[3] and he previously served as George A. Miller Visiting Professor of Media at theUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.[4] He is also a founder of the academic gaming research blogTerra Nova.
His 1993 article "A Rape in Cyberspace"[5] detailed attempts ofLambdaMOO, an online community, to quantify and deal with lawbreaking in its midst. The article was later included in his first book,My Tiny Life: Crime and Passion in a Virtual World. Dibbell has also written about Chinesegold farmers forThe New York Times Magazine[6] and aboutgriefer culture for "Wired" Magazine.[7] He chronicled his attempt to make a living playingMMORPGs in his second book,Play Money: or, How I Quit My Day Job and Made Millions Trading Virtual Loot.[8][9]
Dibbell graduated fromYale University, summa cum laude, in 1986. He graduated from theUniversity of Chicago Law School (where he was an editor of theUniversity of Chicago Law Review)[10] in 2014. Dibbell now practices law as an associate in the Business and Technology Sourcing practice of the global law firmMayer Brown.[11]
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