'EVE Online' players to vote

NEW YORK -- Players of the game "EVE Online" will soon be able to vote for an unusual community council that will present their concerns to the publisher, the company announced last week.

The players, who number more than 220,000 and are spread around the world, will be able to vote in May for a nine-member council of representatives, Iceland-based publisher CCP hf said.

Elements of democracy are not unheard of in online games. "A Tale in the Desert" lets the players write laws and vote on having them applied in the game. But "EVE Online" -- which depicts a cutthroat universe of space traders, miners and pirates -- may be the first to feature a form of representative government.

Democracy may be more workable in "EVE Online" (www.eve-online.com) because all its players inhabit the same universe and can interact with each other in the game. Most online games split the players up over dozens of servers.

The game also has an unusually sophisticated social and economic structure, with a player-operated industrial sector and vibrant trade in minerals. The publisher last year hired a full-time economist to study it.

In keeping with the game's setting, CCP is not banning vote-buying, voter coercion or other practices that real-world democracies frown on. Players can yield their voting rights to other players through a proxy system.