Rabon 1 Christopher Rabon Alicia Bolton English 101 17 October 2013 The Difference Between Ordinary and Extraordinary

If there is ever a subject in which sides can be formed then arguments will shortly follow. Arguments have been deeply intertwined with literature and writing through out the years. When arguments are written and documented it allows a greater ability to analyze and truly decide whether or not the stance and argument presented is convincing or not. Alex Weiss is the author of an article I recently read called Should Gamers Be Prosecuted for Virtual Stealing? which addresses the argument that courts should not be involved in disputes over video games. The author states his point well but doesnt have the strongest essay. A similar article written by Malcolm Gladwell titled Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted approaches the topic of whether or not social networks have an influence on changing the world. He stands to say that the world will constantly progress even without technology influencing it and composes his essay flawlessly. In order to have a truly effective argument one must need to clearly distinguish their arguable position, support the stated arguable position with convincing reasons and evidence, and use strategies such as logos, ethos, and pathos, and finally address the counterargument without any fallacies. While Alex Weisss Should Gamers Be Prosecuted for Virtual Stealing? gives a valiant effort to create an outstanding

Rabon 2 argument It falls quite short of the superb essay that Malcolm Gladwells Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted is. Alex Weiss creates an argument around a court case that regarded the player of a video game suing another player over the theft of an item in the game. He chooses a great topic to develop his essay around. The essay starts off strong as he develops the initial argument by stating, Video games are not work or investments for which people should be compensated; they are escapism(Weiss 727). The author of the article clearly states their point of being against legal action being taken over the loss of a virtual item. The author then attempts to support his stance of being against legal compensation for virtual losses by describing another virtual massive multiplayer online role-playing video game that he used to play while attending high school. The game the writer played was called EVE and allowed players to steal cheat and do anything they would like essentially. He allows the reader to imagine the concept of the game by saying, EVE is the rat race imploded upon itself, a game that brings out the worst of its subscribers' humanity(Weiss 727). This is effective in allowing the reader an insight into MMORPGs and how the entire concept of the game is to somewhat escape the real world. Where I do believe this part of the authors article helps support his claim he relies too heavily on it and tends to stray from the main point of the article by over explaining and over describing EVE rather than addressing the main issue. He uses logos during his article by writing about how ridiculous it is to consider compensating someone for putting time and effort into a luxury such as a video game when none of it truly exists. He uses ethos by talking about the MMORPG EVE that he used to play. In

Rabon 3 EVE players are encouraged to steal, cheat, and lie to get ahead in the game. EVE is very similar to the game the player that filed a lawsuit about played. Pathos is not used much in the article other than when the author talks about real crimes being committed other than virtual ones and when the victim of the in game theft was attacked and beaten up by the theft. The counterargument is presented in the article. The author talks about how in other MMORPG video games like WoW there are clear rules and penalties for in game thefts. He also talks about how players will blindly throw money at a character they have created without thought of consequences. Overall the article is mediocre at best because there just isnt enough compelling evidence to truly sway the reader to see the authors point of view. Malcolm Gladwells Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted talks about the fact that throughout history the human race has assembled for the rights of people to be upheld without the need or help of social media to organize the event. Are people who log on to their Facebook accounts really the best hope for us all?(Gladwell 315). This quote captures the heart and soul of this argumentative essay regarding social networking and its impact on revolutionizing the world. When one looks closely at the quoted sentence they can see the authors true feelings regarding social networks getting credit for aiding the revolutions happening all over the world. He supports his opinion in several ways. First off he tells a story regarding the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement and talks about how even though there was no social network or social media to get the word across the many states that joined in the fight against racism and prejudice they still banded together to stand up against the injustice that many faced in the 1960s. He

Rabon 4 also talks about several protests in Moldova and Iran where social networks like Twitter and Facebook were given credit for establishing and giving the protesters the upper hand in the protests where in reality less than half of the citizens that protested had social media access. He describes the outrage people have against the events in Moldova by saying: As for the Moldovas so-called Twitter Revolution, Evgeny Morozov, a scholar at Stanford who has been the most persistent of digital evangelisms critics, points out that Twitter had scant internal significance in Moldova, a country where very few Twitter accounts exist. Nor does it seem to have been a revolution(Gladwell) His use of pathos is seen from the beginning of his essay by referring to the Civil Rights Movement, which truly hits an emotional nerve with many people. The same example can be used when he presents logos in his essay. Logically speaking social media has only been around for a short time and many revolutions and movements have happened without an Internet connection. He includes several other quotes from Evgenry Morozov for credibility to use ethos effectively. The counterargument is presented when he talks of Youtube and Facebook pages devoted to the Help Sameer campaign to show that it can be beneficial but not necessary. Overall the argumentative essay that Malcolm Gladwell presents is well put together with plenty of information to support his stance while providing minimal to no fallacies. Arguments will always take place where an opinion on a subject can be given. Arguments are always going to be there but may not always be effective. The more evidence provided for an argument the better and more solid it will inevitably

Rabon 5 become. When forming a good argument on paper there will always be key things to search for to determine if it is a well-developed opinion and supported properly. The main thing to keep in mind is to turn and ordinary argument into and extraordinary argument is that little extra.

Rabon 6 Works Cited Gladwell, Malcolm. Small Change: Why the Revolution Will Not Be Tweeted They Say I Say with Readings. Ed. Gerald Graff, Cathy Birkenstein, Russel Durst. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2010. 312-28. Text Weiss, Alex. Should Gamers Be Prosecuted for Virtual Stealing? The Norton Field Guide to Writing with Readings and Handbook. Ed. Richard Bullock, Maureen Daly Goggin, Francine Weinberg. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 2013. 727-29. Text.