Can Roblox Save Democracy?
Can Roblox Save Democracy?
How one group is trying to nudge Roblox players into checking their voter registration status.
Kamala Harris has a Fortnite map called “Freedom Town.” Donald Trump streams on Twitch—and so does Tim “Crazy Taxi” Walz. Politicians are trying to reach younger audiences, so with the election in the U.S. so close, they’re also looking at Roblox.
Virtual Vote is an initiative to encourage Roblox users to check their voter registration status, but is not specifically affiliated with one candidate or the other.
You can see what it looks like by checking out this video I recorded:
Virtual Vote has dropped in little voter encouragement portals inside a number of popular Roblox experiences/games. It doesn’t encourage you to vote for a candidate, nor does it even point you towards a way to better understand the two candidates.
“No one likes to be told what to do, especially kids,” said Virtual Vote Founder and Virtual Brand Group CEO Justin Hochberg. “Social cause marketing, whether it’s ‘get out the vote’ or ‘save the planet’ often comes across as the mental equivalent of ‘eat your spinach because it’s good for you.’ The Virtual Vote game experience across Roblox isn’t branded and we don’t tell anyone what to do or why it’s important.”
Interestingly, Hochberg was a producer on the reality show vehicle that helped launch Donald Trump into the public consciousness beyond tabloids, The Apprentice.
There are carrots to encourage people to check their voter registration status at a website called Unlockables.gg, such as nabbing gear for your avatar or a chance to be flown out for a taping of Jimmy Kimmel’s late show. (Given the jokes on Kimmel’s show, presumably someone voting for Kamala Harris would have a better time.)
“Young people like to be entertained,” said Virtual Vote founding partner and Super League president and COO Matt Edelman. “With the right creative approach, entertainment can serve an altruistic purpose. Think Rock the Vote, Schoolhouse Rock, and We Are the World. Virtual Vote recognizes that Gen Z spends their time playing games. That’s their primary form of digital entertainment. So we made a fun game and it just happens to encourage civic engagement. And it’s working!”
(Super League is an advertising company focused on metaverse projects for brands.)
As for what Edelman means by “it’s working,” the organizers told me, “over two million Roblox users have already interacted with the Virtual Vote portal, and nearly 4,000 voters have either newly registered or checked their registration status.”
4,000 isn’t nothing, but without knowing if it’s 4,000 new voters, it’s tough to gauge. In the 2020 election, President Joe Biden won Wisconsin by just over 20,000 votes.
I pressed the organizers on whether there was any data about the political affiliations of Roblox users, but Hochberg noted “politics are not part of the Roblox platform.”
If you search for Trump, here’s what comes up:
The Gay Quiz, huh? Hmm. Here’s what you get when you search for Kamala Harris:
Nothing!
But here’s what you get when you search for politics:
Projects & Politics, huh? Hmm.
“The players do intrinsically feel empowered by all the opportunities to express their choice,” said Hochberg. “Our thesis was that its ethos would translate to make themselves heard on an even bigger platform, democracy. Looks like we were right.”
Well, we’ll see.
There are many problems with Roblox, as has been discussed on Crossplay numerous times, but at its core, the appeal of Roblox to young people is an online playground to waste time with friends. It’s not shocking, then, that corporations have gone out of their way to try and appeal to kids inside of Roblox. You go where the people are, and many people are hanging in Roblox. Plus, those people are getting older and older.
It’s why Walmart is trying to prop up a weird storefront in Roblox, or why Warner Bros. launched a Beetlejuice experience that was also a vehicle to sell movie tickets.
Was either a true success? Is Virtual Vote? Hard to say.
But Roblox is too big to ignore, and so people are going to keep trying to see what works, including encouraging them to vote. There are worse things to encourage.
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Also:
I’ll have a post about this next week for subscribers, but my oldest has started noticing the political ads on TV and it’s made for some…interesting conversations.
The Beetlejuice experience did break through a bit. My oldest came across it and was intrigued, even if she’s not actually going to buy a ticket through the thing.
Broadly, it feels like corporate Roblox experience are just a way to spend a bunch of money on something “metaverse” without caring if it’s even effective.