REYKJAVIK, Iceland — This city near the top of the world has a distinguished history of hosting summit meetings. Presidents, prime ministers and premiers have come here to discuss their differences and chart earth’s future.

Yet mere planets were beneath the concern of the nine leaders — warlords, religious crusaders, industrial tycoons, freedom fighters, university dons and banking moguls — who temporarily set aside their differences last week and gathered here under a banner of peace. After all, they had an entire galaxy to consider.

Of course that galaxy does not really exist. Yet for the more than 200,000 players of the science-fiction game Eve Online; for the company here that created it, CCP; indeed for the broader concept of how companies relate to their customers, the inaugural meeting of the Council of Stellar Management was a watershed in the evolution of online democracy.
Seth Schiesel
Face to Face: A Council of Online Gamers
NYT
Published: June 28, 2008