Essays
These are full-blown essays, papers, and articles.

Presentations
Slideshows and presentation materials from conferences.

Interviews and Panels
Reprints of non-game-specific interviews, and transcripts of panels and roundtables.

Snippets
Excerpts from blog, newsgroup, and forum posts.

Laws
The "Laws of Online World Design" in various forms.

Timeline
A timeline of developments in online worlds.

A Theory of Fun for Game Design
My book on why games matter and what fun is.

Insubstantial Pageants
A book I started and never finished outlining the basics of online world design.

Links
Links to resources on online world design.

All contents of this site are
© Copyright 1998-2010
Raphael Koster.
All rights reserved.

The views expressed here are my own, and not necessarily endorsed by any former or current employer.

Racial Slur Database Portable May 2026

The Racial Slur Database (RSDB) is a long-standing crowdsourced online archive

Inclusive Language Guides: Governments and corporations use them to create "inclusive language" manuals, such as the District of Columbia's Racial Equity Guide, which helps employees avoid racially coded language . Racial Slur Database

The potential impact on communities and individuals is significant. The Racial Slur Database (RSDB) is a long-standing

Automated candidate extraction (n-gram frequency, co-occurrence with slur indicators)
Human review by trained annotators with diversity in background
Cross-validation across sources

11. Release and sharing practices

Internal use: full dataset with provenance and examples, strict access
Research access: vetted researchers under data-use agreements, redacted examples
Public-facing outputs: aggregated summaries, severity statistics, guidance documents; avoid publishing raw slur lists without strong redaction
Licensing: restrict reuse that could enable abuse (e.g., non-commercial, research-only licenses)

Slurs are more than just offensive words; they are speech acts that alter the power balance between speakers and targets. The Racial Slur Database serves as an expansive archive for these terms, allowing researchers to track their origins, meanings, and frequencies in public forums. 2. Methodology: Data Integration Green’s Dictionary of Slang: A scholarly

of slurs to provide context on how these terms emerged and are used. Submission Requirements

The Racial Slur Database is a valuable resource for anyone looking to understand and address the harm caused by racial slurs. By documenting and educating people about these terms, we can work towards a more inclusive and empathetic society. We invite you to explore our database and join the conversation about the importance of respectful language and cultural sensitivity.

Green’s Dictionary of Slang: A scholarly, multi-volume work that includes racial slurs but places them in rigorous historical context with citations from literature and court records.
Anti-Defamation League (ADL) Hate Symbols Database: While focused on symbols and codes (like the Pepe the Frog controversy), the ADL provides extensive background on the etymologies of hateful language.
Academic Journals (Journal of Hate Studies): Peer-reviewed articles often include appendices of terminology used by specific hate groups, stripped of the sarcastic, user-generated noise of the RSDB.