Club Penguin uses a simple user interface that combines colourful graphics, a variety of text fonts and animations. But even without typing a single letter, there are literacies of status at play with in the world.
Tale of Two Avatars
Every player creates a penguin avatar. A player’s penguin is his or her “face” to the world of Club Penguin. Players can buy clothes, hats, toys, pets and more for their penguins. These accessories serve little purpose other than being “cool” or fun and displaying your commitment to the world.
Flappy Fry is my avatar. As you can see he is very plain. I have not bought him any clothes, toys or pets, because I am not a “paid” member of Club Penguin. I can spend my coins only on a very limited number of items, until I subscribe to the world using real world cash.
Although this doesn’t seem to directly impact how Flappy is viewed or treated by other penguins, there is no hiding of status in these worlds.
Brandaozinha, on the other hand is a very affluent penguin. She (or he) is clearly a paid member of the world. Every item in her profile from her crown to her lollypop - even the spooky background - was paid for using coins earned by playing games in the world.
Although Club Penguin is ad-free, it is not free from reinforcing the framework of consumerism to its players. See Consumerism in Penguinland for more.