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Ron Edwards' term for the general theory, constructed by him and others, of role-playing interaction, incorporating the idea of the GNS categorization of Creative Agenda and further describing role-playing as a nested hierarchy of elements, shot through with that creative agenda.

A rough outline of the Big Model:

Social Contract
- Exploration
  - Techniques
    - Ephemera

Creative Agenda is presented as a large arrow going from Social Contract to Techniques. (A more detailed diagram (PDF))

A highly praised explanation of the Big Model from Gaerik, on Vincent Baker's "I Would Knife Fight A Man" forums:

Role-playing is a social activity.

Any sensible analysis of role-playing must start with the players as real persons and not with the characters, the setting, or other fictional elements. Why? Because the characters, setting, and whatnot don't actually exist. They're fictional. The players do exist. It is the social interaction between the actual players that forms the context of role-playing. This context is called the Social Contract. If the Social Contract of a role-playing group is screwed up then the foundation of their play is rotten and they are pretty much doomed in terms of having reliable fun. Having reliable fun is a basic definition of functional role-playing.

Role-playing is creating fiction together.

The participants of an RPG are creating imaginary events through play. The pictures in everyone’s head of what happens need to match. If one player is imagining a gritty modern fantasy while the other players are imagining a My Little Ponies adventure, you're going to run into problems. These matching pictures is called the Shared Imagined Space (SIS).

The Shared Imagined Space is created through negotiation.

This is key. The SIS isn't created by some sourcebook or anything else. It is created via negotiation between the players. Now the negotiation may just be the players all agreeing to certain source materials to start but the fact remains that it was a negotiated and agreed upon by all the players.

Interaction between players at the gaming table is directed toward including certain situations or events into the SIS. The back and forth dialogue that develops during play, to include making statements of intent, rolling dice, appealing to the authority of the rules, and all the other game discussion that goes on, is the process of negotiation. Only if all players agree, explictly or implicitly, to a new piece of fictional content can play continue on that basis. This process is called the "Lumpley Principle".

System does matter.

System is the rules by which the negotiation process is organized. These rules may be written or not. Some groups play by a set of rules that differ in significant ways from the actual game text. Therefore, if someone tells you that system doesn’t matter, he is referring to the rules in the game text and he is saying so because his group is not playing by those rules anyway. The actual rules they play by are mainly their own, and those rules, the unwritten ones, do matter. Those actual rules influence two important things:

The fictional content shaping the Shared Imagined Space.
How players act at the table to create that content.

There is role-playing, and then there is role-playing.

The process people use to role-play may vary widely from group to group. That’s because different people have differing priorities when playing RP Gs. A gaming group has the best chance for sustained fun when all the players have the same or similar priorities. "Having fun" is not in itself a priority. How the fun is had is the priority. Simply having fun always the ultimate goal so it is useless as an analytical tool. The shared group priority is called the group's Creative Agenda.

Note: Creative Agenda is the full picture! It is not individual moments in play or individual parts of the System. It is recognized when watching a group play for a longer instance with special attention to moments where specific priorities may conflict with each other. That’s not to say that any action by a player at any time during play needs to fit a scheme or something.

The following three general categories of Creative Agenda have been identified in the The Big Model:

Gamism: The players accept the challenges of the Shared Imagined Space, taking risks and showing performance as players and reaching or missing a certain goal. Sometimes all players may work together to a goal. Sometimes they may compete. The social reward for Gamism is gained by the player stepping up and meeting challenges.

Note: Gamism is not the same as Powergaming, which is a sub-species of Gamist play and is often dysfunctional.
Narrativism: The players engage in the moral and human issues of the Shared Imagined Space, taking a position as players and making a statement about their characters, the game world, and/or themselves. The social reward for Narrativism is gained when the player makes and interesting thematic statement through play.

Note: This is not what is commonly called Storytelling or Cinematic play. If functional, both are usually in there somewhere.
Simulationism: The players experience the Shared Imagined Space as something worthwhile for it’s own sake. Something which they do not fully control because it follows it’s own laws. Experiencing the Shared Imagined Space and contributing to it is part of any role-playing, but in this mode, it’s the top priority. The social reward for Simulationist play is generally gained through skillful celebration of the subject matter or source material.

Note: Complex "realistic" rules are only one style of Simulationist role-playing. More frequently you’ll find features like style, atmosphere, acting, or dramaturgy to be more important that complex physics mechanics.

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