18-12-2004 07:18									#61
	Remove this text

quote: Originally posted by Shogun Gunner That's not relevant. People profit and lose from ventures all the time. It doesn't matter how the activity is categorized. The only differention is that some economic activities are better bets than others. This particular one is not a very well grounded idea to invest in for many of the reasons stated earlier.

In fact, the owners of the MMORPG could make a LOT of money playing in their own market...

	18-12-2004 07:18									#62
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quote: Originally posted by General Ludd If I understand correctly, Project Entropia is free to play but you have to pay real money for items (or bum it off other people who are kind enough) which allow you to actually progress to the point where you can *really *play the game and aquire in-game money on your own, which can then be 'invested' in other in-game items or exchanged for real-world currency.

If you look at the bbc article there is a link to a wikipedia article. In that article it says that you can sell characters. So you can develop characters and sell them. That's creating an asset which can then be traded for other assets. The people who run the game can simply create assets by programing them but the real driving force is how many people play the game and invest their money, because when the assets are just programed in they decrease the value of the assets already in the game. The programers can keep inflation to a minimum by creating more items but they can also create deflation which would not be good for their game, since people are investing their money.

If this game did become very popular it could have a significant impact on the real economy.

	18-12-2004 07:19									#63
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Kid, it's not gonna happen.

	18-12-2004 07:21									#64
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quote: Originally posted by Kuciwalker Kid, it's not gonna happen.

This game might not, what about the idea itself (shelling out real money for virtual stuff)?

	18-12-2004 07:23									#65
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quote: Originally posted by Kuciwalker Kid, it's not gonna happen.

Nice rebuttal.

	18-12-2004 07:24									#66
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quote: Originally posted by Kidicious Nice rebuttal.

Let me put it this way: it stands about as much chance of becoming a significant force in the economy as Apolyton would if it Mark and Dan sold moderatorships. That is, zero.

There'd have to be hundreds of millions of dollars, if not billions, flowing through the game for it to be significant.

	18-12-2004 07:31									#67
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It actually sounds appealing though. Think about it. It's not like just buying a stock and watching to see what happens too it. With this investment you get to play it like gambling but funner. Hell, it's funner than opening a business.

	18-12-2004 07:35									#68
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Use real money at your own risk. Unlike casinos, this is not regulated. The operators can just pull the plugs one day and vanish with your money.

	18-12-2004 07:39									#69
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I wouldn't be suprized if they regulated them one day.

	18-12-2004 07:43									#70
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quote: Originally posted by Kuciwalker In fact, the owners of the MMORPG could make a LOT of money playing in their own market...

Good point. In a traditional market, the rules are clearly stated regarding financial transaction, legal recourse, etc. There are currently no rules or guarantees in this new "market".

sorry, I just have to put quotes around market as this is really just a novelty idea today.

	18-12-2004 07:43									#71
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quote: Originally posted by Kidicious It actually sounds appealing though. Think about it. It's not like just buying a stock and watching to see what happens too it. With this investment you get to play it like gambling but funner. Hell, it's funner than opening a business.

It's like gambling, but much higher risk, and you can lose your money just by sucking at the game.

	18-12-2004 07:45									#72
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quote: Originally posted by Kidicious I wouldn't be suprized if they regulated them one day.

I don't see how they really could.

	18-12-2004 08:39									#73
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel libertarianism

How on earth did that come up?

	18-12-2004 08:50									#74
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quote: Originally posted by Thucydides Wow, think of the possibilty. A few people who have too much time on their hands and a little capital can make careers out of playing this game. It's a zero sum game of course, so other people who play this game on a more recreational level are going to be giving their money to this guy and a few others like him. But given enough interests in this MMOG, you can make your entire livelihood on virtual real estate in a video game. This is good news for gaming geeks everywhere Unfortunetly, I don't have the time to invest in game like that anymore despite having the money

Actually a friend of mine wants to set up a company in this popular MMOG (actually he wants it to be a commune or whatever) and make items to sell in the game for real money. I might look into it if he can secure me a free trial or something, but I told him "so you want me to spend hours in the game doing dull repetitive tasks (making armor, or furnature or whatever) for money? Sounds like a fricking job, what's the fun in that?"

Unless its gonna be a big payoff, it sounds fairly dull overall. But still an incredibly facinating idea/concept with a huge amount of potential for the future of gaming and the economy and humanity. Wow, I lvoe it.

	18-12-2004 08:53									#75
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Worse than dotcom.

	18-12-2004 09:00									#76
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Actually, this reminds me a lot of Pokemon cards.

	18-12-2004 10:09									#77
	Suffering from ads?

In the last thread about a similar issue, Skanky told us of one of his friend who made 60,000 $ a year as he sold Diablo2 items found by his bots on E-Bay.

	18-12-2004 10:22									#79
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The question is, should he have to pay the bots fair compensation for the social value of their labor

	18-12-2004 10:31									#80
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quote: Originally posted by Kuciwalker The question is, should he have to pay the bots fair compensation for the social value of their labor

They're pure capital.
As long as he does whatever little job there is to be done (like putting the items on e-bay and arrangeing the meetings with customers), he should get all the money his very small job produces.

Maybe he's the guy who invented the machine that makes thousands of dollars when you press a button

	18-12-2004 10:39									#81
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No, that's the printing press

	18-12-2004 11:15									#82
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quote: Originally posted by Kuciwalker The question is, should he have to pay the bots fair compensation for the social value of their labor

Exploited bots of the world unite!

	18-12-2004 22:05									#83
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quote: Originally posted by Kuciwalker The question is, should he have to pay the bots fair compensation for the social value of their labor

It's only virtual social value.

	18-12-2004 22:07									#84
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Notice that the libertarian economists have not created one of these virtual economies to compare communism to free market capitalism. They must be still trying to find a way to make it work for the free market.

	18-12-2004 22:08									#85
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quote: Originally posted by OzzyKP How on earth did that come up?

Well, there is a rather simple explanation what's the connection, but generally, for me, posting "libertarianism " is great, reason or no reason.

	19-12-2004 01:48									#86
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Yea, this might work out for the guy, but if the game makers decide to create 40 islands like his and sell them for cheaper, he's powerless to stop them.

	19-12-2004 01:54									#87
	Got spare money?

Jaguar is right, you know. The game makers may decide that it costs them nothing to actually form a new island, so they'll try to maximise profits, leading to a tumble in real-estate prices in "entropia". Note that by "tumble" I mean that prices will fall as much as 70-80%.

Kidicious: market economies are naturally in an advantage in this game, since these games are about adventure, personal freedom, and the complete lack of interaction with females.

	19-12-2004 01:54									#88
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quote: Originally posted by Jaguar Yea, this might work out for the guy, but if the game makers decide to create 40 islands like his and sell them for cheaper, he's powerless to stop them.

He could always strap explosives to his chest and visit their offices.

	19-12-2004 01:58									#89
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel and the complete lack of interaction with females.

You'll probably find more females playing MMORPGs than any other genre of game.


Still predominately male, but not nearly as much so as games like, say, civilization (and let's not even mention the message boards that are dedicated to it )

	19-12-2004 02:01									#90
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That's true, however, I don't spend entire days playing civ.