42 replies to this topic

[Blaxill]

fireside said:

Because one is real, which is my point.

I'd be interested in your definition of a 'real' currency.

.oisyn said:

Fair enough, but that doesn't really change my point, which is in the paragraph you chose not to quote.

Ok sorry (I believe this is your point)

.oisyn said:

I'm not saying that gold and only gold has no value. I'm saying that that what the gold represents has no value itself. Thusly the items you can buy with it. IRL, this is not true. Sure, we agree upon the value of money, but the point is that with that money I can buy things that are not simply "up for grabs" and created out of nothing. If something can be created out of nothing, the value of that thing (and thus the value of money) is severely reduced.

I believe if the players themselves could create the items (and the amount they could create was not time restricted or resource restricted in anyway) this would be true. Value of things that have no variable cost (i.e. can be mass produced for nothing) relies solely on supply restriction, and this is the same reason that software carries a value. For instance a software company restricts supply by setting a price for its products, which is different to products that carry a variable cost that would be produced where marginal costs equals average cost(and price will be set according to demand.) So as there is a limited supply of the items they have an attached value (WoW currency or US currency.)
As I also don't play WoW I am unsure about this next issue. If the items you can buy with in game gold cannot be traded it can substantially devalue them and the currency but I don't believe this is the case. Also as Blizzard does not let people sell their in game gold, it does decrease the value of the WoW currency, but allows them stricter control over the circulation of the gold.

To address another issue, of course a bot can run without player guidence and this certainly reduces the value of the currency, but it still takes time. Since you cannot make infinite amounts of gold in an instance the currency still has value.

[.oisyn]

Blaxill said:

Ok sorry (I believe this is your point)

Actually, this was:

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I guess my whole point relies on the fact that I think it's naïve to think that Blizzard will continue to treat WoW's economy as a real economy. Now I'm not a wow player myself, but I thought the EULA said something about not being allowed to sell items, but I could be wrong on that. But if that is true, it's not unrealistic to think that they ever find a way to stop that. Also, you can simply run a bot that farms gold for you at no cost (well maybe like $30 for the bot). Of course that is also not allowed, but hey, worst thing that can happen is that you are kicked from the game. Which is another big difference from a true government - there are no severe punishments that scares people from not breaking the rules.

I think you can bluntly summarize it as that I don't trust Blizzard with their economy, as maybe they don't value that economy as much as the users do (or at least those interested in buying and selling gold or items). Suppose there were 10.000 WoW users active in the economy, but another 10 million other user not interested in trading stuff but merely engage in quests and other "social" activities within the game. Then Blizzard would not care much about those users and they will change things that will improve the game itself even though they might have a negative effect on the economy as a whole. Suppose, for example, there is a rare item that gives the carrier a certain ability. Then Blizzard releases a bunch of quests for which you need the item that already existed, and in order to let more people do the quest they make the item less rare, in which case the economical value of that item diminishes. And the only reason is that Blizzard decided to make the item less rare.

But, as I said, I'm not a WoW player and I don't know how much Blizzard and the wow users value the actual economy, and maybe I'm just too suspicious about it. I've heared some bad stories about Eve Online, about the employees being arrogant pricks and are misusing their admin abilities while they play the game like everyone else and are placed above the law. Much like some countries in real life. I would rather not go there . But I digress.

[fireside]

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I'd be interested in your definition of a 'real' currency.

A real currency can be traded in the real world, outside of a virtual community. Go to the supermarket or pay your bills with WOW gold sometime. This is no more than monopoly money, exactly the same. It has value when you are playing the game, if it has value outside of that, then you are confusing reality with a game. The word for that is delusional. They might not be trying to buy their groceries with it, but it's still pretty strange behaviour. If you were playing monopoly and one guy sold some of his monopoly money to another guy for real money, you would think one person was a little crackers and the other person was taking advantage of someone that was a little crackers, which is exactly what's going on with this WOW gold selling. Not only that, but it essentially changes the game for the other players in a way it wasn't meant to be changed.

[Reedbeta]

Is money in a PayPal account unreal because you can only use it on websites? You can't go down to the supermarket and pay for goods with it either. Also, assuming you live in the USA, try paying for your food with Euros sometime. They will not take it any more than they would take WoW gold or Monopoly money. The fact that a currency has value only in a particular context does not make it somehow less valid.

fireside said:

If you were playing monopoly and one guy sold some of his monopoly money to another guy for real money, you would think one person was a little crackers and the other person was taking advantage of someone that was a little crackers

http://www.amazon.co...y/dp/B00000IWCW

Of course, since you can create bills on your own computer and print out arbitrarily many and play Monopoly with them, the value of this money is basically nil (about $15,000 Monopoly for $3.59 US). But you can't counterfeit WoW gold, there's only a limited supply, and people want it - so it has value, and there's no good reason you shouldn't buy it.

By the way, the Zimbabwe dollar (a real-world currency by any standard) is now worth far less than Monopoly money (in July, $4 US was about equal to $150 billion Zimbabwe).

fireside said:

it essentially changes the game for the other players in a way it wasn't meant to be changed.

This is the only point you have made that I agree with.

[fireside]

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Is money in a PayPal account unreal because you can only use it on websites?

Not true that I know about. You can use pay pal for real businesses and I'm sure find some way of exchanging for most businesses. This would not work for WOW gold.

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By the way, the Zimbabwe dollar (a real-world currency by any standard) is now worth far less than Monopoly money (in January, $10 million Zimbabwe was roughly $4 US).

Yes, but I could go to the bank and get the exchange rate. It's still a real currency. I can't go to the bank and get the exchange rate for WOW gold because it is game currency, although banks have been showing delusional behavior of their own lately.

[Reedbeta]

fireside said:

Not true that I know about. You can use pay pal for real businesses and I'm sure find some way of exchanging for most businesses. This would not work for WOW gold.

Oh, so now it's currency if you can "find some way of exchanging". Well, in that case, you could sell your WoW gold online to gamers and then go down to the store and buy food with the money you made. That's a way of exchanging.

Bottom line, it's not delusional to buy something that's valuable to you. Sure, you personally might rather spend a bunch of time to get the gold in-game the normal way, but someone who doesn't want to spend their time that way and just wants to pay money for their gold can be perfectly rational in doing so.

[alphadog]

http://arstechnica.c...tual-theft.html

"Dutch courts had an interesting case to deal with when two youths were sued for stealing in-game items from another youngster, forcing him to give up items in the game Runescape. The youths were sentenced to community service for their crimes."

Well, the Dutch seem to think virtual stuff has real-world value...

[fireside]

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Bottom line, it's not delusional to buy something that's valuable to you.

So, if I bought an invisible shield that would protect me from rays thrown by the Zarkians who I believe are invading, I wouldn't be delusional? The fact that I bought it proves that my fantasy has crossed into reality and has become true delusional behavior.

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Well, the Dutch seem to think virtual stuff has real-world value...

I feel sorry for the Dutch taxpayers if the courts intervene on something like that. What can I say, government officials can be just as delusional as anyone, only they spent real taxpayer money settling someone cheating in a game. I can see the next trial now, two kids playing marbles.

[.oisyn]

alphadog said:

http://arstechnica.c...tual-theft.html

"Dutch courts had an interesting case to deal with when two youths were sued for stealing in-game items from another youngster, forcing him to give up items in the game Runescape. The youths were sentenced to community service for their crimes."

Well, the Dutch seem to think virtual stuff has real-world value...

Yes we already discussed that a few posts before, please read the thread before posting. Thanks for the link though, we only had a Dutch article up until now

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I feel sorry for the Dutch taxpayers if the courts intervene on something like that. What can I say, government officials can be just as delusional as anyone, only they spent real taxpayer money settling someone cheating in a game. I can see the next trial now, two kids playing marbles.

Read the article! There was no cheating involved. They forced the items off him in the real world using a knife and intimidation. I am actually proud of my country in this respect.

[JarkkoL]

If people are willing to pay for something, then by definition that "something" (was it real gold, virtual gold, your dirty underpants or invisible shield against Zarkian rays) has value (:

[imerso]

" Woman arrested for killing virtual reality husband "

http://edition.cnn.c...urder.japan.ap/
Off-topic but correlated, I guess...

[Reedbeta]

fireside said:

an invisible shield that would protect me from rays thrown by the Zarkians

The shield doesn't exist. While you may well doubt whether WoW gold is worth having or buying, it certainly does exist. (The fact it's not a thing you can hold in your hand doesn't prevent it from existing, obviously...much like the money in your bank account.) Paying money for something you want that exists and is limited in supply is not delusional.

[fireside]

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The shield doesn't exist.

The shield exists in a fantasy world just like the gold exists in a fantasy world. It just happens to be a collective fantasy so other people who have crossed over and brought their fantasy into reality are willing to pay for it with real money. The gold doesn't exist and has no value.

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They forced the items off him in the real world using a knife and intimidation.

More evidence of delusional behavior. They brought their fantasy into reality and committed a real crime which deserved punishment.

[Blaxill]

fireside said:

The shield exists in a fantasy world just like the gold exists in a fantasy world. It just happens to be a collective fantasy so other people who have crossed over and brought their fantasy into reality are willing to pay for it with real money. The gold doesn't exist and has no value.

Just no.

Firstly if everyone knows about your imaginary shield it becomes a public good (i.e. non-rivaled and non-excludable, meaning everyone can have one for free) and WoW gold is by definition an excludable good. Your imaginary shield is worth nothing because anyone at any time can imagine one for free. WoW gold has a value because it carries an opportunity cost, including but not limited to; time, internet bandwidth, subscription fee, keyboard durability etc...

Whether things are 'imaginary' has absolutely nothing to do with its price. If imaginary things carried no value then you wouldn't be able to sell original ideas (which are not public goods as others haven't thought of them yet!)

[fireside]

If the gold exists then the people are really the elf avatars they are playing. If it were agreed upon by all members that the gold represented real money, like poker, that would be different. Here the agreement is that the gold has no real world value and anyone that gives it real world value is delusional.

[Reedbeta]

fireside said:

The gold doesn't exist and has no value.

It does exist. It exists in exactly the same way the money in your bank account exists - as a number stored in a computer someplace. Just because you can't pick it up doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

It does have value for people who desire it. Just because you don't personally want any does not mean it's valueless to everyone.

fireside said:

Here the agreement is that the gold has no real world value and anyone that gives it real world value is delusional.

They may be breaking their license agreement with Blizzard, but delusional is the last thing they are. Assigning a price to a commodity that people want is one of the most rational of human activities.

[fireside]

Like I say, this is no different than someone buying monopoly money during a monopoly game. The money has value in the game context but no other. The game is a fantasy. If the people attach value to the monopoly money and pay real money for it, they have a problem and should see someone. They're not doing themselves or the people playing the game any good. Establishing a trade system among neurotics doesn't legitimize it. It's called cheating. If you cheat in a game you have a personality problem.

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Assigning a price to a commodity that people want is one of the most rational of human activities.

The thing people want is something from a fantasy that they earn in a game context. Assigning a price in the real world to it can't be called rational. It's not like paying for a game. This is paying for something in the game, something that you play the game to earn. That's not rational.

[.oisyn]

fireside said:

More evidence of delusional behavior. They brought their fantasy into reality and committed a real crime which deserved punishment.

Eh, yeah, but what's your point? Btw, this was not solely what they were punished for. In fact, they were punished largely for theft. They had taken away something from someone else that was of value (sentimental or economical, that doesn't matter). If I design a model on the computer, and someone breaks into my house and copies the design while also deleting it from my harddisk, don't you think that is theft? Even though my design was virtual?

Well, either theft (physically moving my design) or copyright infringement (copying my design) accompanied by vandalism (deleting it from my harddisk) anyway

[fireside]

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Well, either theft (physically moving my design) or copyright infringement (copying my design) accompanied by vandalism (deleting it from my harddisk) anyway

I don't understand your point either. Copyright infringement is illegal as also vandalism. They are real world crimes. If you were playing a game and committed copyright infringement as part of the role playing experience, there would be no crime, obviously. Otherwise how many games would we be able to play? It would put undo restrictions on a fantasy environment. The law in the game would have to take care of it, or not, depending.

Here's a quote from an article about that trial:

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Eurogamer says this is the first time such a ruling has been made in Holland, and that cases involving virtual items are rare and often not prosecuted. In February, police in the city of Minnesota in the U.S. refused to look into the case of a player who lost all his items and in-game currency after his Final Fantasy XI account was broken into. Despite having a real-world value of about $3800, the police said "game points were 'devoid of monetary value'," and thus no actual theft had taken place.

There is one potentially mitigating factor in the Dutch case that may have helped the courts reach their decision, however. The virtual theft was preceded by a real-life ass-kicking: The two thieves beat up their victim and threatened him with a knife.

[.oisyn]

Yes but what's your point? Please explain that.

Btw, your original quote was:

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I feel sorry for the Dutch taxpayers if the courts intervene on something like that. What can I say, government officials can be just as delusional as anyone, only they spent real taxpayer money settling someone cheating in a game. I can see the next trial now, two kids playing marbles.

Is your point that this should be punsished *because* there was real life intimidation involved, but not otherwise? Also, I don't see what another case in another country has to do with it.