Two For One

Some of us make trading items in MMORPG's for real cash come off as utterly ridiculous. $100 for a pair of boots that grant you doulbe movement speed? $250 for some funny red hat that happens to be unique? Seems outrageous. However, it does seem the future as people can tap into two markets instead of one.

A system where people buy stuff with real world money for their virtual counterparts enables everyone to make money off of nothing, literally. The funny unique red hat is nothing more than a collection of 0'a and 1's, translated in a bunch of pixels. Once the operator closes the servers off of which the game runs down it is lost, and so is your investment. Still it is generating billions per year. People pay for entertainment, and basically that is what it is. Entertainment, only purely in virtual form. That is the danger of it, at the same time.

Money is a clever human invention. It shows how much you are worth. In terms of credits: If I'd buy a VCR from you for 50 credits, I'm telling my bank to transfer 50 credits to you. I'm worth 50 credits less, and you're worth 50 more. The 50 credits are my payment for the service you have provided, that is how money works. When the service is a virtual service it basically does not exist. I'm paying money for something you're technically not doing, I'm giving you money instead of paying. This whole system is very prone to collapsing as one day people can collectively decide to not spend money on stuff that is not there. Most economic collapses are caused because people don't pay for things they don't have, instead they choose to save it up. When there are billions going around it's quite a impact it will have.

The money transferred in virtual worlds is referred to as a 'shadow economy' most of the time, but in reality it isn't. You are using real world money to get funny hats and expensive virtual swords. The grocer on 7th Av. spends his hard-earned cash virtually, meaning there is something else he's not spending it on. Hypothetically speaking: If something like this really takes off there will be a devaluation of real world goods, people are isntead spending it on virtual property, property that doesn't exist. Once they decide to not spend it on virtual property there's an inbalance. The virtual economy will collapse, putting people out of work while real world industries are hardly making a profit because they cannot sell their stuff.

Don't get into this thing. Ultimately it is dangerous to spend money on things that are not there. It's a bottomless pit you're pouring money in and while that is very promising from out of a raw economical perspective it's also something that's bound to collapse. First it is entertainment, second it is of no actual value at all as it is non-existent. In the end you'd rather spend your money on a new TV, believe me.

Share some opinions, I'm curious as to what you guys are thinking.