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PC Games (Games) Role Playing (Games) Entertainment Games

Virtual MMO Currency Trading Crippled By Fraud 110

Posted by simoniker from the taking-advantage dept.
Thanks to Terra Nova for pointing to the Gaming Open Market website, home of "the next generation of [MMO] game commodity trading", where there's an announcement that: "Until further notice, Gaming Open Market will be closing its doors to all game currency trading except Second Life." There's more information in a post at the official Second Life forums, where Jamie Hale explains: "Yesterday, I had a user breeze through spending over $3000 USD on [EVE Online] and [Star Wars Galaxies]. Immediately after taking delivery of the ISK and credits, he reversed all the payments, claiming he never received the goods. This is a well-known loophole in PayPal's seller protection policy. Basically, I have no recourse at all. PayPal accepts no form of proof of delivery except physical waybills (UPS, FedEx, etc)."
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Virtual MMO Currency Trading Crippled By Fraud More

Virtual MMO Currency Trading Crippled By Fraud

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  • Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:31AM (#9494691)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Care to cite your sources? I read [walrusmagazine.com] that the per capita income of each character inside EverQuest is about $2,266 USD annually. That is greater than the GDP of contries like India, Bulgaria, and China. However that has nothing to do with the stock market.

  • The thief e-mailed and confessed? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by whoda ( 569082 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:35AM (#9494723) Homepage
    Quit messing around with Paypal, and call the District Attorney where the guy lives.

    He has admitted he commited fraud, get him arrested and see him in court.

    • More updates (Score:4, Informative)

      by whoda ( 569082 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @11:58AM (#9496447) Homepage
      "This incident has been reported to the FBI Internet Fraud Department, and tomorrow to the RCMP. We have compiled as much information as possible on this person, including his name, address, phone number, email addresses and the IPs used to log into our site. All of this information will be turned over to the authorities."

      And that should just about make sure the guy is found. Paypal does do some 'decent' checks to verify your identity when setting up accounts.
    • Quit messing around with Paypal, and call the District Attorney where the guy lives. He has admitted he commited fraud, get him arrested and see him in court.

      Good idea. District Attorneys work hard, and could use a good laugh now and then.

      To get the DA interested, the seller would have to be selling something that they actually have a right to sell.

  • From the thread:

    "So basically, we're out $3000, or about 70% of our profits since January. And to be completely honest, it hurts."

    Sorry, you sir need to get into a new business. The one you are currently in sucks for you, sucks for the game, and sucks for the people playing the games. MMORPG's are NOT a job. People who are spending real money for in-game advantage through third parties should be shot in the street for being so stupid.

    That said, you're an idiot for using PayPal. Blame yourself, not the pe

    • Re:Awwww, poor baby can't run his crappy gaming si (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Schezar ( 249629 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:50AM (#9494850) Homepage Journal
      People who are spending real money for in-game advantage through third parties should be shot in the street for being so stupid.
      Now, why is that exactly? Let's look at the situation.

      Person A spends 20 hours a week playing MMOX to build up his level 245 Necromancer Dark Elf Paladin. He then enjoys playing the game as such.

      Person B spends $200 on a level 245 Necromancer Dark Elf Paladin. He then enjoys playing the game as such.

      Frankly, I don't see any objective difference between the two. Granted, the specific gaming experiences for players A and B are different, but externally they're the same. One spends his time, the other, his money. Both to play A GAME! IT'S A GAME! GAME!!! It's supposed to be FUN! FUN! GAME!

      Games are NOT serious. Player B didn't enjoy working through a level grind to get the character he wanted, or maybe he makes enough per hour to justify the expense. Either way, it's all for the sake of fun. Just because he has fun with the result, while you have fun with the process, doesn't mean he's any different from you.

      You see, these are GAMES. You play them to have FUN. Not everyone has fun in the same way.

      So, my question is basically why does this suck for the game, and for the people playing games, if the purpose of a game is to have fun?

      • Re:Awwww, poor baby can't run his crappy gaming si (Score:4, Insightful)

        by schild ( 713993 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:58AM (#9494955) Homepage Journal
        It sucks for the game because the person who bought the level 245 Necromancer Dark Elf Paladin is skipping the majority of the world that the developers put their blood, sweat and tears into.

        It sucks for the players (not all of them) but the ones he might interact with because having skipped the majority of the game, in all likelihood, doesn't know shit about the game and will wreck nothing but newbie havok upon those stupid enough to group with him.

        MMOGs are a game, yes. But it's also a type of business that relies on player retention. When someone skips from the beginning to the end the chance of retention is probably dropped about 90% because the only thing the player will take part in is the endgame.

        The person who played 20 hours a week may very well have catassed his way up there. But I can guarantee you he'll generate more free PR through word of mouth than the guy who dropped his wad on a pre-leveled character.

        Doesn't sound like you play MMOGs much.
        • It sucks for the game because the person who bought the level 245 Necromancer Dark Elf Paladin is skipping the majority of the world that the developers put their blood, sweat and tears into.

          The person who played the character to level 245 didn't skip the majority of the world.
          • The person who played the character to level 245 didn't skip the majority of the world.

            So what? It's not a 1:1 correspondence; the Level 245 characters tend to come from one person making characters and selling them as a job. Besides, you're not refuting his point at all; if the person who bought the character instead started from scratch, then you'd have two people playing through the game instead of one.

            Rob (I almost typed "paying" up there instead of "playing." That certainly would've been apropos)
            • if the person who bought the character instead started from scratch, then you'd have two people playing through the game instead of one.

              Actually, probably not as the person selling the character wouldn't be creating the character to sell in the first place. And what if the person purchasing the character decided he didn't have the time required to play the entire game in the first place, so he never p(l)ayed at all.

              As much as gamers like you hate this, this is part of what keeps these games going. It'

        • Re:Awwww, poor baby can't run his crappy gaming si (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Danse ( 1026 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @11:53AM (#9496372)

          It sucks for the game because the person who bought the level 245 Necromancer Dark Elf Paladin is skipping the majority of the world that the developers put their blood, sweat and tears into.

          So what? If he paid for the game like everyone else, then the devs got their money for their blood sweat and tears.

          It sucks for the players (not all of them) but the ones he might interact with because having skipped the majority of the game, in all likelihood, doesn't know shit about the game and will wreck nothing but newbie havok upon those stupid enough to group with him.

          And that's different from about 90% of the rest of the idiot players how exactly?

          MMOGs are a game, yes. But it's also a type of business that relies on player retention. When someone skips from the beginning to the end the chance of retention is probably dropped about 90% because the only thing the player will take part in is the endgame.

          How is this the player's problem? If the devs made the game more interesting in the beginning instead of just a leveling treadmill, then maybe people would be more inclined to play all the way through.

          The person who played 20 hours a week may very well have catassed his way up there. But I can guarantee you he'll generate more free PR through word of mouth than the guy who dropped his wad on a pre-leveled character.

          Again, that's someone else's problem, not the player's.


        • Doesn't sound like you play MMOGs much.

          That's a pretty unnecessary statement. I'd venture to say he's played them enough to know full well what the phrase "level grind" means. Well enough to understand why some people will spend real world money on preleveled characters to skip the whole process.

          Personally, I play several MMOs, and I'm the type who levels his character through the conventional means, grinding away. Because for ME, it's about experiencing the game the developers created -- that's FU

      • Not completely disagreeing with you. But MMORPGs go well beyond games for a lot of people. They are environments for social interaction with other humans. As such, the word "game" is almost derisive.

        And I rarely heard my fellow EQ players 5 years ago call the level grind fun. City of Heroes might be a different story from what I've heard.
      • What you are failing to see is that MMORPG's aren't just about your experience, they are about everybody's experience.

        If I sepnd $200 for a level 245 Necromancer, that is probably because I can't get there myself, either because I am a dumbass, or whatever. I haven't experienced enough of the game to have attained that level (in general). I am going ot make bumbling, stupid mistakes that the original player wouldn't have. I don't care, I am having fun.

        Until I start routing newbie areas out of frustrati
      • You post sounds like someone who only plays single-player games. From that POV your post makes complete sense, but this isn't about single-player games.

        "Not everyone has fun in the same way."
        For example, griefers have fun by ruining the fun of others. And cheaters have fun by changing the rules midway through the game.

        I ask you to choose a game you really enjoy, play it with either a griefer or cheater, and then TRY to repeat your assertions.

    • Re:Awwww, poor baby can't run his crappy gaming si (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Winterblink ( 575267 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:56AM (#9494921) Homepage
      Sorry, you sir need to get into a new business. The one you are currently in sucks for you, sucks for the game, and sucks for the people playing the games. MMORPG's are NOT a job. People who are spending real money for in-game advantage through third parties should be shot in the street for being so stupid.

      The best argument I've heard thus far FOR the practice of buying MMO items and money is that some people simply don't have the time to play as much as others. To some it's not a big deal to spend some cash to get themselves to the point where the powergamers already are at. I'm not saying I agree with the tactics of the fraudulent bunch out there, but I don't think executing people for legitimately spending their money as they see fit is a valid argument either.
    • Second Life is not a game. The developers ENCOURAGE online money trading.
      SL is more like massively multiplayer productivity software with a social aspect. In it, you can create just about anything you can imagine, you can build 3D objects, script them, you can customize your avatars to the hilt and make custom animations for them in poser. It is a dream for machinima.
      After setting up a shop and making a few cool items, you can make money without spending a single minute in world. Since 99% of the content in
    • I can't comment on how good or evil it is to buy your way into a MMORPG, since I don't play those, but I can say that Gaming Open Market has provided an excellent serviced to Second Life, which isn't a MMORPG at all. There's no treadmill, there's no game objectives, and buying and selling goods is part of the purpose of the SL metaverse. The developers of SL encourage people to trade cash on GOM, because it served the valuable purpose of keeping the cash moving in the virtual economy. If it weren't for GOM,
    • Actually no it's the gaming companies that suck. They should be providing equivilant services, rather than catering to the whims of a few loudmouthed brats who scrape their $15/month together to sweat and slave in their parents basement then get upset when someone else buys a level 245 character.

      There is a demand for this sort of service to go on. The world of MMOs is getting crouded, and sooner or later some publisher is going to latch on to the idea (actually, Second Life already has but sooner or later
      • Sorry, you sir need to get into a new business. The one you are currently in sucks for you, sucks for the game, and sucks for the people playing the games. MMORPG's are NOT a job. People who are spending real money for in-game advantage through third parties should be shot in the street for being so stupid.

      From what I understand the site's a faciliator for others to do their trading on game goods. So it's rather odd you'd state that "MMORPG's are NOT a job" since no one in this story is making them on

  • Had a friend with the same experience (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Oz0ne ( 13272 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:45AM (#9494804) Homepage
    What you need to do is ship a cd to the buyer with the codes to access the virtual items/characters.

    That is a physical delivery, and paypal WILL support you and help you solve your problem. Very sad that you had this problem, but you need to make sure to use any/all services you subscribe to your advantage and not blindly trust in your customers. There are a lot of people that will do you much worse than a couple thousand given the opportunity.

    • Re:Had a friend with the same experience (Score:5, Insightful)

      by timlee ( 303958 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @10:06AM (#9495040)
      That has a lot of disadvantages because many legit buyers look for "instant delivery" and "24/7 service." If you want someone to wait 2 to 5 days for a CD to arrive with access codes to how they can get the goods they paid for when there are hundreds of other sellers out there who are willing to ship instantly, then you are going to lose that customer plain and simple.

      I think PayPal, with its current policies, is not geared to serve virtual trading. There needs to be a service that can verify virtual delivery of virtual goods. However that in itself is a problem because game developers are generally against the real life trading of their virtual goods that they technically still own.

      The line between virtual and physical goods is still very defined. The cooperation of game developers is needed in order to cross this line and for safe transactions to occur.
      • That's kind of what I already said. You have to use the existing tools to your advantage.

        There are no existing tools for virtual property markets.

        I don't really think there should be. Yes, you may lose customers, but you don't lose money. Taking a risk where you can lose money in fraud/theft instead of simply not making it, is idiotic. It's their choice if they want to do that of course... everyone has the right to be stupid.
      • For $3K, I certainly will do everything in my power to make sure that I or the other party will be ripped off.

        If that means that they have to wait 3 days for a Cd to show up, so be it.
      • Well you could ship the CD with tracking numbers and as a courtesy send "unofficial" ones through electronic means so they could don't have to wait. Hey, could you ship a CD to the guy who defrauded you and claim you delivered to paypal.
      • I think PayPal, with its current policies, is not geared to serve virtual trading. There needs to be a service that can verify virtual delivery of virtual goods. However that in itself is a problem because game developers are generally against the real life trading of their virtual goods that they technically still own.

        Which brings us to the heart of the issue. These are essentially black-market goods (not that I give a damn, just saying). If you buy a gun out of the trunk of some guy's car in a dark al
        • That has a lot of disadvantages because many legit buyers look for "instant delivery" and "24/7 service."
        So you allow instant delivery for them with a service that doesn't have the problems Paypal presents or fraud. It's an unfortunate truism that the legit people end up having to endure extra hassles thanks to all the crooks and jerks in the world though.
    • That just shifts the scams to the seller side. Since the seller can "prove" he sent the item whether it contains the goods or not. What can the buyer do if it contains only 1copper.

      At least with the sellers getting scammed it keeps the item selling in check. With a buyer-gets-scammed system, I think the market would be larger then currently.

  • So... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by hookedup ( 630460 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:46AM (#9494819)
    Who's going to start the first escrow service for gamers..

  • Payment? Lessons? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @09:54AM (#9494888)
    The thief emailed us and explained that the goods he stole will be kept as "payment" for the lesson he taught us.

    Yep, if a theif is able to steal something, he should be entitled to keep it and go free. I'll try that line the next time I "teach Best Buy a lesson."

  • Good (Score:4, Insightful)

    by lowmagnet ( 646428 ) <eli DOT sarver AT gmail DOT com> on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @10:11AM (#9495114) Homepage

    Now if a certain development house (NCSoft) would just kick Chinese IPs from their NA servers like they did to NA IPs on their Korean servers, I can start really playing, and I can safely ignore cries of RANG RANG and 999999 from ebay/etc. adena farmers.

    Finally, one less site selling in-game stuff for money. Almost every MMO has a policy against this, but they do it anyway. It has to stop. It is cheating. I don't care about any arguments about the time it takes to do X in the game. Why not just create an idspispopd equivalent? That's what developers are doing if they don't at least fight this.

    • Wait isn't idspispopd the noclip code?
      wouldn't idkfa be the code you meant.

    • Re:Good (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Danse ( 1026 )

      Well, someone had to spend the time ingame to get the money or goods to sell, so it shouldn't really matter one way or the other who currently has possession of the goods. You may not care about time arguments, but for many people, time is valuable. Leveling treadmills aren't very enjoyable for many people, but playing as a powerful character is. So they trade their money for someone else's time. Doesn't seem like cheating to me. I could pay a friend to play my character for me for a month and it would

      • Actually, a lot of the time, these people who collect in-game money, sit amongst 2 or more computers whilst macros take care of most of the work for them. I don't think this is the same as your friend working for you. Also, these people make the game experience unenjoyable for people who like the leveling treadmill.

        Adena Farms Inc© [lineage2.com] is a good explanation of how this hurts the gaming experience.

        • Re:Good (Score:2)

          by Danse ( 1026 )

          I have a friend that plays EQ on 2 computers at the same time. He doesn't use macros, he just has to keep track of both of them. I could see making the argument that using macros is cheating, but I really don't see paying someone else to play for you as cheating. There's still a person playing.

          • Comment removed based on user account deletion

            • Re:Good (Score:2)

              by Danse ( 1026 )

              I doubt he'd be that much of a noob. You don't invest that kind of cash in a game that you don't know how to play. Most likely the people doing this stuff have played several characters up to high levels already. At least that's been my experience from knowing quite a few.

  • Wow (Score:1, Troll)

    by metamatic ( 202216 )
    You mean the kind of person who cheats at video games is also likely to cheat you on Paypal transactions? I'm amazed.
    • Stop posting about that which you know nothing about. Oh, wait, this is slashdot, I should be expecting this kind of thing already.
      Buying and selling money is a normal aspect of SL, encouraged by the developers. And SL is not a game either.
      • I just checked out the site of this Second Life, and it looks alot the same as 'There' which i 'played' the trial version of.

        So how big is the community in there : And are they mostly 3d-modelers/ coders on there, or a more general mix of people ?

        • Re:Wow (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Lordfly ( 590616 )
          Definitely more artists and creative types. There had a "waiting list" for approval by the developers, to make sure you didn't say anything offensive. in SL, pretty much anything goes. The creative output of the playerbase is nothing short of amazing.

        • Re:Wow (Score:4, Interesting)

          by jafuser ( 112236 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @12:01PM (#9496501)
          it looks alot the same as 'There' which i 'played' the trial version of

          On the surface SL looks a lot like There and Active Worlds, but the difference is that SL is more geared to giving everyone tools and letting them create the content instead of feeding you with content created by the company itself.
          And are they mostly 3d-modelers/ coders on there, or a more general mix of people

          There are a lot of amateur and professional coders and 3d modelers in SL. I know of at least a few people who have admitted to me that they currently work with big 3d game companies and have shown me their real-life professional portfolio.

          The tools are actually surprisingly good too for such an environment. Most technically-minded people seem to be impressed by what they've created.

          - Building and linking models using 3d primitives
          - Scripting objects to interact, move, or exhibit certian behaviors. The syntax is much like event-modeled C and the API has over 200 function calls.
          - Custom texturing where you upload arbitrary TGA/JPG textures which you can place on any object or wear as clothing
          - Custom sounds where you upload arbitrary WAV files and can script them to play however you want
          - You can now also upload custom "poser" animations you can script or apply directly to your avatar

          Of course with a lot of amateurs there will be varying degrees of quality for different builds. Some people are content with sticking with the default "plywood" texture that comes when you build, and others seem to remind me of the days of the netscape (blink) tag as they like to try to use every feature in the toolbox on their builds. But for the most part it's a trip to explore the world and quite easy to make things.

          Admittedly the name of the world is quite cheesy, but the technical achievement is fairly impressive and worth taking a look at.

          My sig contains a referral, but if that offends you, click here [secondlife.com] instead to go directly to the website.

          Ignore the crappy screenshots and BS marketing crap on their website, it doesn't represent the in-world well, and you'll find it's a lot more impressive once you log in than the website will lead you to believe. =)
      • Stop posting about that which you know nothing about. Oh, wait, this is slashdot, I should be expecting this kind of thing already. Buying and selling money is a normal aspect of SL, encouraged by the developers

        Perhaps you should take your own advice. (Hint: the person who "bought" the items and didn't pay was not buying SL money. He was buying SWG and Eve Online stuff).

  • Mail them codes (Score:3, Insightful)

    by FesterDaFelcher ( 651853 ) on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @10:32AM (#9495335)
    Mail them a piece of paper that has the codes on it. They have to sign for the letter, they are liable.
  • If you want to keep control of 'your'character, the solution is still simple. Create a third online character, give the third character all the virtual money, send the codes for the third character via registered post.

    This may require a new subscription to whatever game you happen to be playing, but in the grand scheme of things the cost for one month's subscription is peanuts compared to $3000.
    • One person I know mailed a "password" to people via snailmail, then met up with them in game and would transfer the goods to anyone who could provide them the appropriate code. This takes care of the physical property, and fraud protection is provided to the buyer under the terms of the sale as described in the ebay listing - "this piece of paper features a code which entitles you to such and such."

  • This is why I hate PayPal (Score:5, Insightful)

    by PktLoss ( 647983 ) * on Tuesday June 22, 2004 @01:46PM (#9497831) Homepage Journal
    PayPal seems to try and market itself as the new way to pay for things online. However it is completely incompatible with any sort of online only system.

    I work for a small software company, $20 buys you the current version of our software, and all future versions for free. You pay via paypal, use the software for a while, then force a refund since (as has already been mentioned) there is absolutely no way for us to contest it. The PayPal resposne boxes just don't work allow for anything other than a tracking number. You get the refund, and we get squat.

    This is only moderatly bad for us, I can delete the account, so there is no real loss (apart from my time). But take a company like www.TransmissionFilms.com, if they took PayPal and random client B watched a movie, then reversed payment, they have no recourse. And worse than that, they might be contractually obligated to pay the creator of the film $X since the film was watched.

    I think that PayPal needs to step up and embrace the technology that allows it to thrive. Allow merchants to specify exactly what will be provided during registration (ie username, password, account name, etc), and possibly some third party way of validating that data. The customer would be presented with information on exactly what PayPal thinks they should be receiving, at time of purchase. The fraud department would also need to be staffed with people, not drones, to deal with issues that arised thereafter.
    • This is the same problem porn site operators are having, except with credit card "charge backs" rather than Paypal. It is my understanding this is part of the reason American Express doesn't accept porn sites.

      Speaking of porn and paypal, you need to be very careful who you accept and/or send payments. A large number of accounts have been frozen (along with all the money in them) because someone was discovered to have some link to the porn industry. I'm not talking about someone running a porn site and usin
      • Chargebacks are even worse than PayPal referals because generally you are charged some sort of penalty fee per chargeback, and your account is closed if you get too many.
      • This is the same problem porn site operators are having, except with credit card "charge backs" rather than Paypal.

        Maybe porn sites are having trouble with chargebacks because there is a higher incidence of fraud by people who want to access them for free?

        Someone stole my CC information and used it to pay for porn site access about a year and a half ago. I have no idea how they got ahold of it, but fortunately the site owners were happy to remove the charge once they verified the connection came from an
    • If they wanted to spend the money in bandwidth and hosting space, one possible solution would be to keep up an ftp server and have all the transactions take place thru that server. And then keep the files on the server for the amount of time it takes to contend not recieving property for payment in case they need to investigate it.
  • Let me see if I understand this correctly. On the board (link in the article) Jamie Hale admitted that he knows why Paypal won't do anything about this. Namely because there was no physical shipment. Well, why don't they throw that step in? Ship out something the user has to recieve as verification, and talk to paypal to verify that it would count as "goods recieved".

    Or how about actually creating a working relationship with the company that produced/developed the game? Then he could have re-couped al
    • I would *love* to create a working relationship with the game companies. Sadly, despite all the effort I have put into turning the existing out-of-game trading into a safe and efficient marketplace, I have received nothing but dead-air from most of them. Linden Lab has been very supportive. There Inc. has been supportive - just not publicly so. Mindark (Project Entropia) has given an unofficial nod with some fine print. Sony, Artifact Entertainment, CCP, etc. have said nothing. Their legal departments prob
      • What about Runescape? Back when I played, Paul and Andrew Gower were very responsive to this sort of serious question, even if the answer was "no, that's not allowed". I don't know how things have changed since it turned from a hobby into a company, though.
  • Sega's Phantasy Star Online has the best approach for money, items, and cooperative play:

    - It has a strict limit to the amount of items one can have and store.
    - The in-game shops never sell the best armors and weapons, you have to fight to get them.
    - On the other hand, decent items are not hard to get, and even the rarest ones are nothing out of this world.
    - Players can't hurt each other, making sure high-level assholes would not slay and loot newbies.
    - Only four players per game.
    - It is an action R

  • Recent purchase on City of Heroes (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I'm one of those people that occasionaly buys money online. I've done it in the past an Anarchy Online, and just a week ago on City of Heroes.

    My reasoning is that the money provides a slight advantage to me for what is a trivial cost to myself (roughly $20). It lets me enjoy more of my limited time playing the game instead of chasing down money. On the other end of the deal, I look at it as supporting a college kid who just paid for ramen for the week.

    Its all good.
  • looks like one A$$hat in the Virtual Sales industry has been both Pwnd and Griefed by someone with even less morals. The one thing that MMORPGs have taught me is that in the absence of consequences, someone will always be willing to sink lower at the expense of others. Not that I think this will stop folks from selling Virtual Goods or change anything.

    • Re:ROFL... PWND (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Looks like you have no clue as to what the game is about. Second Life encourages people to sell items and transfer the money to hard currency.

      I know this is /., but damn can't you at least read the comments above yours before making sure everyone knows your an idiot?

      And no I am not new here :)

      • Second Life is not the issue. I don't like Second Life, but I am referring to the fact that this seller was selling SWG and EVE online goods. On the SWG server I play, at least one major greif oriented guild is basically propped up by one individual's mother's credit card. I am very much against the selling of online goods if it is in violation of the TOS of the game/virtual world involved. Selling Second Life goods is fine, but maybe if the seller involved wants legitimacy as a business, he should stic
  • In my opinion both the company and the thief are in the wrong here. But opinions aside, paying USD for in-game items is against the ELUA that the user has to agree to every time they start up SWG (and probably EVE, though I haven't read through that ELUA).

    You must know at least one of this person's character's name as well as the date & time of the transaction, and you know his real name and billing address, assuming he didn't use a stolen credit card. Report him to SOE for paying cash money for in
  • I have seen some stories about an MMO in development that is based on Gold. since the value of gold is consistent across the world, it is the perfect medium of exchange. Everything in the game can be exchanged for gold, real gold. And all in game items are can be bought/sold/traded for gold. The NPC merchants keep a percentage of all transactions, kind of tax, so the developer continues to make money over the cost of adding new items/treasure in game. Now if that would be the highest subscribed MMO in
  • Take a look at Penny Arcade's [penny-arcade.com] take on the MMO trading fraud situation.

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