When Play Money Becomes Real

Thanks to Wired News for its article analyzing the commercial potential of the trade in MMO virtual items, focusing on Internet Gaming Entertainment (IGE), of which CEO Brock Pierce claims "has more than 100 full-time employees in Hong Kong and the United States... [and] is hiring about five new people a week." Pierce also makes claims that: "In this industry, it's eBay and us... we're the major players", and elsewhere, a Sony Online spokesperson "is aware of IGE and has spoken with the company" with regard to their EverQuest item sales, concluding: "At this point, we're still sort of trying to decide what direction the company's going to move in on this topic." We've previously covered the financial dealings of IGE.

Comments

Re:Taxes...

[shadowcabbit]

This doesn't really seem to apply since you're not using actual real-world currency. I'm not an accountant or tax lawyer, but I don't think a government can tax trade not being done in its native currency (i.e. the U.S. can't charge tax at time of sale if I were to go to Toronto and buy a bottle of soda; on larger purchases, like a computer, they might be able to at the border/Customs, but I'm not sure).