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Virtual Island Sells For $26,500
Aziphirael writes "The MMORPG Project Entropia has just announced that its first treasure island sale via Auction has gone for a grand total of US$26,500. Project Entropia's unique selling point is the ability to convert real money into ingame cash and vice versa. The owner is Zachurm "Deathifier" Emegen who intends to develop the island into a place for the community." From the article: "A large island off a newly discovered continent surrounded by deep creature infested waters. The island boasts beautiful beaches ripe for developing beachfront property, an old volcano with rumors of fierce creatures within, the outback is overrun with mutants, and an area with a high concentration of robotic miners guarded by heavily armed assault robots indicates interesting mining opportunities."
But for the love of god, stop trying to tell other people how to spend THEIR money. They don't tell you how to spend yours.
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
No one here knows about the game and how alive the economy for this game is. I would like to know.
Obviously the guy bought this island as an investment, with the potential to make more money then he payed. I bet the guy knew the risks invovled, that the game may go down, that the company pretty much decides to make a change that fucks him over, that the owning company is pretty much thier god. He is probably betting on the fact that their game will work and make more money, the more people like him can make money, and are hoping that they'll act in his best intrest.
Who knows what the potential return on this could be? Maybe the guy took a calculated risk with his "investment" and decided hes going to do whats "stupid" and potententially make buckets of cash. Or he could go down in flames. Maybe the guy's got enough money that it doesnt matter if it all falls through, but can afford to exiriment.
I mean, we don't know anything about the guy, or the game, to know if hes made an idiotic decision.
I just think before anybody calls him an idiot they should at liest know the details of the risks hes taking, and maybe they actually will turn out to potentially have a great return at a high risk, and he can afford that type of gambling.
I mean, couldn't I buy 26000 in a stock like lucent and exect that it would be worth something in the future, right, it couldn't all just dissapear on me... What did I just buy? A bunch of paper. What's the real value of that paper? It's whatever value people put into it. How is buying a stock any different then buying a virtual island? The value of the island is there as long as people are willing to pay for service from it.
Well with stocks you have more protection from fraud then you would with this investment, but still, the concept is still there, the viritual property has value as long as people are willing to pay for it.
But in this whole sceme, i'd like to be the game devs who can create 26,000 dollar property at whim. Well, I guess they couldn't as the more they made it would reduce the value, but still, we shouldn't write it off without more details.
If this catches on it will become a bigger money-laundering scheme than the Las Vegas casinos:
1. invest dubiously gotten gains into virtual island
2. trade virtual island in-game with criminal B
3. sell new island on open market.
4. spend all that crazy loot legally(sorry, PROFIT!!!)
So, who will become the top Entropia players? Al Quaeda, investment bankers or drug cartels?
My guess is: All of the above.
Hey, I resent that!
I'm a liberal socialist hacker... well, no, I resent being called *that* too, but it's pretty low on the list of things I, as a liberal socialist hacker, resent these days.
However, if someone tells me I'm bad and wrong for spending my money on something other than starving children, he's getting whacked upside the head by the nearest heavy chunk of metal I can find. I've got an old full-height 10-meg MFM hard drive here, and I'm not afraid to use it.
Sure, the starving children of the world need food. I'm all for sending stuff to them, if that's what you feel like doing. However, if you feel like buying an iPod, a sports car, a virtual island, or whatever else you feel like conspicuously consuming, go for it! Guess what? If you do, you're *helping people*. People make a living building and selling iPods, sports cars, and virtual islands. You're putting food on *their* tables. They may not be pitiful starving wretches, but that's only because people like you buy their (sometimes dubious) stuff instead of living like a hermit in a cave (or cardboard box, for those of you in urban areas) and sending all your hard-earned cash overseas to starving kids.
People who think it's some sort of sin to spend money on something other than "saving the world" need to get a grip. If we all spent money the way they think we should, this whole friggin' planet would fall apart.