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Third-World Sweatshops Producing Virtual Goods

Posted by timothy on from the what-the-market-will-bear dept.

prostoalex writes "MSNBC points to the court cases spawned by virtual worlds. Recently, Tom Loftus notes, a virtual island in one of the MMORPGs sold for $30,000, enough to attract commercial attention. Apparently, some businesses create third-world sweatshops, where low-wage laborers are being paid to play and accumulate enough virtual merchandise, so that an eBay sale of it makes the operation profitable. 'One such business, Blacksnow Interactive, actually sued a virtual world's creator in 2002 for attempting to crack down on the practice. The first of its kind to center on virtual goods, the case was eventually dropped,' MSNBC says." Update: 02/06 18:59 GMT by Z : We ran a story about the sale of the virtual island, and Terra Nova has a lot of commentary on the sale of virtual goods. For comparison, the economic impact of this phenomenon is roughly equal to that of Namibia or Macedonia.

2 of 348 comments (clear)

  1. Re:this is like something out of an SF novel by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2004/11/15/andas _game/index_np.html

    not a novel, but a short story from cory doctorow.

  2. Re:Sweatshop? by digitalchinky · · Score: 5, Informative

    I actually live in Asia, a lot of these 'sweatshops' are bloody nice work environments! Just as nice as anything you'd find in Australia - the difference is the workers are paid a little higher than average wages most times. If the company is foreign owned or 'bankrolled' - then conditions have to be compliant with all health and safety regs. The exact same pair of jeans sold in america for $100 will cost around $5-$10 here, on the street (shopping centers)

    Workers get breaks, medical, dental, nobody under 18, the law is enforced pretty well since failure to do so means big government fines.

    It all works out in the end.

    These offshore 'call centers' are staffed by college graduates mostly, just looking for a good income - problem is a few 'Americans' think they are 'stupid' in many instances, and hate talking to them. (I have a neice working in one, I hear the stories every day) Can really screw up ones day. These people are smart, they just don't speak english fluently.

    Just my 2 cents. (Excluding China, I don't know anything about that place - so previous poster might be right)