There are quite a few games (EVE Online probably the biggest one I know of) where you can buy say 1 month of playing time for $X as an item, and then trade that for in game currency legally. Now I have no problem with buying currencies and clearly this system could (and did) work fine. But I'll always hear people say, "From this you can get rich/never have to pay money again!"
How can that possibly work without scam involved? Let's say that you're the only person in the world buying this item (so no sudden influx of other demand to mess up your world conquering plans). You attempt to sell this for in game currency, and supply and demand kicks in and after some initial turblence it's determined that a fair price for that is 150% the net worth of the average player.
Now flip to the buyer side. If 150% (or any other number) of the net worth of the average player is *cheap* to me, that implies I make a lot more in game money than the average player. As far as I know this is only possible if:
1. You play way more than the average player (you should consider a career in gold farming).
2. You know some exploits nobody knows about (this is, well, cheating).
3. You duped people out of their money in the past (this might be somehow legal depending on the game you're in).
It cannot be the case that you're simply a better player than most people, because most games takes steps to greatly limit the ability to earn in game currency by simply being better. Even if you try to sell services, there's really nothing stopping other people from offering the same services. Maybe it's possible you get some kind of early mover advantage, but over time it's hard for me to imagine anything besides cyber that you can offer as a reliable recurrent method of income.
Also, most online games tend to have rampant inflation as a function of time. 1000 gold was a lot of money in WoW, but it's probably just pocket change now (haven't played in a long time, so I can't say for sure). So even if I once robbed a guild bank for 10K gold back in the old days, this money sure isn't going to be very valuable now. While the degree of inflation varies depending on the game, most online games do have pretty significant inflation. This means just hitting the jackpot big once via crime isn't enough.
Of course I'm sure most of the people who said they hit the jackpot online are almost certainly lying if crime isn't involved. I do know some people who made a lot of money online when crime is involved but there's obviously some risk involved there.
I guess since people fall for the same scams all the time in real life, it's natural that people fall for the same ones online too. I don't think buying this stuff is bad, but if you're trying to get rich from doing that, you're definitely looking in the wrong place. You'd be better off considering a life of virtual crime!
How can that possibly work without scam involved? Let's say that you're the only person in the world buying this item (so no sudden influx of other demand to mess up your world conquering plans). You attempt to sell this for in game currency, and supply and demand kicks in and after some initial turblence it's determined that a fair price for that is 150% the net worth of the average player.
Now flip to the buyer side. If 150% (or any other number) of the net worth of the average player is *cheap* to me, that implies I make a lot more in game money than the average player. As far as I know this is only possible if:
1. You play way more than the average player (you should consider a career in gold farming).
2. You know some exploits nobody knows about (this is, well, cheating).
3. You duped people out of their money in the past (this might be somehow legal depending on the game you're in).
It cannot be the case that you're simply a better player than most people, because most games takes steps to greatly limit the ability to earn in game currency by simply being better. Even if you try to sell services, there's really nothing stopping other people from offering the same services. Maybe it's possible you get some kind of early mover advantage, but over time it's hard for me to imagine anything besides cyber that you can offer as a reliable recurrent method of income.
Also, most online games tend to have rampant inflation as a function of time. 1000 gold was a lot of money in WoW, but it's probably just pocket change now (haven't played in a long time, so I can't say for sure). So even if I once robbed a guild bank for 10K gold back in the old days, this money sure isn't going to be very valuable now. While the degree of inflation varies depending on the game, most online games do have pretty significant inflation. This means just hitting the jackpot big once via crime isn't enough.
Of course I'm sure most of the people who said they hit the jackpot online are almost certainly lying if crime isn't involved. I do know some people who made a lot of money online when crime is involved but there's obviously some risk involved there.
I guess since people fall for the same scams all the time in real life, it's natural that people fall for the same ones online too. I don't think buying this stuff is bad, but if you're trying to get rich from doing that, you're definitely looking in the wrong place. You'd be better off considering a life of virtual crime!
