Online Gold... And the laws behind it?!

Umm, the "unreasonable" that I bolded was added by me. I was mirroring the first statement, which also had an "unreasonable".

Here, your original quote was:
Note the word "unreasonable" in the part (b), but not in the part (c). That is a huge point. I said inflation will happen as long as there is player trading, not that "unreasonable" inflation will happen as long as there is player trading. Huge difference. There is an issue of levels of severity here, and I think you might be missing that from my argument.

The gold selling doesn't cause inflation, player trading does. Gold selling causes unreasonable amounts of inflation. See my point? Understand what I'm saying (typing)? You are introducing a slippery slope argument by saying that all inflation must be and can be removed. I disagree.

Oops, you're right. Missed the second one.

I'll stick with all inflation 'can' be removed on account of it's a game economy and not a real economy. All you need to do is balance the gold coming in and out. If gold coming in through normal play = gold going out through gold sinks then you have no inflation. Anet can adjust both sides through code changes so they can hit this sweet spot if they desire.

But let's change (c) to 'unreasonable' inflation like you suggest. The rest of the post still completely applies. You should still fix (b) to fix (c) rather than trying to fix (a) to fix (c) for all the reasons I posted above.

There's a huge problem with that theory: Free Will. As long as players can trade with other players, causing money to simply exchange hands while it's still being created, players will, and every bit of it causes inflation, period. The only way to stop it is to force players to spend their money on gold sinks, which would cause a whole slew of problems on its own.

Let's face it, some players, no matter how many gold sinks there are, will save their money, and pool it. As long as there is trading, there will be those power traders that rely on acquiring their wealth via other players. There is likely a large percentage of players who save money to get a certain item. If that item is armor, well that's a gold sink (except materials), but if that item is a certain rare weapon/shield/off-hand, that will cause inflation because the money was created (out of "nothing"), and then passed around, remaining in the game.

Actually, (b) is only caused by (a), so why not go to the root of the problem? Inflation is not the problem, gold selling is, since it causes "unreasonable inflation". Therefore, remove gold selling. Plain and simple. Trying to find some complicated method to make "unreasonable inflation" into "reasonable inflation", while still allowing gold sellers to do their thing, or even trying to out-sell them is very much not plain and simple.

Look, you agree that removing (or at least actively banning) gold sellers will reduce the rate of inflation significantly. If the high rate of inflation is the problem, and this very simple fix can solve that, why would you want to complicate the matter? Especially if that complication could cause so many more problems, even if it fixes the current problem at hand.

would think twice before signing ur topic, the problem is in groups i always get the bad drops! i guess its luck, but i stoped playing WoW cause they have a monthly fee (xtra real world currency) and i refuse having to pay for something xtra, the idea is tempting, BUT when I decided to buy the game its because i wanted to play it, not because i want to get everything so easy....
in addition i think that the market would inflate so much if it was allowed xtra gold from outside arena, and i tell you 1 thing as a lawyer, everything in the game is the property of Anet and ur not allowed to trade it or make profit out of their work....
so no:
/not signed

How would gold enter the game that ArenaNet is not involved with?

I'm pretty sure selling gold on eBay isn't illegal. Has anybody been sued? At worst you're going to break the EULA and lose your account.

Here's a question for you Higaru. If you go to Kinkos and pay to use one of their computers to write a document then does Kinkos own your document? The computer is their property, so they should own anything you produce from it, right?

In mainstream economics, the word “inflation” refers to a persistent rise in the general price level, as measured against a standard level of purchasing power.

Money changing hands doesn't cause inflation because the general price level doesn't raise. It can raise the price of one specific item, but this isn't inflation.

In classical political economy, “inflation” means increasing the money supply, while “deflation” means decreasing it. Also not what you describe above.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation

I stated earlier that I disagree with this, so if you think this is true please provide proof. Actually, I'll just disprove your statement here.

You say that
[unreasonable levels of gold entering the economy (b)] are only caused by [Gold farming (a)]

Lets look at the huge issue of the duping exploit that just happened.

Could (b) have been caused by this? Yes. They could have duped lockpicks and merchanted them for unlimited gold. It would be a lot faster than botting. They would have probably avoided detection better if they did this instead of the armbrace thing.

By your statement, we must conclude that anyone who used duping to create unreasonable levels of online gold must be a gold farmer. Was everyone banned for duping a gold farmer? No. Therefore your statement is incorrect.

Very well put, I applaud you.


I suppsoe the only thing left for me to say since you said the very thing I would have posted, is that I firmly agree, and am against spending real money to an online game for several reasons.

Its related to copyright laws, and everything in the game is registered to ANET and affiliates, GW gold is therefore considered 1 of many properties of ANET and u can't use it without their consent.
When u post something on ebay u accept the terms and conditions of the site, and if someone bother to read them they included a confirmation that you have the right to sell what you are selling which is not the case with GW gold.

When u go to kinkos to print a doc u use MS word for example and they have a lincense from MS to allow u to print u doc. the content is urs and as u said it kinko doesn't own it, same as those sellers, the license which is granted by ANET does not allow to sell gold.

Outiside gold may be hacked gold, or gold sold by players to a reseller for low price (but this is inside gold), or maybe harvested by bots.
I encoutered a couple of these players when i started the game but didn't understand it @ that time!

cheers

I completly agree with u, i'm against spending xtra unlreasonable money for online games, and its not about giving an advantage for rich over poor, it's about PLAYING THE GAME.
That's the CHALLENGE....

If I employed someone to sit in front of a computer all day and collect gold for my guild wars characters, this would be legal surely?

If I gave my son pocket money for giving me his in game gold while he is on his summer holidays and I am at work.. is that legal? surely it is....

So.. when buying online gold for real money, isnt this surely the same concept.. you are paying someone for their time spent.. not for the actual gold itself?

I agree they (someone from Anet) should log his IP from here, run a search in the game for it and ban him and his IP for good. That will teach him not to violate the rules of the game. I am glad Anet has taken this stand and banning more and more people for violating the EULA. I just hope these are lifetime bans and not the 72 hour ones. Really the 72 hour ones are suspensions and not bans, but, Anet officials like Gaile could be using these 72 hour suspensions and calling them bans in their text. A ban to me means permanant, lifetime, forever, goodbye adios don't come back.

Here is the best and Main reason for them cracking down on Guild wars gold sellers and buyers......Their are too people like you Matthew the wise no dissrespect or anything like that its just that you have been playing the game for 13 months and admited buying ebay gold for items and armor, that is not a problem unless you think just because you now have the nice things you can brag about them HERE IS THE TRUTH IF YOU BUY EBAY GOLD FOR ANYREASON IN GUILD WARS YOU can no longer bragg about you account Items armor or skill because you have ebayed the gold their is a difference in acheaving titles and armor on you own and buying them with real money you spent money which means you did not earn what you purchased acheaving these titles and armors by playing the game is how it is ment to be played earn the respect earn the right to brag earn the right to show your off skills..

The china farming is another cause for Anet cracking down little kids forced to play all day for 10 cents and if they miss quota they dont get paid.

The other reason is when you ebay for gold and use it to buy items, titles, armor is that you are only hurting yourself by not haveing the proper skills and knowhow to work well with a expirenced group of players...

I have been playing Guild Wars for 16 months I have never payed for any Fake game gold, I have over 4 sets of 15k armor, 200+ high end green items, 17 showable titles 10 of which are over tier 3 and 7 are maxed higher than what the max cap stops at including 100% of all 3 contents.
If you are truly a Guild Wars player for over a year you should have no problem earning 20-50k in 1 to 2 hours a day do that for a week and you will not need money for a long time...It is very easy to do with many different character classes not just 55s which do not pull in near as much gold as say a DOA ELE SOLER or a DROLKS RUNNER which is my favorite way to make 20k in 15 mins.

My guild for example has 1 person who ebays in it and he trys to tell everyone he is better than them every chance he gets but does not realize how little respect our entire guild has for him.. we avoid him when we get GvGs and HA groups togeather for the main reason that he boast and brags about being soo good in the game but when we take him with us we never win due to the fact he lacks expirence just because you ebay gold does not give you knowhow of the game and thats why buying gold with ebay does not help you whatsoever.

And lastly the Real problem is People in PvP heros ascent who buy 1 mill gold for xx dollers and go to gurus service fourm and buy fame points (I think with 1 mill gold you can get from rank 0 to rank 6+ in a few hours their is someone who farms fame for 3k a point or some price who goes with R10+ people and leaves 1 spot for the newbie.... this is a real big problem because if you looking for a group in ha and you are ranked legitly and have the skills and knowhow of what build your wanting run and know what your faceing how to use the map to your advantage exploite the other teams weakness but what you did not notice is when you got into the R3+ group their were 2 ebayed rank players with no clue on how to truly HA in a Group environment which in turn you get no response from them cause their used to leaching fame and not earning it...

Its not the fact that Guild Wars dissaproves of buying in game gold with real money its the fact that new and unexpirenced players are doing this and thinking they are better or even on the same playing level than the pros of the game who have earned all their items Loot, armor Titles .

I hope everyone has read and understood why guild wars is doing what their doing about the gold sales and I hope all the legit people out their continue to uphold the qualties of earning your way unstead of buying your way.

Illegal read the EULA you may not transfer, give, sell or any form of transaction allow someone else to use YOUR ACCOUNT for any reason.

Illegal for the same reason above. Your family members are not an extention of yourself in this case or any EULA for that matter if you read it. You may not TRANSFER/SELL any items outside the game for any reason.

Nope, buying online gold for real money is still illegal and a violation to the EULA you AGREED to. Read the EULA, you don't get to agree to PORTIONS of it you AGREE to ALL of it and must abide by your agreement or you and your account are subject to banning.

Well you're pretty ignorant then. The fact is Anet has the "right to sue", but, prefers merely to ban the account since that is the less expensive action on their part they can do and get rid of the criminal. It's expensive to goto court to sue someone over violating a EULA, but, it's not out of their means to do so. Just FYI.

I love how ppl think every human gold farmer in china is held at gun point and gets paid a cup of rice per week.

While i havent talked to any gold farmers in person, the documentary i watched about it showed people farming gold on WOW. They got (from memory) 1000 Yuan a week. This is US$132. Not much? Do any of you know cheap it is to live in China?

For your FYI, the legality of selling online items hasn't been established.

from http://blog.wired.com/games/2007/05/...rd_takes_.html

"Whether or not Blizzard ends up being the company that challenges the legality of selling in-game assets is yet to be determined. Frankly, I don't think they're wrong to be afraid of opening that can of worms."

Blizzard is suing a gold selling company and is INTENTIONALLY AVOIDING bringing this issue up and focusing on the online company's spamming instead. The reason for this is if they do bring it up in court, the ruling could backfire on them and it could be decided that a person does have some amount of ownership. If that happens, WoW and GW could be in a lot of trouble if the servers crash and everyone lost their online items... players would then have legal precedent to SUE THEM.

See how I did that without calling you ignorant? I didn't just say the opposite thing and call you stupid, I backed up my claims with reasons and evidence. Try it sometime.

Not illegal, against the EULA. Are the cops going to arrest you if you let your brother play your GW account? No. There's no cop code for 'perp playing his brother's GW account'. A TOS or EULA is a private contract between you and Anet. There's a difference between breaking a law and violating a private contract.

Also, think for a second about how they could possibly ENFORCE what you write above. How's Anet going to be able to tell if it's you or your brother playing?

They're just saying they have the right to ban your account if you sell it to somebody else.

Simply because it gives people who pay an advantage over people who actually work hard for their gold.

depends how u look at it.
if you farm ingame for x hours to afford x item/armour etc then youve worked for it.

but if u buy gold, you havent. but how did get the real money to buy the gold? oh you worked for it, at your job. so you did actully work for it. just in a non direct way. probably more time/gold effecient to buy it xD. unless anyone wanna share a 100k/hour farm run? xD

i dont see the fundimental difference from the chinese gold farmer, and the normal farmer in the effect of the economy...