Comments on: Money for Nothing

By: jsummerstay

jsummerstay — Wed, 05 Jan 2011 08:05:32 +0000

The rules for virtual goods are very different from real goods, however. “They’re not making any more land” is a good point about real land, but it’s possible to make an unlimited amount of virtual land. Goods can also be replicated at no cost.
The software to allow realistic and complicated graphics is also increasing every year, so purchases will very quickly lose value as better alternatives appear.
The solution from a company’s point of view is to introduce artificial scarcity, through control of a gameworld. But if an alternative should appear that gives more flexibility to the consumer for cheaper, the value of in-game goods could quickly drop to zero.
Yes, virtual goods will continue to bring in more and more money each year. But investments in virtual property will behave very differently that investments in real property.

By: Phil

Phil — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 10:52:59 +0000

>>I’m personally not likely to spend much for virtual goods.

Well, we’ll see. I don’t buy them myself…yet.

In addition to new generations of Farmville and other MUDS, we’re going to see many more contexts for people to make use of virtual goods. I think we’ll be buying them before we realized what happened.

My guess is that you and I (and many like us) are a lot closer to being citizens than we realize.

By: stephentg

stephentg — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 09:34:35 +0000

When I was a kid I heard a sermon from an old preacher where he asked, “What’s important to you? We all say some things are important to us… we may even believe some things are important to us. But pull out your checkbook and look what you’ve been writing checks for. That tells the real story.”

Phil: “Whatever people are willing to pay for it.”

This is a true measure of how much we are living online – what we are willing to pay for virtual goods.

I’m personally not likely to spend much for virtual goods. I don’t do Second Life, Farmville, or MUD’s. If you don’t live there, you don’t spend money there.

I do spend money for digital content – ebooks, movies, music. And I shop online for a lot of the real world goods that I used to buy locally.

But that’s not the same. All those goods and services are enjoyed right here in the “real” world. I guess that makes me a cyber tourist. I’m an occasional visitor, not a citizen.