The Hyperinflation of 2010

[Yugl]

The precedent being to lose money by removing a large portion of their playerbase?

Now if you could read the second portion of my post, you would understand that what you're saying doesn't matter.

[Dooom]

It's a stretch to suggest that buying gil from an RMT means I'm financing account jacking. There are definitely assholes out there stealing from people and turning what they've stolen into cash. And they use RMT to fund that (hell, some RMT companies might actually be doing that, too). But you've got absolutely no proof that all RMT companies are engaged in account theft. You don't even know which previous RMT practices (fishbotting, NM monopolization, gil duping, etc) can be attributed to which companies. I bought gil years before account jacking or NM monopolization, but that's really beside the point.

Then who else might be account jacking on such a scale? Who else but RMT would be interested in doing so on such a scale? And yes, while we can't show all companies do it, it's not a stretch imo to say that some do it, and as such there's every chance that buy buying gil you (not on an individual level, but a global "you" aimed at recent gil-buyers) have been an active participant in this process (can't say for 100%, as we can't prove it, even though no doubt exists in my mind).

And I do think a sensible discussion on gil buying and selling is a good thing, rather than treating it like an unspeakable taboo and simply describing everyone involved in RMT as a monster, or do we want to keep ignoring this huge elephant in the centre of the room? I genuinely have no issue with someone like Bugpop selling his gil to help himself through tough times IRL, but when it comes to the more "organised" level of RMT monopolizing NMs and jacking accounts and making life hard on other players, that's something else entirely.

[Absolutely Virtue]

Perhaps I'm naive, but I question whether a company as large as IGE would include "omg let's steal accounts and sell the gilzz!" in their business plan. Everything I've read about the truly big, professional companies is that they're run just like a typical business. I'm not privy to any more information than anyone else, but I've just got a hunch that the account jacking is being done by a third party, who in turn sells the proceeds to companies like IGE.

You can make the argument that if they're willing to stoop low enough to break the ToS and engage in the buying and selling of gil, they're probably also willing to steal accounts. But as was pointed out earlier, even players way up on the moral high horse apparently have no problem breaking certain parts of the ToS (windower, plugins, etc).

You do raise a good point about selling accounts though. I've noticed that selling seems to be preferable to buying, as if one could exist without the other. They're both lining the pockets of the RMT companies, but selling your account is met with a shrug while buying an account usually makes you a pariah. I guess that goes back to that core idea that gil/account buyers are lazy.

I don't have as much of a bone to pick about the monster monopolization thing, but it could be that I just don't play the game that way. I've never felt there was some item or piece of gear that I just "needed" to have that RMT could have prevented me from getting. But I get what you're saying. If they could prevent me from XPing (what I enjoy most) I'd be furious. Maybe SE needs to make any toon originating from a Chinese IP address targetable and killable by players, lol.

[Mojo]

IGE doesn't actually accrue any currency, they're simply a distributor. Small companies (like the ones you hear about in China) pay people an hourly wage to collect currency in various MMOs. That currency gets purchased by distributors like IGE and MOGS and resold to players for a markup. A good portion of players also sell their currency to distributors when they quit an MMO.

Accounts are primarily bought and sold either person to person or through an account merchant. The transactions occur through places like PlayerAuctions or EGS where people create a listing for the character they plan on selling. A good chunk of currency gets sold on these websites too (for less than what retailers sell it for but more than what they buy it for,) so if you're looking to get the most out of your character when you quit or to get cheaper currency those are the places to go.

Account theft certainly ties into all of this but it's hard to say who is actually stealing accounts. Typically when an account is compromised, all of the items of value are taken and then turned into currency which is sold to a distributor. The character is usually left bare afterwards, it would be risky and difficult to try and sell an account that was recently compromised. There are companies that have people doing this on a massive scale (WoW and FFXI account phishing, etc.) as well as individuals targeting a certain demographic for their own benefit.

Some of the currency is going to end up in the hands of retailers because they have no way of knowing where the it came from. I don't think it's fair to label an entire industry based on the actions of a select few. That sort of collateral damage happens in most industries anyways, if you were to apply that same absolute logic to the rest of the world you'd be left with very little. If you're really that concerned about it, buying currency from those player to player websites is the 'cleanest' gil you'll get.

[Dooom]

Perhaps I'm naive, but I question whether a company as large as IGE would include "omg let's steal accounts and sell the gilzz!" in their business plan. Everything I've read about the truly big, professional companies is that they're run just like a typical business. I'm not privy to any more information than anyone else, but I've just got a hunch that the account jacking is being done by a third party, who in turn sells the proceeds to companies like IGE.

I agree with this, and Mojo's post backs it up too. I can't see a big company as IGE doing something so... well, pretty much illegal (please let's not go back into Phoenix Wright-isms over this, it's just old and done and boring and lame), but a third party? Yeah, I can see that happening.

selling your account is met with a shrug while buying an account usually makes you a pariah. I guess that goes back to that core idea that gil/account buyers are lazy.

I don't see much problem with someone buying an account if they know the jobs said account holds themselves (like, say, someone banned in January buys a vanilla account with their old 75s and sky/sea to save themselves all the grinding again). But if someone who never played before buys an account with multiple 75s, it's far more of a problem. This is assuming it's a player-to-player transaction (say, if the seller is quitting and needs to fund their schooling or whatever). If it's a hacked or stolen account, it's something else entirely.

[Kyreth]

I'm not gonna address everything you said, it's not worth arguing with someone who already has their mind made up and is just looking to talk shit. Nothing I say is going to have the slightest impact on what you think.

That's correct. What you've done supports breaking the game, the same as it has through the entire lifespan of FFXI.

It's a stretch to suggest that buying gil from an RMT means I'm financing account jacking. There are definitely assholes out there stealing from people and turning what they've stolen into cash. And they use RMT to fund that (hell, some RMT companies might actually be doing that, too). But you've got absolutely no proof that all RMT companies are engaged in account theft. You don't even know which previous RMT practices (fishbotting, NM monopolization, gil duping, etc) can be attributed to which companies. I bought gil years before account jacking or NM monopolization, but that's really beside the point.

RMT's have been busy monopolizing NM/HNM spawns as long as I can remember- which is to say, since the NA release at least. When you see friends getting their accounts jacked and the results going up on RMT sites, who the heck do you think is profiting from it. The tooth fairy?

Anything else is decieving yourself with self-induced bullshit. RMT's don't make money by selling you candy and fairy dust. They generate as much Gil by whatever illegal method they can (and their suppliers) get it, and when S-E came down on bots and cockblocking NM's, they swapped to smash-and-grabbing accounts till S-E had to put in the new security systems to shield folks. And they're still crawling over the game like so many cockroaches, looking for new ways to get into your piggy banks so they can sell the results.

And you gave them cold, hard cash for it. Not to say that you're a bad person, eat kittens and kill puppies for sport or anything of the like- but you -did- do something bad, selfish, and wrong because it made your life easier. We all do. The least you can do is not rationalize it for being anything less than what it is. At best, the whole RMT cycle is a necessary evil, a handy way for folks to liquidate their game stuff when it's "sell gil or don't pay the bills". It still ends up fueling the same corruptive cycle in the game, artificially inflating the game economy and encouraging people to screw others en masse. Each person that gets around things by buying into RMT just makes the whole game that much tougher for the honest folks playing FFXI straight up.

You, personally helped make my game less fun. You, and every person who buys and sells through RMT.

[Kyreth]

I agree with this, and Mojo's post backs it up too. I can't see a big company as IGE doing something so... well, pretty much illegal (please let's not go back into Phoenix Wright-isms over this, it's just old and done and boring and lame), but a third party? Yeah, I can see that happening.

It'd honestly depend on when the courts finally get their hands into a case.

If botting, account jacking, etc. is a criminal act, and the proceeds are of monetary value (as they're being RMT'ed for real money, this is quite likely the case), then IGE is acting as a money laundering operation.

I think we can all agree here that someone stealing your account, converting it's stuff into what is effectively real cash and selling it qualifies as "theft", correct?

Cops bust pawn shops and financial institutions all the time. IGE cannot possibly claim ignorance if RMT activities became real crime that their sources are frequently just that. But as right now, there is no official laws regarding theft/counterfeiting (via dupes, etc) of virtual resources...IGE and other RMT's are safe.

The second someone jacking your account becomes a criminal act that's regularly prosecuted, it's an arrow pointed at RMT's heart. At that point, they'll have to disclose where the game currency is coming from, and the "elephant in the room" will be getting much more attention.

[Flokk_9]

I do wish more people would talk about their experience buying gil, because the simple fact is that these companies exist because demand exists.

I've talked privately with friends who have also bought gil, and their experience is pretty similar. Usually they're older, and time constraints from family and jobs prevent them from spending as much time playing as they would like. A lot of people I play with know the story about me buying gil that time. Nobody has ever said anything negative to me about it.

There are plenty of people who measure their self-worth by the possessions of their videogame characters, so your epeen has got to take a hit when a dude goes out and does it the 'easy way.' But honestly, I don't really give a fuck about the opinion of anyone who takes a game, even one I dearly love, so seriously. If you flame me in Whitegate, chances are the sun will still come up tomorrow.

!

One time in spring 2004-ish I borrowed money from my noob brother to buy an hq amemet mantle. But I ended up bidding on the wrong item and losing it all. Person wouldn't give the gil back, understandably, my fault etc, not to mention I was probably drunk at the time. So rather than spend an extra month grind-farming when I also had two jobs and classes and months of scheduled grind-farming already...ended up buying a few hundred k (yeah you could buy it that way back then, lol), replaced my brother's gil and just ate the loss of my own. Was an epic setback at the time but it's a joke between us now.

People who buy gil because of real-life priorities and/or time constraints are just a tiny part of the picture. From stalking just EGS it's pretty clear that huge amounts of gil (not to mention high-$ items) are bought and sold on all servers constantly. Those buyers are the ones I want to hear from. Common denominator? My guess would be relics, either completed or in progress. And good luck getting them to out themselves.

[Hanyoko]

There are three sides to RMT
1) the seller : they are looking to turn in game gil to real cash
2) the buyer : they are looking to turn real cash into game gil
3) the middleman : they buy gil for low and sell it for high to turn a profit, there could be more then one of these in a transaction.

Often the middleman does not know where the seller got their gil, nor do they ask where it came from, most likely they dont care as long as they get what they want to fill their orders so they can turn a profit. The model is very akin to the supply chain of real world.

That is why account theft is as effective as it is, the seller gets the stuff and unloads it at no risk to themselves. Their only constraint is time and they need to fulfill their 'agreement' to have x gil at y time to receive z dollars; ideally before the powers that be at SE 'investigate' the issue.

[ringthree]

Have people completely lost the ability to make moral distinctions anymore? Seriously?

Everyone speeds and that is breaking the law, and since we all break the law, it must be OK to commit murder, right?

[Mojo]

stuff

The bulk of RMT transactions that occur are actually legitimate. Transactions that involve data theft are extremely rare. Your pawn shop example illustrates the exact problem I see with your reasoning. People sell stolen merchandise to unknowing pawn shops often, but does that warrant the condemning of every pawn shop that exists? The answer is an obvious no because the crime was committed by the thief, not the pawn shop (unless the pawn shop buys the merchandise knowing that it was stolen.)

Either way, I think you should open your mind a bit and try putting the shoe on the other foot because all I see is someone who seeks to demonize something they truly don't understand.

Also, since someone was asking, I conduct business on EGS. I'm an Authorized Service Provider there (although I'm taking a break for now) and have been involved with a good number of transactions. I've also spoken with the owners of MOGS and other distributors and discussed their business models, so I actually do know a lot about the industry.

[mackerel]

I seriously considered buying gil at one time. I hate farming and grinding, I had extra money, but I decided against it. I could have just as easily chosen the dark path. That was long before I started Sky and witnessed firsthand the grief RMT bot armies cause to real people. I remember farming sky pops for months without being able to claim Ulli even once. Every NM with a sellable drop monopolized by identical keyboard-smash-named tarutaru. It's half SE's fault for making an entire game system so easily monopolized, but the RMT really should have stuck to harmless fishbots. Everything else puts rice in their bowls at the cost of my entertainment.

[Dooom]

Considering the effect I'm told fishbots had on the price of NPCing fish - afaik, they nerfed the hell out of it - then I wouldn't call fishbots "harmless". Less harmful than other things, yes, but they still had a negative effect on legit players.

[Mojo]

Considering the effect I'm told fishbots had on the price of NPCing fish - afaik, they nerfed the hell out of it - then I wouldn't call fishbots "harmless". Less harmful than other things, yes, but they still had a negative effect on legit players.

Which was?

[Dooom]

The negative effect? Nerfing the money players got for NPCing fish, of course.

This is assuming what I told happened actually did happen, and that I'm not all just pulling this out of the air and soem half-baked memory.

[Yugl]

Have people completely lost the ability to make moral distinctions anymore? Seriously?

Everyone speeds and that is breaking the law, and since we all break the law, it must be OK to commit murder, right?

I don't speed.

[Bugpop]

Edit: I couldn't figure out for the life of me who you were replying to or if you were replying to anyone at all. I see now that your reply was to Kyreth... something about eating puppies and kittens... although I don't know for sure until you confirm but that seems to make the most sense after reading all the posts again.

Have people completely lost the ability to make moral distinctions anymore? Seriously?

Everyone speeds and that is breaking the law, and since we all break the law, it must be OK to commit murder, right?

What does RMT have to do with morality? What one considers to be moral and what is legal may be at odds. You continue to assert that RMT is against the law.


I have disagreed with your claims that it violates copyright law. There is no copyright violation because RMT does not involve unauthorized copies of intellectual property. The use of a license agreement cannot create liability for copyright infringement based on activities that do not violate the Copyright Act.

Bauer & Cie. v. O'Donnell - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It is contended in argument that the notice in this case deals with the use of the invention, because the notice states that the package is licensed 'for sale and use at a price not less than $1,' that a purchase is an acceptance of the conditions, and that all rights revert to the patentee in event of violation of the restriction... it is a perversion of terms to call the transaction in any sense a license to use the invention. The jobber from whom the appellee purchased had previously bought, at a price which must be deemed to have been satisfactory, the packages of Sanatogen afterwards sold to the appellee. The patentee had no interest in the proceeds of the subsequent sales, no right to any royalty thereon, or to participation in the profits thereof. The packages were sold with as full and complete title as any article could have when sold in the open market, excepting only the attempt to limit the sale or use when sold for not less than $1. In other words, the title transferred was full and complete, with an attempt to reserve the right to fix the price at which subsequent sales could be made... to call the sale a license to use is a mere play upon words.

As in Bobbs-Merrill Co v. Straus, 210 U.S. 339 (1908) with copyright, the court found that restrictions could not be extended beyond the statute through the use of a license. They go further by stating that calling the sale a license does not make it a license.
Bobbs-Merrill Co. v. Straus - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Katoke]

It's specifically VIOLATES the TERMS OF SERVICE, which PLAYERS AGREE TO by PLAYING THE GAME, which is punishable UNDER THE LAW. or something, idk if "UNDER THE LAW" is applicable, but it may be, as per ToS.

Edit, SE actually OWNS your character, not you, so if you do something that is in direct violation of ToS, it could be argued that you are violating SE's property, in which you'd have to be responsible for.

Edit edit, Wikipedia isn't a reliable source. College 101.

[Bugpop]

That's correct. What you've done supports breaking the game, the same as it has through the entire lifespan of FFXI.



RMT's have been busy monopolizing NM/HNM spawns as long as I can remember- which is to say, since the NA release at least. When you see friends getting their accounts jacked and the results going up on RMT sites, who the heck do you think is profiting from it. The tooth fairy?

Anything else is decieving yourself with self-induced bullshit. RMT's don't make money by selling you candy and fairy dust. They generate as much Gil by whatever illegal method they can (and their suppliers) get it, and when S-E came down on bots and cockblocking NM's, they swapped to smash-and-grabbing accounts till S-E had to put in the new security systems to shield folks. And they're still crawling over the game like so many cockroaches, looking for new ways to get into your piggy banks so they can sell the results.

And you gave them cold, hard cash for it. Not to say that you're a bad person, eat kittens and kill puppies for sport or anything of the like- but you -did- do something bad, selfish, and wrong because it made your life easier. We all do. The least you can do is not rationalize it for being anything less than what it is. At best, the whole RMT cycle is a necessary evil, a handy way for folks to liquidate their game stuff when it's "sell gil or don't pay the bills". It still ends up fueling the same corruptive cycle in the game, artificially inflating the game economy and encouraging people to screw others en masse. Each person that gets around things by buying into RMT just makes the whole game that much tougher for the honest folks playing FFXI straight up.

You, personally helped make my game less fun. You, and every person who buys and sells through RMT.

I imagine that people who purchase gil do it to make their gaming experience more enjoyable. It would be unreasonable to believe that people purchase gil to make their game less fun.

I imagine that people who use windower do so for the same reasons. It makes their gaming experience more enjoyable. It also may be said that it makes an an otherwise intolerable gaming experience, enjoyable.

[ringthree]

Edit: I couldn't figure out for the life of me who you were replying to or if you were replying to anyone at all. I see now that your reply was to Kyreth... something about eating puppies and kittens... although I don't know for sure until you confirm but that seems to make the most sense after reading all the posts again.




What does RMT have to do with morality? What one considers to be moral and what is legal may be at odds. You continue to assert that RMT is against the law.


I have disagreed with your claims that it violates copyright law. There is no copyright violation because RMT does not involve unauthorized copies of intellectual property. The use of a license agreement cannot create liability for copyright infringement based on activities that do not violate the Copyright Act.

I am not talking about copyright law at all this time. I am talking about morality, and the surprising justifications that people will use to soothe their own internal conflicts.