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Let's face it. Gold farming and RMT are the bane of many players' experiences in MMOs. Bots spam poorly-spelled gold ads in every MMO title with anything even resembling an in-game economy. From a player's perspective, it's a huge problem, and not surprisingly leads many to dislike the idea of RMT. But aside from the occasional media coverage of 'digital sweatshops,' most of us know relatively little about how gold farming operations are actually run, or what effects they have on real world society.

Professor Richard Heeks from the University of Manchester has put together a substantial piece of work on gold farming. The Working Paper's abstract states Heeks' intention "to provide the first systematic analysis of the sub-sector." The paper is titled "Current Analysis and Future Research Agenda on 'Gold Farming': Real-World Production in Developing Countries for the Virtual Economies of Online Games." (Say that three times fast.) It provides an overview of gold farming followed by an in-depth analysis of its economics, sociology, enterprise, and development. In terms of development, the paper considers the benefits gold farming may create, particularly for workers in Asia. While there is a wealth of information in Heeks' work, one aspect that stands out is a question it raises: Which is more important in the grand scheme of things, socioeconomic progress for people in real life, or the enjoyment of a game?

[Via Virtual-Economy]

Well, here we are again... certain people among EVE Online's player base who buy their isk from shady sites are the focus of another dev announcement. GM Grimmi just posted the following: "We have had a number of cases recently with hacked accounts and similar issues and we have found that a lot of them are directly connected with a certain website. This website sells ISK and supposedly EVE Time Codes (ETC), though the ETCs always turn out to be faulty or already used. Players that go to this website and do business with them are running a very high risk of getting keyloggers placed on their system and subsequently having their EVE accounts hacked, and ISK and assets removed. Customer Support cannot correct damages that result from problems with the security of username and passwords. We strongly urge everyone to keep their virus protection up to date and stay away from dodgy ISK seller websites."

Here's another novel idea. Admittedly it's a radical concept and some people might not be ready for it: Play the game and stop trying to buy your way to the top. That said, the ability to legitimately buy and sell ETC is supported by CCP Games, but only from the official ETC resellers, paired with a secure system of buying/selling ETC at the EVE website. The incidents that GM Grimmi describes, as have numerous other dev blogs in the past, stem from players shelling out cash for their isk, presumably from those spam bot sites that turn up in popular channels from time to time. Standard practice with the GMs is to give the isk buyer a negative wallet balance and force him or her to claw their way back up to a positive balance; CCP bans sellers but not buyers. But perhaps this is too lenient. Do you think these players should get banned for buying isk? How does your MMO of choice handle players who try to buy their currency and gear?

When you hear the words "power leveling," which country do you usually think of? The term almost always conjures images of digital content factories in China, where teams of workers grind around the clock for the legions of gamers out there who are willing to pay to get ahead.

Power leveling and gold farming are by no means limited to China though. Other countries in Asia are seeing a marked increase in these activities as internet access becomes more ubiquitous, and of course as broadband speeds increase. PlayNoEvil points out an article from Vietnam News, which reports "game addicts with talent can now indulge in their favourite pastime and be paid up to VND 2.7 million (US$ 160) a month for doing it." PlayNoEvil notes that the salary of a power-leveler is greater than that of a teacher, who only earns between US$ 60 and US$ 100 per month.

Via PlayNoEvil

Red Herring has named Live Gamer, a virtual items trading company, as one of the top 100 privately held companies in North America in 2008. The annual Red Herring 100 North America Awards are given to companies identified as the most promising tech startups.

Love it or hate it, RMT is not going away. The virtual trading economy, which includes avatars, items and in-game currencies, is estimated to be a market worth more than USD 1.8 billion. Much of this trading takes place on the black market, exposing buyers and sellers alike to potential fraud. Live Gamer aims to remove the sketchiness from virtual item trades, enabling secure player-to-player trading while taking business away from some of the banes of the MMO world: virtual item thieves.

I know what some of you are thinking: gold for game time? That's just nuts. I'd probably have thought so myself, save that EVE Online does something like this with players buying time codes to trade for in-game ISK. That way the player who has extra in-game cash laying around can get some "free" gametime, and those who would normally buy game currency are able to do so in a fashion that appears to be more socially acceptable. The potential ramifications for the unethical/unapproved RMT dealers could be huge. Why buy gold from them when you can buy it from another player with the game company's blessing, and know for absolute sure that you'll actually get the in-game cash.

With all that said, what do you think? Do you think that a game like World of Warcraft could benefit from the in-game cash for time-codes system that CCP has in place for EVE? If you could get playtime for cashing out game currency, would you do it? If companies offered the chance for players get in-game currency for a time-code they purchase to trade to another player, do you think it might stop those who normally would just buy from a gold farmer?

Timmy is sick and tired of lagging behind his friends and guild-mates, all because of his inferior flying mount. He decides to purchase some gold with real money and buy his epic mount. Timmy thinks to himself, "It doesn't really hurt anyone, does it?" The answer to that question is, "Yes Timmy, it does". The European World of Warcraft site has listed a gold-selling FAQ that aims to educate players like Timmy on some of the consequences of purchasing products and services from a gold-selling company.

The site lists the obvious stuff, like spammers and bots, which both annoy people and take up Blizzard resources that could be put to better use, but the article also brings up some things that aren't always mentioned. Much of the gold that these companies trade in comes from hacked accounts, and many accounts are hacked after the owner enlists the aid of a power-leveling service. When the companies have access to the account, the unfortunate victim may also find their personal details being used for identity theft and credit card fraud. The bottom line is, without people using these services, the companies could not continue to operate. We here at Massively are also vehemently opposed to gold-selling, and agree wholeheartedly with Blizzard's message. Just say no, Timmy.

"Do you annoy not afford new ship?" Anyone that has played Pirates of the Burning Sea since launch will have received countless private messages similar to the above, soliciting the sale of in-game currency. The latest devlog from the official PotBS site talks about how they are working to combat the spamming -- well, they tell us what they can, because if we can read it, so can the spammers.

Some extremely good news is that a new command is on the way that will make reporting spammers a breeze. Currently players have to leave the game or alt-tab out to condemn these nuisances, but those days will soon be over. The process for Flying Lab Software to actually receive and act on these reports is being streamlined as well. Behind the scenes, they say that they are looking at better ways to catch the spammers before they even get to spam, but as per the above reason, don't expect these methods to be made public. FLS has attemped to deal with this problem from the very start, and it looks like the beginning of round two is on the horizon.

There you are zipping around Paragon City looking for a criminal skull or two to bust when suddenly a "hero" (or villain if you're playing CoV) named "jlaksjdflakd" clad in pink spandex and green skin suddenly pops into your peripheral. No, it's not a small childlike noob entering the city for the first time. It's something far, far worse. It's... the attack of the bottom feeding, scum sucking gold farmer!!

We've all had similar experiences. No MMO is immune to these ne'er-do-wells. But the CoX universe has remained relatively unscathed. Until now. Thankfully, gamers don't have to take this laying down... and neither do the developers. In fact, they're fighting back. W00t Studios head honcho Jester just began a recurring feature called The Fight Against Spam. The series will highlight the valiant efforts of various game developers as they fight the good fight against the nefarious Real Money Traders (RMT).

This first entry highlights what NCsoft has done to hinder spammers in CoX. Several months ago they implemented the "/ignore_spammer" command which lets players ignore (and automatically report to the GM's) a would be trouble maker. Once several reports against the same account are logged, they're banned. The tide of battle seems to have swung in their favor, but the supergroup at NCsoft isn't resting on their laurels. As of yesterday the in-game mail system has been drastically restricted. Now players under level 12 no longer have mail privileges, forcing these malevolent miscreants to their knees by making them do some leveling work of their own. Granted, it may only slow them down... but it's a giant step in the right direction.