Menu
What's New
By:
Filters

CNN:'Entropia Universe' opens virtual pawnshops

craw

craw

Provider
Joined
Aug 3, 2006
Posts
124
Location
South Florida, USA
Society
Fiend Without A Face
Avatar Name
Themodius Craw
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/fun.games/05/11/virtual.pawnshops.ap/index.html

'Entropia Universe' opens virtual pawnshops
POSTED: 10:44 a.m. EDT, May 11, 2007

Story Highlights
• Online game "Entropia Universe" sells pawnshop licenses
• Licenses sold for a total of $404,000
• Pawned items: Virtual laser rifles and bionic implant chips
• "Entropia Universe" currency is convertible to U.S. dollars

NEW YORK (AP) -- Online games give players roles like warriors, space explorers and wizards. Now, there's an exciting new profession: pawnbroker.

"Entropia Universe," a science-fiction game whose currency is convertible to real-world U.S. dollars at a fixed 10-1 ratio, said this week that five pawnshops will make real loans to people who turn in virtual items like laser rifles and bionic implant chips.

The pawnshop licenses sold for a total of $404,000, according to the Swedish company behind the game, MindArk PE AB, and the holders may be able to extend their services to function like banks, potentially boosting the game's economic vitality and sophistication.

"It's just like the construction business in the real world -- none of that would happen without banks," said Jon "Neverdie" Jacobs, who with a business partner paid $90,000 for a license to create a "Gamer's Bank."

Jacobs, who already runs a hunting and entertainment resort that pulls in as much as $20,000 a month in revenue, said players have a lot of money tied up in hunting and mining equipment, and the pawnshops will free up that capital.

Another license winner was Anshe Chung, the online persona of Ailin Graef, a Chinese-born woman who created a minor fortune trading real-estate in "Second Life," another virtual world. The other winners were a German Internet bank, a Russian payment processor and an unnamed private investor.

Last year, a player set up a bank in another science fiction game, EVE Online, but that one was unsupported and unregulated by the game's operator, CCP hf of Iceland. The player tried to abscond with the deposits, but CCP froze his account before he could sell them for "real" money, CCP spokesman Magnus Bergsson said.

Unlike Entropia, EVE does not allow conversion of the in-game currency to cash. The deposits would have been worth between $140,000 and $170,000 on the black market, Bergsson said.
Click to expand...
 
its how i se it to a pawnshops nothing more or less i cant se eny rely banking ther can do in it
 
This is a very bad thing. The banks, which have potential to be more than a pawn shop, are now being labeled as pawn shops by the press.

Pawnshops are negative press in my eyes.
 
There is no such thing as bad press... Even if MA employees killed 200 baby seals and got on CNN it would be good press... Now I am not saying I know of any baby seal killings :rolleyes:

baby_seal_picture_T3526_380416.jpg
 
Last edited:
major-rage said:
There is no such thing as bad press... Even if MA employees killed 200 baby seals and got on CNN it would be good press... Now I am not saying I know of any baby seal killings :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I'm not so sure... I've noticed a serious reduction of the Mermoth Young population lately... :D
 
Angel of Death said:
are now being labeled as pawn shops by the press. Pawnshops are negative press in my eyes.
Click to expand...

But isnt that exactly what they are? Pawnshops?
From what i read they will be that :rolleyes:
 
maybe its because THEY ARE PAWNSHOPS ?
 
SB2 said:
I'm not so sure... I've noticed a serious reduction of the Mermoth Young population lately... :D
Click to expand...

:laugh:

Nice to see NEVERDIE get more media attention. He's our ambassador. The news generated when he bought The Rock is how I joined.
 
JackFlask said:
:laugh:

Nice to see NEVERDIE get more media attention. He's our ambassador. The news generated when he bought The Rock is how I joined.
Click to expand...

I can think of about 4 Warants that like to commercialize..
I'll give you +rep if you name them all ;)
 
As long as the items gets stored in the bank, instead of deed for the items beeing made, they are pawnshops, not banks, Have you ever heard of a bank storing your house in a vault until your done with the downpayent ????
 
Angel of Death said:
This is a very bad thing. The banks, which have potential to be more than a pawn shop, are now being labeled as pawn shops by the press.

Pawnshops are negative press in my eyes.
Click to expand...

I completely disagree that "this is a very bad thing." Any major news story on CNN.com is a HUGE coup for MA/EU, unless it is talking about the complete collapse of the economy or a MA bankruptcy. I joined in the fall of 2005 after reading the CND $100k story on CNN, and am absolutely certain that EU will gain many new, quality participants as the result of this story. Though "pawn shop" may have a negative connotation IRL, in VL it is still somewhat of an intriguing concept, and the story did not have a negative tone.

Sure, MA could have done more to distance their banking initiative from the "pawnshop" moniker, but so far, I still rate it a great success as far as its potential to bring growth to EU.
 
I've said it before, and I'll say it again, as the banks have been looked at as pawnshops since they were announced, there is still the potential to create something else out of it. If I had the cash, I would have invested in one as the potential to make a lot of profit off a virtual bank is extremely enticing.

Let me clarify my thoughts a little bit without divulging too much info.

Regardless of what the primary function of a bank is currently, it's a business, right? There are currently 5 banks, all of which will be competing for clients, we, the citizens of Calypso. In order for the citizens to choose which bank is best for them to use, there has to be some incentives put into place.

If I owned one, I would not be looking at the bank as a pure 100% profit making machine to bring in buko bucks to my bank account. I would place an offer to Entropians to entice them to use my bank. Loan out money, with collateral and an interest rate would obviously be first and foremost. The pawnshop process. But the purpose of a citizen using a bank is as follows:

If I take out a certificate of deposit at a bank in real life, I am effectively issuing a loan to the bank for a percentage back when the loan matures. I goto my local bank and say "I would like to purchase a CD for 100PED and I see that your current interest rate is 2.5%. After 3 weeks (or whatever the bank specifies) the loan will mature and I will get back 102.50PED."

I have effectively let the bank use my 100 ped to invest into something, and I made a profit.

How can this translate? The banks have to have 1M PED liquid. Currently my modest skills TT value is somewhere in the range of 5000 PED. That's only 200 entropia accounts value for skills alone. That 1M PED isn't going to last that long if it takes off, so the bank is going to need more money to invest in the loan system.



At this point I'm just finishing off a 16 hour work day so my words may be garbled. If you're curious about something and would like me to clarify my beliefs, feel free to PM me. I still feel that, even though the CNN/AP article was not written with a negative tone, I still feel that it could be percieved as negative press based on the conception of pawnshop. Just remember that everyone is entitled to an opinion. Thanks for your time, if you've read everything I've had to say.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top