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Investing in a LA

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Zingking

Guardian
Joined
Oct 1, 2009
Posts
231
I was thinking of buying an LA so it could be purely a mining LA, no threat of animals killing you an d what not.

But the fact I don't have the in game cash, or the real cash (since I got into a near fatal motorcycle accident not long ago) set me back.

I was thinking of making a LA into a almost stock, where I would put up a number of stocks for sale, each being a % of its value, so that I and a group of people can own it.

The stock holders will be open to events ect on the LA, and will get what ever taxes split amoung them.

Someone can always buy out another stock holder if they wanted, and it would all be managed by the one managing the stock.

I don't know if its been thought of, but it sounds cool to me :D
 
How do you plan to guarantee u dont just keep the ped and run away ?

No offense but that is prolly a question most people are going to ask and if u cant offer a good response then i doubt anyone will give you $ w/o some kind of guarantee.

GL with your venture in any case
 
well in the real world, how do you prevent stocks from taking your money?

what I would do is make it public everytime someone buy a stock, aka put the transaction slips on the website for the stock. I would also talk to the EU people to back me up, and give them full right to delete my account if any fraud is being committed.

i would basically be transparent, letting all transactions be seen so there can be no fraud
 
A stock dropping in value is not the same as my broker taking my $ and running off with it.

Making it public makes no difference u can still just run off with the $ is my point.

Would u let me hold the deed w/o giving u something of equal value as collaterall ?

If you want to do this you are going to need to have some way to prove u wont run off - because it has happened many times in EU already.
 
well I wouldnt have the money because it would be in the LA, and I know I can think of any precautions to stop me from doing it, but as a business man, I wouldnt do it, I have run events for people who have relied on my with there money. And I can make more money being an honest business man and getting more business because of being trusted then i can from a single scam
 
That's hardly a "prove" U won't run of... I would be surprised if anyone ventures with U, even if U are sincere.
People who own stocks need to see profit,... if there's none how do U repay their money? How do they sell their virtual-virtual stock to someone else as there is nothing ?
I would go on to another idea if I were U :(
 
Zingking said:
I don't know if its been thought of, but it sounds cool to me :D
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It's been thought of... not sure how it worked out...

In general, I'd point out, however, that the game really doesn't recognize collective property.

because of this, you'd either need some form of legal safeguards or an amazing in game reputation for people to trust you with they're money...

another thing to consider is whether the tax on a mining only area would be high enough for potential "investors" to realize any tangible benefit.
 
Dont trust in nobody is a advice for a some years playing...
Take your time and do that alone :p
 
Zingking said:
well in the real world, how do you prevent stocks from taking your money?
Click to expand...

Quite simpy we have a system caled "the law" that covers our asses IRL. To be allowed to have stock transactions you have to be registered and have rules and regulations to follow.

Zingking said:
what I would do is make it public everytime someone buy a stock, aka put the transaction slips on the website for the stock.
Click to expand...

Putting information upp on a webbsite = bugger all, you can lie, cheat and call yourself millie Vanilly if you want. Just because its on the internet doesn't make it true.

Zingking said:
I would also talk to the EU people to back me up, and give them full right to delete my account if any fraud is being committed.
Click to expand...

First of all, MA has made it clear that all transactions in EU are final and they will not get involved.
Second, It isn't much consolation to a person who has invested thousands of dollars that MA locks your account (which you have emptied if you are scamming) since you wont get shit back anyway.

Zingking said:
i would basically be transparent, letting all transactions be seen so there can be no fraud
Click to expand...

Ony way for you to be transparent in this is if you turn to glass.

Sorry but i can guarantee you that you will not find enough people stupid enough to give you their money to buy a LA unless you know them all personaly or can give them some collateral.
 
Ive seen some negative responses in this thread, I would think the idea in it self is a good one. But as stated there is the question about trust, the best possible condition to be able to pull this through would be from having society members( or friends) youd play a long time with and noticed that these people wouldn't(atleast 99% sure, can never be 100% I guess)steal or decieve you.

Im not aware of much other options atm, maybe a contract of some sort, electronical one. Will try to think off more ideas, anyway hope things work out.
 
not going to happen.
Waay too many scammers arround... even if you or your potential investors are no scammers you won`t get the trust anyway.
 
have to agree with everyone else, its not going to happen.

altho the idea is good and i'm sure its been done before, it would only work if your investors were friends who knew you well. there are too many people in the world who wouldn't think twice about lying for a few thousand dollars, hell even people with good reps. if i was a lying cheating possibly poor scumbag and have played EU for awhile, even built up a good rep, and then decided to quit EU... this is the way i would do it =P
 
The only way I could see something like this working is that you would in fact have to open a real life incorporated business. Vote members into your board which should be consisted of well known long time and trusted players of the Entropia Universe. Money would have to be divided up between the board members to hold a % of it until the goal was reached and then 1 highly trusted elected member of the board would purchase the Land Area. Afterwards the land area deed would then change hands to another board member each month.

Daily profits would have to be screen shot and kept up on a website for public viewing just like a real incorporation. At the end of each month dividends would then be given out to the investors of the land area by the members of the board.

not a perfect plan but the only way I can think of to make it more legitimate is to break the money up into several players hands and run it through a real life business that can be held accountable.
 
The only way I could see something like this working is that you would in fact have to open a real life incorporated business. Vote members into your board which should be consisted of well known long time and trusted players of the Entropia Universe. Money would have to be divided up between the board members to hold a % of it until the goal was reached and then 1 highly trusted elected member of the board would purchase the Land Area. Afterwards the land area deed would then change hands to another board member each month.

Daily profits would have to be screen shot and kept up on a website for public viewing just like a real incorporation. At the end of each month dividends would then be given out to the investors of the land area by the members of the board.

not a perfect plan but the only way I can think of to make it more legitimate is to break the money up into several players hands and run it through a real life business that can be held accountable.
Click to expand...

The question is if that would make the business accountable ?
A estate deed is a virtual item in the Entropian universe and if it is traded the trade should be considered final what law would keep one from running of with it?

It cannot be fraud since the Entropia rules state against that.

Other than that its a great concept but Entropia right now is not the platform to do it on.

Zweshi
 
Well for now I guess the only way is to trust someone, but I will keep thinkin of ways it can be done so the not so trusting person can participate too:yay:
 
Safest way to go about this sort of thing would be to sign real life contracts with the real life players of avatars in Entropia, and borrow real life money from them. Then deposit said money, buy a LA, make a profit, then withdraw the funds from Entropia and pay the people back in RL money.

This way the law is on their side, and if you are truly just interested in trying to invest in a LA, all is well and good. If you some how don't live up to your side of the bargain, then they can come after you IRL to get their money back, in a real courtroom.
 
As long as there is no shared property and/or contract system provided within the game this is not a secure idea.
The only thing you could make it secure with is if you find a way that is legal within your country like founding a company and having the shareholders have their investments noted as business assets.
Much too much work to do it this way probably and also not really 100% secure...
 
melander said:
The question is if that would make the business accountable ?
A estate deed is a virtual item in the Entropian universe and if it is traded the trade should be considered final what law would keep one from running of with it?

It cannot be fraud since the Entropia rules state against that.

Other than that its a great concept but Entropia right now is not the platform to do it on.

Zweshi
Click to expand...

Actually you are right on the virtual item... was only trying to think of a legal way it "might" work out. over all there is not enough transparency between the virtual world and the real world to make something like this come true. That is why investing is only going to be done by close real life friends that have probably been friends long before playing EU.

Trust is always an issue between people but most countries do support some kind of legal documentation that outlines he/she agrees to do ABC and if not can be held accountable in a court of law.

personally I agree with some of the other comments that this way more of an ordeal then worth the effort.
 
It is not as easy as it sounds mate, I was part of a large group who pitched in with Star to place a bid on CP when it was on auction. Star went to great lengths working with eternies etc to put together contracts etc to make it all legitimate, there were also policies put in place to have a special management avatar in case of the death of the holder of the deed etc. Not to mention keeping tax systems in different countries happy.

If you are really serious about it you will need to put in a lot of leg work first.

GL
 
1) Its hard to gather money based only on trust
2) I recently appraised value of an average DNA-less LA to ~5000$ yet noone sells for that much making it hardly a good investment
3) If you really wanna have some fun with being a LA owner despite its unreasonable price - take out your revolving MC, charge it for 10ish K $ and pay 350$ / month over 36 months... easy peasy. Youll prolly make 100ish $ / mo and EU maybe wont go bankrupt / do significant changes to system in 3 years.

Regards

I.
 
This has been done before and will be done again. You have to have a great in depth knowledge of how the game works to be able to make a success of this sort of venture. I have often considered trying to get investors together myself to invest in a Land Area but then thought better of it. It would be a massive undertaking and a lot of hard work to get enough peds together to buy a LA let alone run one.

I must admit i wouldn't personally invest any peds with you because of what you wrote in the first post in this thread. However, my advice would be first of all analyse the current market prices for Land Areas and then put together a proposal for would be investors.
 
Zingking said:
OK. but you dont actually think they'll go bankrupt in 3 years?
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Mate, this community would rip my head off if I said "I do".

But dont forget this is a - computer game hanging by a thin thread, with serious financing issues.

I dont say theyll go bankrupt, but significant changes may occur.

Another thing to take into consideration: this game is gambling based with tendency to be declared one. If they were their taxes would go seriously up and they would lose US market in an instant. That WOULD mean instant death and bankruptcy for sure.

Im just saying these are serious risks. Investing into overpriced virtual property run by a company working in deep grey zone and fat negative number on their cashflow statement.

;)

I.

P.S.

Ofc dont listen to me if running LA is just fun for you and you can afford it.
 
The idea is perfect, but it wont work.

Reason to this is that MA does nothing to guarantee our safety from scams etc. The more people involved the bigger the chance of one being scammer.

Mindark should really publish a statement about financial things and whats their approach to scams etc.


As I said, if it were safe it would work, but its not.
 
Gabmlers vs Investors

Your idea is sound, but until MA changes Estates so there can be more than just one owner, the only binding contract is Trust. That being said, the "investment" is more of a gamble, there are too many thing that can go wrong vs. any sure things.

1) MA holds all the cards, they can make the deed worthless just by creating more LA's or Worlds that players get spread so thin that very few LA's are profitable.

2) An LA that was worth 300K last year is now only worth 150K this year and will be worth less next year as well. There is nothing on the horizon to show that the value of LA's will ever recover to their highs. I saw the same thing happen with Shops, I owned 3 of them. I still have 2 and the first one I bought was 30K, im lucky if its worth 15K today. Again there is nothing on the horizon to indicate they will ever recover to their highs.

3) MA can go bankrupt tomorrow and you have nothing. Even if you had some legal recourse for recovery, you can't make blood out of a turnip. Anything that is liquified is going to get spread to all the legitimate businesses IRL that MA owes money to first and even that is going to be pennies on the dollar.

So, in order to make a joint LA ownership work well there would have to be some major changes ingame. Other than that, the only way is to find 10 welthy friends who would trust you with their money, also knowing they are taking a big risk and could loose it all in this virtual world.

Good Luck.
 
I will just say the first thing you need to do is stop thinking you can make money from this game. If you like playing the game then by all means deposit some of your entertainment budget because for 98% of the people here that is all it is ever going to be is entertainment. If you do find a way to earn after playing for a while then you won't need anyone to invest with you anyway.
 
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