http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Dungeo.....-a0157144950

What is wrong with this article?


"In the beginning, there was the MUD. The first Multi User Dungeon, Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw's "MUD1," came online at the University of Essex in 1979. A text-based computer adventure game, much like the board game Dungeons & Dragons, the MUD allowed players at remote terminals to interact and play in the game's nearly 400-room virtual world--acquiring swords with which to slay dragons, and the like. It was a programming and gaming milestone.

As computers--and networks--spread and became vastly more powerful and pervasive, the idea of the MUD expanded and evolved. In 1998, the game design firm Verant Interactive created EverQuest, which it dubbed the first "Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game" or MMORPG . From the outside, EverQuest couldn't have looked more different from MUD1: Instead of text, players saw a complicated, three-dimensional, graphic version of a virtual world, and they chose an avatar to represent themselves in the activities of that world (trading, fighting, questing).

Unlike MUD1, which required expensive terminals hidden away in university computer labs, connected to gigantic main-frame computers, EverQuest could be played by almost anyone with a home computer and a modem. Also unlike MUD1, which hosted just dozens or scores of players at a time, EverQuest quickly accumulated nearly half a million players, each of whom paid an initial price for the purchase of the software and then a monthly fee of $12.95 for the privilege of slaying orcs, dragons, and other beasties in the virtual world while getting to interact with hordes of likeminded players....."

More on the link above.

I think the interesting part is the very end:

" Miller's committee began examining virtual gaming economies last October and is expected to issue a report early in 2007. And while Miller said that the committee wouldn't "[seek] to impose a new tax on virtual economies," he said that the report would clarify "what is a taxable event in a virtual world." "Congressional and IRS interest in this issue," he explained, "is simply a matter of time."

So gamers take note. The day may be approaching when, after killing an orc and slaying a dragon, you will get your 1,000 gold pieces--and a 1099 form. "

rofl, can picture that. Buying something from an NPC and having two different prices:

X Item
Price: 1 000 000 gold
Inc. VAT: 1 175 000 gold

I would think that because the law doesn't really count virtual items as actual assets though (at least the law offers no real protection over virtual assets, I don't think my local bank is going to insure my UO house to cover server crashes or going IDOC any time soon) it would be impossible; that and the sheer scale of virtual items in games like WoW just doesn't make it feasable

I don't quite understand the idea of taxing for virtual goods. In most games, it states that the goods are the property of the people who put the games out, right? So even if we earn that million gold in game, technically it isn't ours, it belongs to the game. So how can we be taxed on virtual items which are not ours to begin with?

I can understand if you are taxes from actual real money you might make from the selling of virtual goods. For instance, selling gold for real cash, you could be taxed on the cash received.

Aside from that tho, how would they figure out the taxes?
*confused as usual*

I think I'm as confused as you are Adri.... Sounds to me like just another attempt to put a damper on people having fun.... We're taxed on our internet, hardware, software, electricity to run our computers.... Leave the gaming communities alone We've all been taxed out our ears now as it is and yet we're still making the deficit go higher and higher....

Lol, to put this in perspective, since these people are all trading these goods without permission, (aside from a couple of game world exceptions), then the Congress would be setting the precedent that trade in illicit goods / services is a taxable event, thereby making it a venue for employment. Erego, making illicit profit legal.
I will send this possibility to my best bud. He is in law school and loves stuff like this.

Then under that law, they would be able to tax people who sell drugs or stolen goods.
I dunno, I think they are starting to make a tempest in a teapot. There are not tons of brokers sitting around making thousands of dollars each week. This may hurt the little guy more than anyone else in the long run.