U.S. Government online gambling ban threatens MMORPGs? |
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At long last, online legislators have succeeded in banning online gambling transactions. Online gambling operators are scurrying around for the next best place to put their stocks into, now that gambling shares have plunged. You're asking, what has this got to do with gaming? Obviously, online gambling and gaming are two different worlds, but they share something in common. MMORPGs, for example, require online transactions, in order to trade valuable items in the virtual worlds. Now, fear has spread among MMO communities, since it's likely that this legislative move by the U.S. Congress might somehow in the future affect our MMO transactions as well.
Using credit cards or online payment systems for Internet betting is now a crime. In the world of online gambling, "real money" is the equivalent of valuable items traded online in MMO games. Now, we won't fall into any political argument against this Congressional ban on online gambling transactions, but we won't feel so complacent, either. For one, MMORPGs make use of online transactions too.
In time, these politicians may jump on to the gamers and developers and threaten the industry that thrives as a form of entertainment. We like what Sony did with its Station Exchange. If all MMO operators are going to follow Sony's example with its secure handling of "real money" online transactions, there would be less reasons for the Congress to spread their claws on these games and force to regulate them. We hope.
1 Jumps Play World of Warcraft Offline
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Comments [refresh]
There's a difference between gambling and buying.
Think about it...
If they ban credit card transactions in games, then ebay should go as well. It's not gunna happen.
You guys should still be worried by all of this. While online gambling will still happen (via much less transparent means than before - mailed cash should cover it if no other method can be found), you should be worried about the Government, supported by the so-called "family values" special interest groups, will decide that MMORPGs are bad for you too (and, more realistically, money is going to companies offshore that isn't being taxed) and ban this as well.
People are not going to mail cash in the kind of numbers that it takes to keep an online gambling site afloat. If any of the MMORPG companies do business within the United States, then they are taxed on any income generated within our borders. It's too expensive for a fly-by-night company to come along and create MMORPG content cheap enough to be profitable and attract a large amount of players. While there have been efforts to limit access to certain video games (GTA and whatnot), they haven't actually been banned. Never. Plus, MMORPG's aren't the type of game that a lot of young kids are going to play (unless they're easily played on a home gaming console) enough to generate any kind of hype from any of the so-called "special interest" groups.