In an interview, the non-fiction author Edward Castronova talks about the role of digital currency in MMORPGs, real currency, and why they are essentially the same. For the professor, both are basically just play money.
In an interview with thenational, Edward Castronova, a professor of communication in Bloomington, addresses several topics that may also be of interest to MMORPG fans. For him, the currency in MMORPGs, such as World-of-Warcraft gold, is just as real or virtual as dollars, euros, or yen.
In the past, people paid with bundles of grain or livestock, but that became too cumbersome because one would always have to slaughter a cow to exchange money, Castronova jokes. But since the end of barter trading, we have increasingly distanced ourselves from a ‘real’ currency. Even gold is not valuable in itself, but only because we consider it valuable.
Especially in our current times, where everything becomes digital and more abstract, using cash or coins is actually a relic from a bygone era and will soon disappear.
Castronova became known in 2002 when he calculated that the world of Everquest, Norrath, was richer than Bulgaria and only slightly behind the economic power of Russia. This trend from a decade ago has since detached itself from MMORPGs and has intensified further.
Currently, a kind of ‘play money’ is also emerging outside of games, fantasy currencies: BitCoins or AmazonCoins. These lie outside the ‘tax system’ but are used to acquire real goods. Surely, states will soon have something against this.
All these currencies, whether BitCoin or World-of-Warcraft gold coins, are assigned a certain value. Castronova calls these currencies “WildCat” and has published a book with this title. According to Castronova, we are currently facing some upheavals in how we perceive currencies. It cannot be said at what pace these changes will occur. Sometimes such changes come slowly like falling snow, but sometimes they erupt suddenly like a volcano.
