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“He began calculating frantically. He gathered data on 616 auctions, observing how much each item sold for in US dollars. When he averaged the results, he was stunned to discover that the EverQuest platinum piece was worth about one cent US—higher than the Japanese yen or the Italian lira. With that information, he could figure out how fast the EverQuest economy was growing. Since players were killing monsters or skinning bunnies every day, they were, in effect, creating wealth. Crunching more numbers, Castronova found that the average player was generating 319 platinum pieces each hour he or she was in the game—the equivalent of $3.42 (US) per hour. “That’s higher than the minimum wage in most countries,” he marvelled.
Then he performed one final analysis: the Gross National Product of EverQuest, measured by how much wealth all the players together created in a single year inside the game. It turned out to be $2,266 per capita. By World Bank rankings, that made EverQuest richer than India, Bulgaria, or China, and nearly as wealthy as Russia.
It was the seventy-seventh richest country in the world. And it didn’t even exist.
Castronova sat back in his chair in his cramped home office, and the weird enormity of his findings dawned on him. Many economists define their careers by studying a country. He had discovered one.”
View the complete article here.
Original article located at http://www.walrusmagazine.com/articles/2004.06-economics-game-theories/1/.
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Slowly, we descended, and bit by bit, my head gradually sank beneath the sea. I breathed in deeply and soon the underwater realm was an orchestra of inhaling and exhaling.Soon, the orchestra was further enhanced by the sounds of hammers, chisels and hacksaws as we proceeded to devour the ship. My [...]
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And so last Thursday we gathered a party of about twelve divers and two dive boats and shot off from the Sharjah coast.After 30 minutes of bouncing on the sea surface, we arrived at the dive site. The water was crystal clear and the wreck could be seen from the surface.
‘Anchor away!’ came [...]
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14 miles off the Sharjah coast there is a ship that sank not more than 3 weeks ago. Under 20 metres of water it lies on its side on the sandy seabed – The Mariam Express.An ex-cargo vessel, the Mariam Express (previously called the Delos Express) was used as a ship-on [...]
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It has come to my attention that nearly 3/4 of male users on hi5 are, in fact, a bunch of drooling, desperate perverts who actually believe that women enjoy receiving messages relating to the size of their penis from complete strangers.Well, they do. But only because it’s so bloody funny.
Here is [...]
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I now know why God put us on this Earth…To experience events such as Desert Rock, Dubai’s annual rock fest, where famous metal/rock bands from all over the world gather in, literally, the middle of the desert, to deliver a whole day and night of body-pounding, heart-wrenching, adrenaline-pumping, and ear-splitting music.Picture, [...]
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The Phillips Jazz Festival is an annual event, lasting three nights, which has been taking place in Dubai for the past three years.Out of lack of anything else to do, I went with a few friends this year. I had severely underestimated how great a time could be had.
I went there on [...]
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Having lived in the UAE for nearly 14 years now, it has suddenly dawned upon me that I have, in fact, been living those 14 years in a dark cave.All this time, I have viewed the UAE as the pinnacle of living simply because I had nothing else to compare it to.
The [...]
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Slowly, one by one, the rest of the campers emerged from their tents. We had cereal with milk for breakfast and near the afternoon, Brian decided to do a bit of dune bashing.We all hopped onto his Isuzu pick-up (I sat in the back trunk of the pick-up with two others and [...]
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The festivities that night were awesome. We all got completely plastered on some vodka/fruit juice concoction home-brewed by a South African bloke named Brian. Rani brought his guitar along and we proceeded to break into song. Bruce Springsteen – Streets of Philadelphia, Don McLean – American Pie, Bob Marley – No [...]
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I’ve just come back from the desert of the UAE. My clothes stink of sweat and alcohol and barbequed meat, I’ve got dirt and grime all over my face, and, of course, there is sand in every place imaginable. I’ve got a few minor cuts and bruises to serve as evidence of [...]
