Seek, share, or withhold: information trading in MMORPGs

Information is one of the main types of vessels of value and target of economic transactions, coordination and production. With the advent of modern information and communication technologies (ICTs), information naturally has a more prominent and seemingly complex role in the economy. But what might be the most dramatic shift in the role of information in economic exchange is the intrinsic value of information goods, ranging from virtual items to digital music (Hamari, 2013; Lehdonvirta and Castronova, 2014). That is, information goods are increasingly the products that people pursue as the end products rather using them merely for coordinating other economics activities. In this article, we discuss the way in which information is such a valuable economic good in the context of online games (particularly MMORPGs or Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games – games that) and other persistent, virtual worlds. With virtual worlds, we (following Castronova, 2005, p. 11), mean expansive, world-like, large-group environments made by humans, for humans, and which are maintained, recorded, and rendered by computers. They are constructed, semi-separate realities that exist within what is commonly called the real world, stay active even when a player is not engaging with them, and can be contrasted with the real world.