Minecraft server with an economy plugin reveals truths about what unregulated capitalism holds for t - Polidicks

[QUOTE]Maz collaborated with three other super-rich players, fixing markets to get incredibly wealthy off the back of the server's miners, without having to lift a pickaxe. Eventually she was able to freewheel on competing markets, dealing only with resellers to buy and sell raw materials back and forth, somehow notching stupendous profits for simply moving blocks of rock from one chest to another. Her methods, she notes, were exactly the same as those employed by vast financial services such as Goldman Sachs.[/QUOTE] [URL]http://www.theverge.com/2014/12/4/7331359/capitalism-problems-as-explained-by-minecraft-hedge-fund-manager[/URL] read the entire twitter stream here, interesting as hell stuff: [URL]https://storify.com/JohnOfBrindle/the-great-minecraft-crash-and-the-women-who[/URL]

I reaaally hate to say this buuuut This is about as "truth revealing" about capitalism as Eve Online's clans are "truth revealing" about radicalism and terrorism

same thing happens in WoW only the idiots on wallstreet and washington DC don't seem to understand this or worse, do understand and collude with it to enrich themselves [editline]4th December 2014[/editline] still in minecraft, whats the point amassing so much wealth on an iconomy server without using all of it on grand works such as making massive cathedrals with lava-filled lakes all around them and gates made out of cast obsidian and diamond blocks adorning every wall

I say keep regulations for another 50 years, then drop them. Just long enough to phase out the last of those who would think only of profit and not their employee conditions, then we can have unregulated capitalism without all the dangers of profiteers.

I mean fuck I don't think unregulated capitalism is a terribly great plan either, but this isn't exactly "truth revealing" or even all that newsworthy for that matter. [QUOTE=Megadave;46640298]I say keep regulations for another 50 years, then drop them. Just long enough to phase out the last of those who would think only of profit and not their employee conditions, then we can have unregulated capitalism without all the dangers of profiteers.[/QUOTE] You realize that those kinds of people aren't just going to magically disappear with this generation, right?

Maybe my title sounds a bit sensationalist. I don't really *mean* we're headed that way, Real life economies have waaay more regulations than this MC server does, but what I think it's the valuable takeaway from this experiment is that capitalist economies *need* regulations, or else everything is going to go to hell. My favorite part of this is: [QUOTE]Libertarians complain that regulating financial markets "stifles growth" and it's a mistake to argue this because they're 100% right. In fact, *that's the entire point*. You flatten the curve. The peaks aren't as high, so the wells aren't so dreadfully deep[/QUOTE] also yes I am aware this isn't exactly news, It's an interesting read at best posted on a news site.

A bug caused an ingame economy to crash? Well no shit, I remember when Runescapes economy crashed every few weeks. Also it seems odd to use this as a model for the real world when the real economy is vastly more complex and much larger.

Who would have thought that an unregulated system with little in the way of cheques and balances was going to be abused by those who established it...

[QUOTE=Megadave;46640298]I say keep regulations for another 50 years, then drop them. Just long enough to phase out the last of those who would think only of profit and not their employee conditions, then we can have unregulated capitalism without all the dangers of profiteers.[/QUOTE] Profiteering is literally the point of capitalism though

I don't think the capitalism principle relies on bankers printing infinite money

It's not a problem of Capitalism, it's a problem of missing information and coordination between actors, not exclusive of capitalism... People pls

This article is just a very big stupid snipe at capitalism.

Clicking the source to see tweets lol like the title didn't have my skeptical as hell already. If you haven't joined a minecraft faction + economy server with a bunch a friends and destroyed its economy and ruling structure then you have missed the best part of the game. Nothing made this easier than when pistons first came out and you could build a machine to duplicate hundred of diamond blocks. Magic ruined minecraft for me though because if you farm up xp and potions (aka donate to the server owner) you can become nearly invincible, and faction servers basically became pay2win. But yea fiat currency in a video game is like the furthest you can get from reality.

Almost everyone who abides and studies the capitalist theory understands this. One thing though... Unregulated capitalism does not exist. Capitalism needs a spice of socialism to work, and socialism needs capitalism to keep people in line.

[QUOTE=Sableye;46640260]same thing happens in WoW only the idiots on wallstreet and washington DC don't seem to understand this or worse, do understand and collude with it to enrich themselves [editline]4th December 2014[/editline] still in minecraft, whats the point amassing so much wealth on an iconomy server without using all of it on grand works such as making massive cathedrals with lava-filled lakes all around them and gates made out of cast obsidian and diamond blocks adorning every wall[/QUOTE] If you read some of the tweets you would see that the end goal would be to make a giant extravagant looking city.

reminds me of the old MC server I used to be big in where I owned 2/3 or more of all the money on the server and I crashed the economy. I then had to spend all my money on every shop to get the RP flowing again

Of course, the main problem is that you can't cause the communist revolution on the server without getting banned for griefing.

[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;46640798]Almost everyone who abides and studies the capitalist theory understands this. One thing though... Unregulated capitalism does not exist. Capitalism needs a spice of socialism to work, and socialism needs capitalism to keep people in line.[/QUOTE] Statism != Socialism And rather, than work, I would say....keep existing....

[QUOTE=Megadave;46640298]I say keep regulations for another 50 years, then drop them. Just long enough to phase out the last of those who would think only of profit and not their employee conditions, then we can have unregulated capitalism without all the dangers of profiteers.[/QUOTE] The whole method capitalism uses is to leverage economic inequality in a way that large opportunities can be created. The problem is that only some people get access to these opportunities, and they are the people who have the resources required to exploit them. Those resources include time, education, and the ever important [I]capital[/I]. Less regulation usually causes less people to have access to opportunity, but those that do can exploit it even further. Whether that sacrifice is worth it is really the whole point of the capitalism/socialism debate. What we do know, because we've seen it, is that if you let capitalism run amok, a few people end up with everything and everyone else ends up with nothing. Unlike what "free market" experts will tell you, there is no natural balancing act that counters this: in fact this is really the inevitable effect of deregulation. Basically, instead of a government or dictator owning you, a corporation does instead. I fail to see how that is an improvement.

breaking news: video-game with non-existent economy system used to predict complex economic situations in real life. you know what else i can deduce from this article using the same logic? that if i work hard I can get to the very very top, just like spending hours mining in game!

in runescape they limit the quantity of items you can buy at a time to certain #s of 1000s so that merchant clans cant manipulate prices and trigger a mass sale/panic. they use a buying/selling system that basically turns items into redeemable stock that goes through an exchange. also kids in sandlot beating the rival baseball team is a metaphor for the proletariat overcoming the bourgeois

[QUOTE=FlakAttack;46641822]The whole method capitalism uses is to leverage economic inequality in a way that large opportunities can be created. The problem is that only some people get access to these opportunities, and they are the people who have the resources required to exploit them. Those resources include time, education, and the ever important [I]capital[/I]. Less regulation usually causes less people to have access to opportunity, but those that do can exploit it even further. Whether that sacrifice is worth it is really the whole point of the capitalism/socialism debate. What we do know, because we've seen it, is that if you let capitalism run amok, a few people end up with everything and everyone else ends up with nothing. Unlike what "free market" experts will tell you, there is no natural balancing act that counters this: in fact this is really the inevitable effect of deregulation. Basically, instead of a government or dictator owning you, a corporation does instead. [B]I fail to see how that is an improvement.[/B][/QUOTE] it isn't, but most people are either too stupid or too uneducated to realize it, which is unsurprisingly considering that this is something unregulated capitalism(and in general too tbh) also causes(and actually defended by a few of the earliest liberal thinkers(some more recent too), like bernard mandeville who said it would be best that the masses should be kept stupid, to make them easier to control). the only thing that keeps capitalism from becoming too horrible, is the whole chaotic nature of it, which gives it an impression of being fair for the average person.

[QUOTE=Deng;46640367]A bug caused an ingame economy to crash? Well no shit, I remember when Runescapes economy crashed every few weeks. Also it seems odd to use this as a model for the real world when the real economy is vastly more complex and much larger.[/QUOTE] Well the economy crashes every 6-10 years irl so maybe its not such a bad model albeit rudimentary.

[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;46643106]Well the economy crashes every 6-10 years irl so maybe its not such a bad model albeit rudimentary.[/QUOTE] Runescape is better than Minecraft for simulating an economy, but it's not entirely great. You can literally create your own money in runescape, and resources are effectively infinite.

[QUOTE=Sableye;46640260] still in minecraft, whats the point amassing so much wealth on an iconomy server without using all of it on grand works such as making massive cathedrals with lava-filled lakes all around them and gates made out of cast obsidian and diamond blocks adorning every wall[/QUOTE] What's the point of amassing ridiculous amounts of wealth in real life? Hoarding is a mental illness. I really dislike the movie/documentary Zeitgeist, but one sketch really stuck with me. [video=youtube;kSAVN-nYSLI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSAVN-nYSLI[/video]

[QUOTE=Deng;46643917]Runescape is better than Minecraft for simulating an economy, but it's not entirely great. You can literally create your own money in runescape, and resources are effectively infinite.[/QUOTE] Runescapes inflation is only kept in check artificially via money sinks. People with bots could pump 1000s (or 1000000s) into the economy daily. They try to counter it by making people pay for repairing stuff and/or buying ingredients but then offset it by offering seemingly random drops/rewards of 10000s of gold. For the final nail in the coffin the currency will always have certain bounds on it since no matter how much people bot or how much is taken out of the economy most of the items people use/need are buyable from stores for a fixed amount and items will never drop in price to 0 because most have an alch price letting you turn an item into more money, this means the money gets value from game mechanic rather than trust/debt/usage/stock backing it up. </nerd mode> I think the above things means it is a bad simulator for fiat currency and so is a bad simulator for real life economy. Guildwars might be slightly better with ectos, since the armour they produce is purely visual without any bonus stats and the value is almost entirely player defined. The devs did step in at times to make them rarer or easier to gather. Minecraft is moddable so people could do what they like. The low population limit is the only hindrance stopping people from modding in a realistic economy. I guess that could be tackled with some external database tracking players across servers or something. Do you know of any other games with an interest economy system, ideally something where values for everything are decided by the players using it.

thing is though they may have hoarded all this money but they couldn't do anything with it. nothing is really valuable enough in minecraft that you have to buy it from other players

[QUOTE=papaya;46644118]thing is though they may have hoarded all this money but they couldn't do anything with it. nothing is really valuable enough in minecraft that you have to buy it from other players[/QUOTE] They might have adjusted the world creation for less diamonds to spawn or something.

[QUOTE=mdeceiver79;46643986]Runescapes inflation is only kept in check artificially via money sinks. People with bots could pump 1000s (or 1000000s) into the economy daily. They try to counter it by making people pay for repairing stuff and/or buying ingredients but then offset it by offering seemingly random drops/rewards of 10000s of gold. For the final nail in the coffin the currency will always have certain bounds on it since no matter how much people bot or how much is taken out of the economy most of the items people use/need are buyable from stores for a fixed amount and items will never drop in price to 0 because most have an alch price letting you turn an item into more money, this means the money gets value from game mechanic rather than trust/debt/usage/stock backing it up. </nerd mode> I think the above things means it is a bad simulator for fiat currency and so is a bad simulator for real life economy. Guildwars might be slightly better with ectos, since the armour they produce is purely visual without any bonus stats and the value is almost entirely player defined. The devs did step in at times to make them rarer or easier to gather. Minecraft is moddable so people could do what they like. The low population limit is the only hindrance stopping people from modding in a realistic economy. I guess that could be tackled with some external database tracking players across servers or something. Do you know of any other games with an interest economy system, ideally something where values for everything are decided by the players using it.[/QUOTE] I heard Eve Online is good, but it's difficult to decide really.

Well Eve Online is one of the few games where they actually had to hire an economist.