Topic

Regulating Glitch's markets

Hi Everyone,

So as we all already know, Glitch isn't the world's first MMORPG to have in game auction/market flooding and instability. Eve actually hired an in-house economist, since managing markets is (gasp!) a tricky thing:http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2009/08/eve_onlines_got_a_real_economi.html . We as a community could attempt to self regulate by creating funds for say, buying items and taking them off the market when a certain commodity floods (this could also be a way to turn a profit to eventually self-fund these sorts of regulatory buys, since you're essentially releasing these items in smaller quantities, for higher net prices, later). Or, we could ask the devs (any staff reading this?) for a sort of in-game Fed, which would be more likely to have the funds to do this for us. Just like the real Fed can increase buying or holding currency or commodities for sale later by changing interest rates, the GlitchFed could change auction fees or vendor prices to regulate the currant. 

There should definitely be a debate on the Forums as to how much regulate suits us (in real life, I'm a socialist, so of course I believe in a strong regulatory structure-- but that might not work here). The Don Draper/Messy Monster Purp Incident just illustrates one of the many perils that a completely free market here allows for. So: WHAT SHOULD WE DO ABOUT IT? Please make suggestions below!

p.s.-- If you have an academic subscription service, the following articles on JSTOR are relevant to the economic problems (and theoretical problems of property) we're starting to see here:

The Laws of the Virtual Worlds F. Gregory Lastowka and Dan Hunter California Law Review
Vol. 92, No. 1 (Jan., 2004), pp. 1-73
www.jstor.org/stable/3481444

Sridhar Balasubramanian and Vijay Mahajan International Journal of Electronic Commerce
Vol. 5, No. 3, Marketing in the E-Channel (Spring, 2001), pp. 103-138 www.jstor.org/stable/27750984

Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

  • whats with all this mumbo jumbo... just play the game man......
    Posted 14 months ago by Walla Walla Subscriber! | Permalink
  • It's called reading. You might not be aware....
    Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Also, there are these things called apostrophes.
    Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Free market is always the solution.

    Ride the wave, baby!
    Posted 14 months ago by NA48 Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Reading, right... because that's what people log into glitch for.... They cant wait to start scrolling Sridhar Balasubramanian and Vijay Mahajan International Journal of Electronic Commerce
    Vol. 5, No. 3, Marketing in the E-Channel (Spring, 2001), pp. 103-138
    Posted 14 months ago by Walla Walla Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Man, I didn't like the harshing on reading, because I actually find issues like this interesting and I thought it was neat that you, in effect, "cited your sources."

    I have an academic subscription, though, as I am a college student. But correct me if I'm wrong, you just recommended a hundred pages of "pleasure reading" here. I quite frankly don't have THAT much time to read. Especially not scholarly articles, which are arguably very dense and time-consuming reading.

    Maybe if you'd like to generate discussion, cite a passage or two from the articles. I'd be much more inclined to read a page out of your scholarly article, than all hundred-plus.
    Posted 14 months ago by Haiku Subscriber! | Permalink
  • By request, I wanted to flesh out what I'd propose in terms of a commodities exchange in glitch.

    Add buy orders to the auctions - "I would pay 2.8 currants each for up to 200 cherries."   When you buy and auction lot, you're essentially creating a buy order that exact matches an existing sell order.  There are details to work out: is there a related listing price and commission for buy orders?

    Post the "last sale" price for everything that trades, as well as volumes.  Ideally, include this information in the information for items in game.  Replace the info text "worth 17 currants" with "last sold for 17 currants."

    Alter the behavior of vendors such that they buy and sell at strict ratios of market values.  For example, the tool vendors that right now pay 80% of list?  Have them pay 80% of a decaying average of the last 1000 sales, say.  Also consider adding 0 values for periods without trade activity, so that, over time, prices of un-traded goods decline.

    Finally, leave donation value exactly as is: a fixed notional value on most items, which will serve to center the prices that people are willing to pay.

    I'd lightheartedly suggested this as a "libertarian" suggestion, since part of the motivation is that I think that a free market would tend to solve issues of game balance on its own.  Is mining overpowered?  Suddenly there will be a glut of chunks, and the prices will drop, and the monetary incentive will decline.  Is cheesemongering crazy?  Likewise.  Where's all the food?  Wow, those are some good prices, maybe I should start cooking.

    Granted, there are problems of game design even if the market doesn't explode or collapse.  For instance, you'd expect that successful glitches would drive up prices as they valued their own currants lightly, which would make life difficult for noobs.  As a result, segments of the market would need to be scaled to social segment - there would need to be crafts that remain affordable because they don't scale to be interesting to a glitch with 16 skills, 1000 energy and 100,000 currants.
    Posted 14 months ago by Yarrow Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Woah! I didn't mean to imply that one had to read the articles to make an argument. Sorry! I just thought some people might find them interesting if they happened to have the time. They have abstracts on the first page, FYI. You're absolutely right Haiku, it would be crazy to ask anyone to do that as leisure-time fun (again, sorry about any confusion there!). Most of the issues in those articles are addressed nicely in the Planet Money podcast I referred to earlier.

    For the record I am NOT in any way an economist, though unlike Walla Walla, I happen to find the emergent properties of a world like Glitch fascinating enough to at least think about in academic terms. How often to you get to see something like a whole economy form? It's just cool! Now, what do we think of Yarrow's suggestion for a self-regulating market, especially re:mining? I think her/his idea of scaling the market so that lower level goods are more interesting (and thus more affordable) only to lower level players is very interesting. But would that then make anyone lose the incentive to level-up?
    Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink
  • For the purpose of spurring discussion, here are some things we might ask ourselves:

    1. How stable do we want the currant to be? That is, do we want to be able to buy roughly the same amount of commodities/currant over time, or should this ratio be allowed to fluctuate with market availability? How should vendors serve to regulate this?

    2. Right now, the auction market allows for severe price undercutting. Should we change that, as Yarrow suggests, by among other things, taking out the phrase "worth" so that people know what they're doing? What about limiting listings/commodity to cap the low end of the price?

    3. Right now in Glitch, there aren't many incentives (besides trophies, occasionally) for holding on to immediately non-consumable items. Should there be more incentives for this, to make it less likely that people sell them right away at auction? Or should we leave the game-model alone here, since the bag slots are relatively small?

    4. Finally, can we, as players, self-regulate this whole economy or do we need a bigger, overarching agency to do it for us? Do we need a game "Federal Reserve", so to speak, since we as individuals can't impact the whole market in the same way?

    These are just a few questions of mine, but I'm sure you have more of your own.
    Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I like things the way they are.  The uncertainty of the market is part of the charm.  Seriously, what is the point of accumulating vast wealth in this game anyway?  
    Posted 14 months ago by Jewel Stoned Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Free market. No governmental interference artifically subsidizing prices or inflating the value of some goods. That only leads to inefficent resource allocation.

    Auctions provide useful information to both sellers and consumers. If the price is driven down by competition, producers will move to more valued commodities (excess of purple flooding the market? OK, I will grow something else instead).

    I am of the school (ha ha, literally) that thinks the model of auctions and player trading in Glitch is the closest to a true efficient free market as exists. In RL there are too many other factors that can not be controlled (governmental interference, lack of ready access to information, lack of acces to open markets).

    I love it, even if I do not get what I think is a "fair prce" based on the resources and energy put into a product. Other times I get a higher return merely because it what the Glitchens want. The best part is that since it is a game, it does not put my lifestyle in jeopardy when I make a bad choice :)
    Posted 14 months ago by Kookaburra Subscriber! | Permalink
  • and if you don not want to read it, pass on it, no need to be snarky.
    Posted 14 months ago by Xyrem Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Jewel Stoned for fun, maybe? what's the point of doing ANYTHING in this game? we all have different interests when it comes to gameplay.
    Posted 14 months ago by Rev. Desdemona Subscriber! | Permalink
  • The API lends itself to some of these activities and there are already scripts that you can use to set a 'buy' order at a certain price and up to a certain amount.

    There are already scripts that show you the highs, lows, expired, and sold price on every auction that is set up. 

    This seems like a niche interest that is best served by a group and by API scripts. And I too, think a totally free market, the way it is currently set up, is the most interesting play style. As someone who frequently sells on the Auction, I find the volatility to be fascinating. 

    If you want to try to influence the market, you can.  Simply gather enough currents and start trading.
    Posted 14 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I'm feeling that until Glitch has a real world dollar based currency conversion feature (currents to dollars), there's really not much to regulate. And I'm not certain the means, ie. how to, are not in the current feature set.

    Anyone remember the early days of SecondLife - when small fortunes could be made converting Lindens to dollars?
    Posted 14 months ago by MeherMan Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Glitch staff have made it very explicit that they are not going to have a game where RL money can be used to purchase in-world items that would help you in the game.  All credits purchased with real money are only going to give you decorative items, like the clothing choices you can currently make. 

    If they aren't creating a game where money can flow into the game, it seems highly unlikely that they'd enable money flowing out.
    Posted 14 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Susan Sontag: I personally believe in as little regulation as possible, particularly when it comes to a game, which most people play for fun rather than political theory... I guess I don't see that market-flooding is so huge a problem that a savvy player can't overcome it with strategic thinking, rather than some sort of bureaucratic oversight that, in effect, constrains people's play and makes what should be an enjoyable, player-directed experience into a series of strictures.
    Then again, I have the same feelings about in-game political offices, but that's another thread. Seems like people oughtta be able to just play, and let what is ultimately not that big a deal slide as they get on with petting piggies and massaging butterflies.

    I'd probably also have less of a reaction to it if your replies to others who didn't necessarily agree hadn't been so rude and condescending, but that's just me.
    Carry on.
    Posted 14 months ago by Djabriil Subscriber! | Permalink
  • +1 Djabrill
    Posted 14 months ago by Ebil Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Buy orders are all that's needed.
    Posted 14 months ago by Cross Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think we just need a little more time before the market is more stable.  It hasn't been public for a while.

    WindBorn mentioned the API, and it's how I feel.  People that are really into that can battle it out over APIs while TS focuses on game play.  The market will eventually stabilize as more APIs are released that deal with it and more Glitches get into it.  The people currently influencing the market are those of us that got a head start making our money.  Pretty soon, there will be tons of glitches hitting 60 and things will be chill.
    Posted 14 months ago by a lifted pixel Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think that for me, this is one of the places where Game completely departs from Real Life.  I really don't want to get into what my RL political views on economics are.  However, I read this thread and the thing that is completely lacking is the definition of what in-Game problem you are attempting to solve by imposing an academic model of economics on it.  Or are you simply trying to conduct a thought-experiment on controlling resources and currencies?

    Do you want everyone to be able to buy a house sooner, or instead make property owning irrelevant?  The ideas above about segregating resource markets between experienced vs newbie players sounds like the re-invention of class warfare.  Why is having some items available through NPC vendors rather than through harvesting or player auctions a bad thing?

    The sorts of in-Game problems I run across related to resources don't seem like they are affected by free vs regulated markets.  I want players to be able to participate meaningfully in new street projects regardless of their current level; there should be something that anyone can contribute.  I want larger houses that have more flexibility in their feature design, and are more attractive.  I want productive activities that are more interesting than grinding away at the same three or four ores all day.

    I can't tell whether are trying to insert an artificial level of complexity because you are bored, or if you are trying to create an economy that you know how to manipulate easily to get rich faster, or something else all together.
    Posted 14 months ago by KhaKhonsu Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Hopefully, as the game ages, TS will introduce two things that can help the player-run market thrive:

    - Let Spirits keep selling the basic tools, but introduce better versions that are player crafted only, like a third tier after the first two that has some added bonuses.

    - Keep spreading the skill tree apart, so players will have to pick a path to specialize in. Right now, I have nearly every crafted skill leveled (besides a few cooking and gardening) and I can easily be self-sufficient, letting me ignore the auction completely.
    Posted 14 months ago by Draron Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Let me be perfectly clear-- I'm not trying to get rich quick, I promise! I just thought it might be interesting to discuss the current state of affairs in game in terms of existing economic models. How often do anthropologists or economists get to study a society unfolding before their eyes? It just seemed like a fun opportunity to think about some big questions I have about the way society works within a relateable, easy conceptualised framework. So yes, Mereret, I should have been clearer. This is just a thought experiment/discussion, because it happened to interest me. And yes, I want to customize houses too :)

    I don't think the models I was looking to were introducing artificial complexity-- I think that complexity is already there. What does it mean, anyway, to own a bunch of pixels? Is virtual ownership really ownership? Why do we create the idea of ownership in virtual worlds with virtual goods at all? Does this reflect an obsession with possession in our culture, or something else entirely?

    I think Glitch users--all of you-- are really interesting people, and I just thought an informed conversation would be fun. Yes I'm a huge nerd! YES, I like talking about big economic or philosophical problems in my spare time (which doesn't mean you should or have to)! I'm very sorry to anyone who might have thought my tone was rude. I'm in academia professionally-- citations are kind of a reflex for me, as is the tendency to clarify a question in very strict, sometimes harsh sounding, but ultimately rigourous terms. So again, I do apologize if I've offended anyone.
    Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink
  • And again, just to be clear, I like milking my butterflies and petting my trees n'pigs too. I'm not some wacko Econ snob. I just love the metagame almost as much as my spice mill and my as of yet undiscovered ghosts!
    Posted 14 months ago by Susan Sontag Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Purp Incident? I'm a newbie here, could you please link me somewhere I can read about this?

    I think that capitalism works in the context of a videogame. It takes people and allows them to plan goals and use the market as they think it'll work. Adding regulations to that may generate a more equalitarian situation, but we should allow some sort of competition in-game: the game is more cooperative and social than anything else I know. Reducing competition will surely endanger that dimension of the experience of playing Glitch.

    The thing here is that we shouldn't let the game become VERY dependant on the market, otherwise newbies WILL have problems getting certain stuff due to low resources. That's what worries me about the initiative of diminishing the role of Spirits to buy stuff. Glitch should *ensure* a very low barrier of entry, and making that dependant of free market is a bad idea at a conceptual level: there are many ways that it might go wrong.
    Posted 14 months ago by Xyzo Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I once tried to stabilize the price of Moonstone. Here's how it went.

    I spent about 30K c buying all moonstone that cost less than 1200c, then repriced them as 1199c. The market price for that item is 800c. It literally took minutes for Moonstone to start appearing at auction again at 800c (even though the sellers could have easily gotten 1198 for it).

    Why did this market not inflate as it should have? I think there are two reasons.

    1) Glitch suggests a market price when you list an item. People are likely to list at or near that price, no matter how high the price could be.
    2) People just want to dump stuff for cheap, and undermine any potential price inflation.

    The result of these two factors are that prices are artificially low, but I don't think there's a way to fix this (at least not until Glitch adjusts the "street price" to match the average auction price).
    Posted 14 months ago by tonedef Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Currently Glitch does not have auctions, they have a marketplace.  Sellers price their goods and see how the market responds.  Like in any such marketplace, motivated sellers undercut other sellers offerings.   I don't believe real price discovery is possible using this model in Glitch, because sellers can't easily determine a meaningful cost of producing their goods.    What would work better for price discovery would be real auctions, where an item is offered for a set period of time and bidders compete to determine the price they are willing to pay.  

    Put differently, in a marketplace setting such as we have now, price discovery is done by sellers and depends on supply.  In an auction setting, price discovery is done by buyers and depends on demand.    There are too many intangible inputs on the supply side for that to be a good market mechanism.  I believe a demand-based market (real auctions) would be better. 

    Unfortunately, auctions take time, and the good thing about the current marketplace is that if you're standing in your house and NEED some seeds, or whatever, and don't feel like running out for them, you can just grab some and the frog is there in a minute or two.  

    ..... 
    Posted 14 months ago by WalruZ Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I don't see what problem is being caused by flooding/undercutting in-game. I see lower prices in the auction house as a net good as it allows newbies to see/do/experience things they might not otherwise be able to until much later.

    I could see where regulation might be called for is if there's some group that gets together to spawn camp a particular key 24-7 and then sells them for hugely inflated prices, but that's not what we're talking about, right?
    Posted 14 months ago by juv3nal Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Personally I see no need for regulation unless currants and real world cash are interchangeable - and I don't believe that day will ever come because it makes the whole game miles more Serious and attracts unwelcome attention from potential exploiters, gold farmers, bots etc. At THAT point yes I agree you need regulation and control and Official Stuff.

    I'm sure we're all going to lose a couple of thousands of currants now & then but that just means we go mine some more sparkly... we'll still have a roof over our heads (literally, not necessarily in-game).

    I would like buy orders though... I should go explore the auction scripts.

    Can't say my real world views necessarily agree with my Glitch's :-)
    Posted 14 months ago by Snazzlefrazz Subscriber! | Permalink
  • This *stuff* is what I like about Glitch.

    So enriching...
    Posted 14 months ago by The Black Chicken Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I hope other people can add more to this discussion. (eats popcorn)
    Posted 14 months ago by The Black Chicken Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I read a fair chunk of this, and what I want to say to this is:
    Oh sweet Tii, don't let this become another Eve Online.
    18 months of my life, wasted to spreadsheets, mining, and spreadsheets. Oh, and mining. Did I mention the spreadsheets?

    While I like some of the idea of a player run market, I don't want to log on one afternoon to find out that thanks to someone going on a thousand-and-nine beer marathon, the cost of a can of beer is no longer 10₡, but is now 1023₡ and 91 jumps from my current system.

    ...er, street.

    As suggested earlier here, it'd be one thing to allow the vendors to sell the basic items at a friendly cost, and for advanced items, let those bend a bit more to the will of the player market.
    I'd be reliving a nightmare if everything suddenly got dumped into the hands of the players with regard to selling.

    Pardon me as I ramble.
    Posted 14 months ago by Xial Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I'll say this in a very simple way:

    Real Life: markets need regulation.
    Glitch: markets need to be fun.

    Therefore, let things be as they are: creative and not rigid!
    Posted 14 months ago by Kul Koba Subscriber! | Permalink
  • But the market is sinking as the players grow in number. The balance between supply and demand is getting tilted.
    Posted 14 months ago by The Black Chicken Subscriber! | Permalink
  • +1 for Susan Sontag; I'm a huge nerd as well, and the behavior of virtual economies is interesting!
    And, um, guys, if this isn't your thing, um, okay.  That's fine. Let us virtual economy nerds geek out on stuff without throwing fruit and disrupting the thread.

    So: Buy orders. Excited about that.
    Now all we need is a  way to short!

    Sort of kidding.

    ~CTP
    Posted 14 months ago by CrashTestPilot Subscriber! | Permalink
  • the market, as it is, doesn't require regulation.

    not because unregulated markets inherently lead to "efficient resource distribution" .. because they don't, at least not inherently .. but because the market in Glitch is lacking so many of the financial structures that require regulation in the real world, and adding those structures in wouldn't improve gameplay.

    the one possible exception where regulation might become necessary is with certain ultra-rare items like spawning keys, where a single player or small group of players can monopolize the entire supply - but there are very few items of consequence like that in the game and the developers can just increase supply.

    btw, the glitch economy isn't a great example of a free market, as the developers tinker with item values and resource supply all the time in a search for game balance. the market comes pre-regulated right out of the box, in a way... and don't get me started on the price fixing attributes of the NPC vendors.
    Posted 14 months ago by striatic Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @striatic:
    I agree, in that I'm not sure the market needs regulation inherently.
    Like you, I think that we have three economies happening at once:
    a) Auction (which is really a market).
    b) Vendors (Buyers of first resort, which as you say, have a price fixing attribute that impacts Auction prices.
    c) Inter-player community markets/gift economies/trades

    The Vendors impact Auction pricing by creating a source of income that may be higher than that of auction pricing.
    The utility of auction pricing is that it is not location specific; So seeking out a Vendor can introduce additional time before one can make a transaction.
    The good news about Auctions is that it's global, and data rich, but introduces a tendency toward discounting, save in the case of v. rare items.
    Commodities, naturally, become subject to being commoditized.

    The thing I'm finding interesting is the notion of ONLY doing the energy inputs that have the highest currant output: Foods, tonging, high-end alchemy, and herbs.

    I recently experimented with simply buying ore, adding the input of smelting, then tonging out moly bars, and selling those to a Vendor.  That wasn't bad, but it wasn't nearly as profitable on its face as mining sparkly under the influence of earthshakers.

    The advantage is I could do that without a great deal of effort and wandering around.  I'm wondering if this kind of behavior (buying raw goods, investing energy in producing "value-added" and remarketing the products) is widespread, or if that strategy is outpaced by raw materials gathering.

    This of course is a microeconomic behavior, not a market behavior, but I'm wondering if we'll see signs of that impacting what we see in the Auction space.

    Anyway, that's the best I've got for a Friday.

    ~CTP
    Posted 14 months ago by CrashTestPilot Subscriber! | Permalink