The former feudal system of MMO industry can no longer satisfy the growing needs of auction culture, microtransaction markets in particular. Consequentially, it seems anti-social contracts grow firmer by the day. New Hollywood has emerged and we are witnessing the commodification of real-money trade, the microtransaction model itself, as cosmetic, hidden, and natural as it may seem.

If Blizzcon meant the chance to allow fans the (exclusive) first opportunity to play the upcoming Star Craft II and Wrath of the Lich King, partake in PvP pawnage, sing, dance, ride the mechanical bull, and repetitively heckle Jay Mohr to Jungle smack levels that would make Jim Rome and the clones proud, it also allowed the opportunity to buy eBay wares (after long waits, power outages, heckling from customer service representatives, and paying for the privilege). More importantly, however, the media event sine quo marked an important moment in the history of cultural branding, commodification, encouraged RMT, and secondary market spillover.

Despite the facade of Q&A panels, feedback loops remain highly monolytic, just enough carrot sticks to feed the enslaving addiction, further subverting gift culture with that of economic necessity, arguably the foundational motivational tool so crucial to Blizzard's success. Players live from one drop to the next, just hoping to roll need, wary of lurking Ninjas' wrath. However, as auction culture takes root, Blizzard has begun to adopt traditionally Asian models to placate the masses, always one trinket away from going weak at the knees, calling out, "I love the leader." If only Marge and the hover bikes were here to save the day! Yes, the world of Warcraft is a cult of comic proportions on the scale of Pudovikin's 1925 classic Chess Fever and more powerful than Eisenstien's Battleship Potemkin march on the Odessa Steps. There is nothing better than taking a moment to sit back, and reflect upon the "vast wasteland" of New Hollywood entertainment, the boredom Newton Minow must be feeling.

But enough rhetoric. On to some evidence.

Looking beyond Blizzard's hardline stance against all things IGE, new strategic organization of the RMT phenomenon has led to emergent World of Warcraft virtual asset markets. While prohibition and integration have traditionally been viewed as the only responses available to virtual world operators, new configurations have quietly found their way into the Azerothian mix. Take the World of Warcraft Trading Game: Heroes of Azeroth, first released in October 2006 and part of the Blizzcon 2007 swag bag, partially composed of a 31 card Starter Deck and pack of 15 game cards complete with a collector's edition murloc "Mrglrglmrglmrrrlggg" card. "They rarely attack alone!" Annoyance sells. The collectible card game remarkably follows Blizzard's box-subscription-expansion model: two or more players are only able to compete after each has acquired the starter deck and although the game could proceed at this point, purchase of booster card packs define the game experience by enabling players the usual vendibles: weapons, armor, and quests.

Despite their indexical core, these particular cards remain extrinsic motivating factors in a game of RMT cultural poaching, ones that serve as entertaining eye-candy and grind-inducing, addictive means towards a steady flow of profit. Pixilated crack. For the game also allows players the opportunity to find legendary "Loot" cards (Trademark noted). These random drops (inserts) "unlock cosmetic upgrades" for in-world characters: custom tabards, unique pets, and new mount appearances. The cards come with a code written on the back that are then redemmed  for "amazing original art from today's top creative visionaries." Pimp my ride. Now while card carrying culture has been leveraged time and time again in the creation of commercial community, these fabricated artifacts combine the allure of shopping and the benefits of customization, the incentives of rewards programs, and the convienience of RMT to link one's game playing experience directly to the willingness to buy insane amounts of trading cards worth substantial secondary market value. And while these items are argued to be "ineffectual" as they do not directly augment avatar capital and thus benevolent accessories to a skill-based system, such protectionist defense not only fails to take into account the multiplicity of WoW subscribers subliminally jacked into the system, trapped in a never-ending grind whose consequences only Dibbell knows how best to describe, but remains completely oblivious to Blizzard's engenous manipulation and creation of peon culture.

The hero's journey slowly becomes a grinding crusade to material wealth until the point we experience the tragedy of the barrens: player communities devoid of meaningful engagement, completely erroded by anti-social pursuit of glamour and riches. Gas station gift shop. Disney Land wait. B-movie experience. Show and tell. Wal-Mart Online. RMT gone to hell. And while the promise of RMT lies in its ability to free players from the shackles of an endless series of hoops and ladders, microtransaction models reinforce the grind, without adding anything to the community experience. Broken hearts, faded dreams, and false play indeed. It is not surprising that these cards are regularly traded on ebay, given resourceful players' adversity to monotony. Time, money, and arguably emotional efficiency. What is interesting, however, is when we start to consider the interactions between physical and digital markets and the nature of the intangible.

Synthetic world auction culture grows profoundly paradoxical. Although gamers seek any means possible towards intangible meta-contentment, commercial acceptance remains predicated on the basis of tangibility, creating a narrow channel of gray market activity. While RMT and other generally prohibited forms of trading offer intangible means to intangible possession, trading cards offer tangible means to intangible ends. Heroes of Azeroth reinstates this traditional social order, remaining accepted on ebay. Yet grayer markets lurk.



Gift cards offer an interesting parallel and easily overlooked exception to the RMT phenomenon, creating a legitimately liquid marketplace where virtual chattels do not. At this point, let us introduce eBay auctions for the Blizzcon Beta Key, the uber swag door prize awarded to those in attendance at the convention. Secondary market value starts here. This plastic card consists of two codes: the first allowing access to a combat nerfed, dancing, flag bearing World of Warlock murloc character costume and the second granting entry into the beta test for an unannounced future title. According to rampant speculation ( 1 2 ), the game was first believed to be Star Craft II, only to fall into question during the event and simultaneous unveiling of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. Regardless, the uncertainty has fueled bidders' demand for the item, which having consistently sold for upwards of $300 and $400 in the week immediately following Blizzcon, still maintains prices just below the $200 mark, almost double the $100 price of admission.

Yet the sales are not without a bit of controversy. Ebay has begun delisting auctions for the beta key. Customer service confirms that the Trust & Safety Department decided to remove a collection of beta keys from the site. The first representative contacted was quite friendly and helpful, however, she was unable to provide further details on why the listings were removed. The second representative contacted, however, stated that eBay was not delisting the item in general, suggesting a batch of shady sellers or other fraud related issues. The ambiguous legal status of these cards arises after Ebay decided to go Everquest on real money transfers in virtual goods and services. In January, Slashdot was one of the first to break the news that eBay had begun delisting auctions for virtual property and have a good explanation of their policy on digitally delivered goods. Yet joystiq seems to sum up best the manner in which eBay seeks to eliminate "all manner of polygonal pets, in-game gear and web-based wealth."  The ambiguity is astounding: the legal status of gift cards raising further questions of ownership and gift giving in a digital age. If there are no grounds for doubting the legitimacy of these digital markets and paperless value, what is it about trading cards with a code that makes the market more legitimate than items, gold, and accounts?

I wonder if B-HUAC has contacted eBay about these booming collectibles markets, raising interesting questions when assessing online gamers' authority to sell in-game assets. Should contracts of adhesion really continue to circumvent the first-sale doctrine as gamers come to realize "virtual" properties are as real as the playing cards they hold in their hands? Wonder what Koster would say? Do these avatars have rights? Why have gold anyway? What about Malaby, Fairfield, Hunter and Lastowka? Should we also hear from Castronova, Consalvo and Bartle? No tax abeiting necessary.

As new avenues for community formation emerge, it seems that continued attempts to control and contrive the cultural life of MMO properties miss the point of where games' value comes from: mainly unpredictable and interpretable social outcomes that arise because of and despite a bounded set of rules. But why must this be treated as such A New Approach to Games? This is where machinima, surprisingly, looks so promising, especially considering Blizzard's overwhelming acceptance of the new people's medium. And this is where RMT, born from gift cultures' dark underbelly, yet with such utilitarian promise, sadly dies, swallowed by corporate ninja looting, invisible to the wrath of wow bots in your raid. While MMOS were born a communications medium, cultural branding seeks to overturn the technological joys of auction culture, grind protecting propaganda exploiting and circumventing the gift giving process by creating incentives to horde rather than the incentive to share. Should we not recognize RMT's ecological potential, a conservation of social, cultural, and economic value? When will we learn to recycle? And when shall we recognize the microtransaction model for its scary inevitability: further extraction of gamer surplus, destroying the magic circle to degrees RMT could never dare sustain?

But Sustain That Brand we shall.

And as empty feelings linger in an increasingly privatized public sphere, where do players go to escape the grind? Will gamers find solace in a friendly round of table top farm and loot, or perhaps, engulfed by the pains of real money trade, benefits all but extracted, turn towards the art of machinima: warcraft mo-vies? Can these cultural tools of immersion check and balance an otherwise stagnant process of mundane repetition? Is play not irreducible, transgressive freedom and adventure its driving force? Or will machinima ultimately suffer the fate of the grind, play all but extinct and having melted into work?