Gold farmers

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Gold Farmer (also gold farmer or Chinafarmer ) is the name for gamers that are (partially full time) employs a fee for example in online RPGs large amounts of in-game currency or other in-game items to earn in order to sell them outside of the game to other players . Alternatively, you " level " game figures or player characters in order to sell the corresponding accounts , so you play through the lower levels of the game.

Richard Heeks , a professor at the University of Manchester , writes of around 400,000 people who made gold farming a living in 2008. Eighty percent of the players live in China, and the entire market is worth $ 500 million.

Since it is time-consuming to further develop game characters from extensive games such as online role-playing games, these services can achieve high prices at Internet auctions.

For many Chinese with no training, this is a dream job. However, consequential damage to health can often occur. In addition, there are repeated cases in which young people and prisoners are forced to play in the People's Republic of China. Often their passports are taken away as a means of pressure.

It is now banned in the USA and Great Britain to sell game accounts through internet auction houses, but not in the rest of Europe, Asia and Australia.

The Chinese government decided on June 30, 2009 to ban virtual currency trading and to take action against it.

See also

literature

Individual evidence

  1. BBC: Poor earning virtual gaming gold
  2. Golem.de : Chinese prisoners forced to gold farm , author: Peter Steinlechner, article from May 26, 2011, accessed on May 27, 2011
  3. Golem.de : Child Labor: World of Warcraft 12 hours per day , Author: Christian Klaß, article from October 9, 2006, accessed on May 27, 2011
  4. Farm yourself rich: China prohibits WoW gold farming