~On the CS and its negative effects on the economy of Minetown~
The purpose of this thread is not to cast aspersions at the admins and moderators of Minetown but rather to bring to light those problems that have become apparent to me.
The Minetown credits shop is that place where most of the denizens of Minetown central and the surrounding towns and suburbs turn to to purchase gold for the services and products necessary to properly enjoy a large multiplayer build server such as Minetown. Since the official 1.8 and the temporary closure of the credits shop a lot of people in the chat boxes have set to whining incessantly about their inability to do this.
Stieg Hedlund; a game designer with 25 years of experience in the field has said, "... the economy of the real world and that of the virtual world are not all that different... If the federal reserve starts printing money the value of currency will go down, If the economy of a MMORPG prints money the same thing will occur..."
I believe that because the CS holds the power to "print" gold bars that the economy of Minetown is effectively setting itself up to have what I'd like to call a "Gold Bar Bubble".
The 1.8 Adventure update came out on September Twelfth and since then the CS has been close due to Bukkit's late updating schedule. It has been 15 days since then.
In a brief discussion with GodofSquirrels he says that the aprroximate DAU (Daily Active User) is about 215 people and the total MAU (Monthly Active User) is about 2000. If those 215 people optimize their potential credits every other day than 3010 gold bars will be introduced to Minetown over the course of two weeks.
This may not seem like much but if all of that money is going into the purchase of goods than none of it is being removed from the cycle and large clusters of gold bar can accumulate over time with little to no flush from the economy.
Let's pose the current gold bar at a set value=1 and that of the deflated printed gold bar a 1/10 the value of the first one. This would assume the amount of gold has multiplied by a ten fold value.
If right now 10 gold bars can buy you 640 cobblestone the deflated printed gold bar would require 100 to purchase the same amount. This is a major problem. If right now the credits are increasing by 3010 per two weeks if we say there are currently 10,000 gold bars currently in existence then this can potentially occur in only 66 weeks.
An average user reading this is probably dubious to the concepts expressed here and is more likely than not planning to post undiscerning coments and will probably pay little to no mind to the seriousness of this situation. This is because the effects of this are not currently present and the value of cobblestone is staying at the same rate for a long period of time without changing. This brings back the idea of a economic bubble.
An economic bubble or a market bubble is, "trade in high volumes at prices that are considerably at variance with intrinsic values". To put this into layman's terms it means that people are selling at buying at the same rate even though the value of the currency is dropping or the price of the good is increasing putting it completely at odds with the laws of supply and demand.
Because people continue to sell, in this case, cobblestone at the same rate even though the value of the gold bar is rapidly decreasing this dangerous economic situation has been put into a very precarious situation. Such that the opening of the CS and the sudden inpour of gold can set the bubble to "pop" leading to an almost apocalyptic economic situation that will likely drive people away from the server.
My opinion on the matter is that:
a. the price of gold relative to credits be more variable to account for the amount of gold in server at any given time.
b. that a admin or moderator run tax be implemented so as to create some amount of removal of gold at some substantial rate.
c. that the time between when credits can be earned increase so as to keep gold from coming in too rapidly at any one time.
and d. that the people of Minetown, independent to the aforementioned ideas, try to use up more gold as blocks or weapons or armor or to simply incinerate excess gold to keep the amount down.
This is in no way a scam or some way to trick people out of their money I am simply a concerned citizen who wishes to keep such an event from happening. Especially because with 1.9 gold nuggets will be introduced making gold a renewable resource I think that better regulation of economic affairs in minetown be put into action.
CrimsonYoshi
The purpose of this thread is not to cast aspersions at the admins and moderators of Minetown but rather to bring to light those problems that have become apparent to me.
The Minetown credits shop is that place where most of the denizens of Minetown central and the surrounding towns and suburbs turn to to purchase gold for the services and products necessary to properly enjoy a large multiplayer build server such as Minetown. Since the official 1.8 and the temporary closure of the credits shop a lot of people in the chat boxes have set to whining incessantly about their inability to do this.
Stieg Hedlund; a game designer with 25 years of experience in the field has said, "... the economy of the real world and that of the virtual world are not all that different... If the federal reserve starts printing money the value of currency will go down, If the economy of a MMORPG prints money the same thing will occur..."
I believe that because the CS holds the power to "print" gold bars that the economy of Minetown is effectively setting itself up to have what I'd like to call a "Gold Bar Bubble".
The 1.8 Adventure update came out on September Twelfth and since then the CS has been close due to Bukkit's late updating schedule. It has been 15 days since then.
In a brief discussion with GodofSquirrels he says that the aprroximate DAU (Daily Active User) is about 215 people and the total MAU (Monthly Active User) is about 2000. If those 215 people optimize their potential credits every other day than 3010 gold bars will be introduced to Minetown over the course of two weeks.
This may not seem like much but if all of that money is going into the purchase of goods than none of it is being removed from the cycle and large clusters of gold bar can accumulate over time with little to no flush from the economy.
Let's pose the current gold bar at a set value=1 and that of the deflated printed gold bar a 1/10 the value of the first one. This would assume the amount of gold has multiplied by a ten fold value.
If right now 10 gold bars can buy you 640 cobblestone the deflated printed gold bar would require 100 to purchase the same amount. This is a major problem. If right now the credits are increasing by 3010 per two weeks if we say there are currently 10,000 gold bars currently in existence then this can potentially occur in only 66 weeks.
An average user reading this is probably dubious to the concepts expressed here and is more likely than not planning to post undiscerning coments and will probably pay little to no mind to the seriousness of this situation. This is because the effects of this are not currently present and the value of cobblestone is staying at the same rate for a long period of time without changing. This brings back the idea of a economic bubble.
An economic bubble or a market bubble is, "trade in high volumes at prices that are considerably at variance with intrinsic values". To put this into layman's terms it means that people are selling at buying at the same rate even though the value of the currency is dropping or the price of the good is increasing putting it completely at odds with the laws of supply and demand.
Because people continue to sell, in this case, cobblestone at the same rate even though the value of the gold bar is rapidly decreasing this dangerous economic situation has been put into a very precarious situation. Such that the opening of the CS and the sudden inpour of gold can set the bubble to "pop" leading to an almost apocalyptic economic situation that will likely drive people away from the server.
My opinion on the matter is that:
a. the price of gold relative to credits be more variable to account for the amount of gold in server at any given time.
b. that a admin or moderator run tax be implemented so as to create some amount of removal of gold at some substantial rate.
c. that the time between when credits can be earned increase so as to keep gold from coming in too rapidly at any one time.
and d. that the people of Minetown, independent to the aforementioned ideas, try to use up more gold as blocks or weapons or armor or to simply incinerate excess gold to keep the amount down.
This is in no way a scam or some way to trick people out of their money I am simply a concerned citizen who wishes to keep such an event from happening. Especially because with 1.9 gold nuggets will be introduced making gold a renewable resource I think that better regulation of economic affairs in minetown be put into action.
CrimsonYoshi