She’s one of 61.6 million active users of a game called FarmVille, which enables players to grow imaginary crops and raise make-believe animals without getting stuff on their shoes.
FarmVille may be the most popular game app on Facebook, but it’s just one of many. Mafia Wars, the No. 1 choice of make-believe criminals, has 45.5 million monthly active accounts. Mall World, where you can operate your own imaginary boutique, claims to have 4,755,504 monthly users — all of them female. One research firm estimates that 80 percent of active online users will be members of at least one virtual world by 2012.
While all of that sounds like good, cheap entertainment — nothing more than a giant Monopoly game — there is a difference. In these games you don’t just buy the Internet versions of Boardwalk with play money. You can put them on your credit card or PayPal account and get an authentic bill at the end of the month.
And now we’re talking REAL money. Spending on stuff that doesn’t exist, and never did, will amount to nearly $2 billion this year. Next year it’s expected to reach $2.6 billion.
Even those who aren’t into virtual games can spend real money to buy nonexistent items. Super Pets, with 5 million subscribers, offers Snoop Dogg pretend hoodies for your pretend pooch. A Justin Timberlake fake hat sells for $2.
Proponents of the virtual goods market find virtue in what they’re selling.
“People have been buying intangible things for years. A movie ticket, for example, is really an experience taking you through a set of emotions,” an industry executive declared. “Virtual goods is the same idea, but it’s based on social emotions.”
Others aren’t so sure.
“Thanks to the ‘virtual goods’ industry, we have a generation of young people who are ‘virtual idiots’” with Twitter brains,” an online critic countered.
For most virtual goods buyers, purchases cost less than a movie ticket. A dollar here, two bucks there. But, sometimes, the price of fantasy is fantastic. According to published reports, one virtual game player paid 330,000 real dollars for an imaginary space station.
If that story’s true, there’s only one word for it.
Unreal.
Contact D.L. Stewart at dlstew_2000@yahoo.com.
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