Planet Calypso economy subject of academic study

MindArk subsidiary First Planet Company announced that it is working with a Florida State University doctoral student in the College of Business on a new study about virtual world industries and virtual economies. According to First Planet company, this study will help to determine if a player’s experience with a product in a virtual world influences their intention to purchase a product and how that experience can affect a brand.

First Planet Company and business scholars at The Florida State University and Stockholm School of Economics have partnered to develop answers surrounding buying habits in virtual worlds. The study being conducted within the upcoming Miss Calypso beauty pageant on Planet Calypso seeks to understand how the mental state of a virtual world user influences his or her attitude toward, and intention to purchase digital products within virtual worlds.

“Despite the increasing attention that virtual worlds have seen with respect to marketing by companies, little is known about the perception of products within virtual worlds. Even less is known about how a consumer’s cognitive state resulting from an experience with a product in a virtual world may influence his or her intention to purchase a product,” said Rob Hooker, a doctoral candidate who is conducting an independent study in the College of Business at The Florida State University.

The 6th annual Miss Calypso beauty pageant will take place on November 22nd, at 3:00 PM Eastern Standard Time (Noon on the West Coast) in the MMORPG Planet Calypso. Results from this study will be available in Q1 of 2010.

Facebook cracks down on offer providers

It looks like the ban hammer has hit its mark on two of the biggest in-game offer providers on Facebook: Gambit and Tatto Media. Earlier in the month Facebook announced that it had shut down in-game offer providers for some shady and misleading offers, but didn’t name names. This week the social network did. Both Gambit and Tatto Media have been accused of serving up offers in games that have hidden obligations or fees. The reason for the bans, according to an excellent report on VentureBeat, was ” repeat violations of Facebook’s guidelines for offers.”

If you take into account that 30 percent of revenues in the $1 billion virtual goods business are derived from such offers, then this is a very serious matter that needs to be addressed now, because it shows a weakness in that business model. Game providers like Zynga, Playfish and others have started cracking down on these kinds of dubious offers as well - though Facebook has certainly done its fair share of forcing these companies to do the right thing.

Ultimately in-game offers need to be re-thought and refreshed so that users aren’t roped into products and services without knowing what all of the details are. Some examples of this might include a service that doesn’t tell you until it is too late that you have signed up for a lengthy and expensive subscription, or a product that is mailed to you unsolicited with a questionable amount of time to return. At the end of the day players have to ask themselves if the virtual currency they might earn by participating in an offer is really worth the risk and ultimate costs (goods and services they didn’t know they purchased).

You can learn more by checking out this excellent VentureBeat article on the topic.

Virtual Goods Summit adds iPhone panel

The Virtual Goods Summit, a conference dedicated to the virtual goods space in gaming, today unveiled a lineup of new additions to their program, including an iPhone panel, five new speakers and two new lectures. The updated program comes in the wake of new research that projects the virtual goods market will grow to $1 billion in 2009.

In its third year, the Virtual Goods Summit starts on October 29 in San Francisco, CA with the Virtual Goods University, a full day workshop specifically for disseminating information on the fundamentals of virtual goods. On October 30 the Virtual Goods Summit will feature a full day of discussions focused on trends and success stories from individuals at the forefront of digital goods sales and services.

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Virtual goods in Dungeon Fighter Online

Nexon America announced that it will soon be offering a chance for gamers to enhance their experience playing Dungeon Fighter Online on October 8 when it opens an Item Shop. Players can now use Nexon Cash to purchase premium wares to enhance the dungeon fighting experience. The Item Shop, found in-game on Hendon Myre Lane, will include potions to boost your health and stats, safe upgrades with increased storage capacity and no weight limit.

Players will also get a chance to purchase Life Tokens, which bring players back to life when they die in a dungeon battle. Players will also have a chance to purchase Avatar items. Anything purchased from the new Item Shop during the open beta will remain with players after the game is officially launched, so players can enjoy the advantages the DFO Item Shop purchases.

For more information, check out dungeonfighter.nexon.net.

F-Secure details World of Warcraft scams, trojans

Players of Blizzard’s ultra popular MMO World of Warcraft are under attack by a phishing scheme that lets the attacker steal players’ gold and rare items by luring players with an offer of “free in-game mounts,” anti-virus and security researchers at F-Secure point out. This is common knowledge to many WOW players (read the official forums for proof), but not to those few of us that don’t play World of Warcraft, or security experts who don’t pay too much attention to virtual worlds.

The attacker lures the player in by using the in-game World of Warcraft chat system to spam links, which victims then click on to go to a site that looks a lot like the official World of Warcraft site. There they divulge their information (account name, login, password) to complete strangers. Once the attacker has this information they find their way to that account and unload their virtual goods to another account and then sell it for real money in online auctions in places like China.

Another way of getting robbed of your precious WOW commodities and loot is much more malicous - a family of trojans called “WOW” (Trojan-PSW.Win32.WOW ). How you get it isn’t perfectly clear (F-Secure mentions banner ads on malicious web sites), but this malware steals account information and passwords related to World of Warcraft. F-Secure describes it as follows: “The WOW trojan is designed to steal account information in order to allow a remote hacker access to the player’s account. The hacker can then logon and steal the player’s virtual assets by transferring them to another player account. Such assets are often sold or auctioned off for real-world currency. With millions of players, such trojans can easily affect thousands of users.”

A good visual walkthrough of how this might happen can be found on F-Secure’s Blog.

As always, if something is probably too good to be true, then it probably is a scam.

PlaySpan survey finds women buy more virtual goods

Research and consultancy firm, Frank N. Magid Associates, and PlaySpan today announced a new study that evaluates attitudes and behaviors of consumers on virtual goods spending. According to the study, 12 percent of the overall population surveyed reported that they had bought virtual goods in the last 12 months.

However, a closer look at the habits of virtual goods buyers reveals that virtual world visitors are the heaviest virtual goods buyers, with 46 percent of these consumers buying virtual goods (from virtual worlds, games or social networks) and nearly one third of iPhone owners buying from the same platforms.

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Ecko Unlimited brand invading CrimeCraft

Vogster Entertainment will collaborate with Ecko Unlimited to incorporate the famous label’s clothing items in its persistent world shooter CrimeCraft. Marc Ecko’s urban fashion division will help Vogster implement its clothing line into the game so that would-be thugs can wear them as they wage urban warfare on each other.

As part of an exclusive offer from retailer Best Buy, players purchasing the game in store or online at www.bestbuy.com will unlock an Ecko Unlimited t-shirt for their in-game avatar. Those that pre-order through Best Buy will also receive a pair of virtual Ecko sneakers for their in-game characters. A variety of Ecko Unlimited apparel will also be available to all players in CrimeCraft, regardless of purchase location, including hoodies, jeans and additional t-shirts.

CrimeCraft is scheduled for release on August 25, 2009. For more information, check out www.crimecraft.com