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Seems rather pointless. To provide a legitimate service for 8 months and then abscond with the money because there are no legal consequences isn't much of a cha
by yllus 15y ago
Seems rather pointless. To provide a legitimate service for 8 months and then abscond with the money because there are no legal consequences isn't much of a challenge, experiment or lesson to anyone.
The only surprise is that they waited 8 months instead of 8 weeks to do it. (I would have rewarded a few points if they waited 8 years.)
- ploxination 15y agoPointless? They got 1 trillion ISK.
- yllus 15y agoIn exchange for 8 months of at least moderate effort. Two people couldn't have come up with $21,000 in earnings over 8 months? (The $21,000 figure taken from the comment above me.) And they could have made that money in non-virtual currency that they could have used outside the game. If this was to run an experiment about greed or investor naivety that would be another thing, but that doesn't seem to have been the case here.
- Fargren 15y agoThey did it while playing a game. And there's a certain thrill in scamming people, certainly.
- anigbrowl 15y agoYou're assuming that their goal is real-world cash. A lot of people play MMORPGs seriously as a hobby; 8 months of graft in return for (almost) total in-game economic freedom is a great payoff.
- wccrawford 15y agoThere was no legit service. It was a ponzi scheme. Profits paid out where paid from income coming in. If at any point everyone had pulled their money out, there would not have been enough. The scheme probably could have gone on longer and pulled in more money, but they had a goal and met it. You know why so many people lose so hard in Vegas? They don't cut and run when they're ahead.