I recently read an article by Julian Dibbell entitled “The Life of the Chinese Gold Farmer” and I was thoroughly intrigued. It brought perspectives to light I hadn’t thought about, Many gamers out there are quite familiar with MMO games such as World of Warcraft, Phantasy Star Online, Ultima, Guild Wars, Second Life, Final Fantasy, the list goes on, but some may not be aware of the subculture that exists as a result of these games.

There are many players who play the game straight up and are content with leveling and questing, perhaps joining some buddies every once in a while and making a new one at other times. Then there are the hardcore gamers that play with no other purpose than being the best and having the most elite gear or the largest bankroll. Then there are the players that want to be “elite”, but want it the easy way and purchase their items from farmers or online services.

The latter classes of players are the ones that intrigue me and made me think about what is right and wrong with MMO games. In all MMO games there is a sub culture of gamers for the most part of Asian decent that play, no better stated “work”, in these games to gather gold or currency in order to sell it back to real life players typically in Europe and America. If you have played an MMO like WoW they are typically known as “Chinese Gold Farmers” and typically are frowned upon by other players and in extreme cases hated and even hunted.

These MMO games take on a life of their own and even an economy of their own. Where items and virtual currency are equated to real life money, this is known as R.M.T. or real money trading and that is what Julian’s article revolves around. It focuses on the life of the farmers.

Twelve hours a night, seven nights a week, with only two or three nights off per month, this is what Li does — for a living. On this summer night in 2006, the game on his screen was, as always, World of Warcraft, an online fantasy title in which players, in the guise of self-created avatars — night-elf wizards, warrior orcs and other Tolkienesque characters — battle their way through the mythical realm of Azeroth, earning points for every monster slain and rising, over many months, from the game’s lowest level of death-dealing power (1) to the highest (70).

This article provides you a different perspective to the farmers, one of a human being trying to survive by working while playing a game. Just think these guys work 12 hours a day grinding and not even for personal gain or fun, just to give their online earnings to their boss and earn a check.

For every 100 gold coins he gathers, Li makes 10 yuan, or about $1.25, earning an effective wage of 30 cents an hour, more or less. The boss, in turn, receives $3 or more when he sells those same coins to an online retailer, who will sell them to the final customer (an American or European player) for as much as $20.

It is ridiculous that this guy sits in front of a screen for 12 hours in order to earn himself less than $2. After reading this article and giving this more thought I came to some deep thoughts. We often come across the “Chinese gold farmer” and shower him with hate and loathing, but whom should we really blame? The person on the other end of the internet highway just trying to make a living? They are trying to feed themselves, would you hate someone that works at the local Best Buy? Why do we point our anger at the farmer? Why do we not hate professional gamers, they technically throw off rankings and practice on gamers in order to earn a paycheck.

Yes the farmers arguably throw off the economies of games by inflating prices and bringing in false revenue streams for players, but whom should we really blame? In my opinion you can’t blame the workers because they are providing a service, you have to blame those that purchase their service. Similar to drug slinging, there would be no crack dealers if there were no crack users. If the demand for an item albeit narcotics, online currency, adult material, whatever, would cease then so would the service being provided. So to hate on the “Chinese gold farmer” who is hopping around your virtual world is in my opinion the wrong thing to do, instead chastise your buddy who went ahead and purchased gold or items online and helped sway the scales of your online world.

I think Penny Arcade sums it up best in this strip.

Let me know your thoughts. Peace.