[busyrobot]

To throw in my 2 cents, in a pure practical sense it is more rational to spend $50 on a 36 x 36 pixel icon if it results in increased entertainment that you enjoy for several days, than say $50 on expensive food and beer. At least you can sell the item and make your money back when you are done. Chris said it best.

That said, food and beer ftw.

While I understand why people buy and sell for USD (it takes me less than 2 hrs of work in life to make $50, and a WHOLE lot more grinding that is no fun at all to get it in game) I have to say I am dead set against USDing for a number of reasons.

1) It ruins competition.
If you play a game that has pvp conflicts, when you know your opponent has deep pockets, no matter how many weeks you work hard to get better items in game, they can throw anything they like at you by spending 15 minutes making a USD trade.

What is the point of even having in game competitive elements if there is a "win" button you can't beat?


2) It devastates the ingame economy. Every item that goes into USD circulation takes that item out of the game economy, pushing the value way up.
People like money.
If they can take an offer of USD vs an offer of ingame currency, and once USD is on the table as an option, you have to throw waaaay more in game currency at the seller for it to be worth his while to sell it in game instead.

I dispise the practice, and "professional" USDers especially. That said I understand why some people would choose to be parasites and why and some people would spend money on USD items.