The terrors of Warcraft

Dear internet,

How has a single video game managed to wrangle an army of people for so many hours? Countless human beings spend their lives staring into flickering screens.

The impact hit me today when my friend theelectricmonk, told me that there is a World of Warcraft economic blog. This blog exclusively covers articles on a single minor aspect of the game called The Auction House.

In the auction house, a player is able to put items up for auction which they find in the world. Swords, Boots, and Troll Sweat can be put up on the Auction House and other players may bid or purchase the items. Somehow, the free market activities of undercutting someone else's prices, amount of a certain items, or how difficult the item was to acquire has created a micro-economy within the video game.

This blog covers price niche's, predictions in price fluctuations, and records trends of item prices in the game. It's a little mini video game stock market. It is the most boring thing in the world, yet somehow players are compelled to spend hours involving themselves with it.

The existence of such a blog is both terrifying and incredible.

Truly,
Kigs