December 2003 - Rich Thurman, a 35 year old dad is being physically threatened by gamers. Not athletes, or gamblers, or guys who sit in the park and play chess, but computer gamers.
Thurman is a normal guy with a wife and kids. After work, he comes home and often plays different games like EverQuest and World of Warcraft. These games are such that one earns in game money, or “gold,” by completing tasks or killing monsters within the game. But Thurman is no ordinary gamer. He is great with coding and programming.
”I'm a metagamer,” he says. ”Game companies lay down their rules. Some play by them, and some don't.”
Thurman uses his skill in computer code to program his computers to play his games automatically while he is away, completing tasks and killing monsters, thus aquiring gold. The items he loots from the monsters he defeats, or the items he programs his characters to make, can be sold in the game for much more than they are worth.
Thurman is being threatened because this virtual “gold” and objects are now worth real money. There are sites available where people use their credit cards to pay for virtual items in game with real cash so they do not have to go through the grinding to earn these items themselves.
Other forms of this “gold farming” exist. There are thousands of workers in China dedicated to the grinding that players may not want to do. These workers are given access to the character and allowed to power-level the character. Other workers simply create items or kill in-game characters to loot items and virtual cash, only to sell these things for real money.
What Thurman is doing is very upsetting to the gaming community because the selling of bulk material has historically inflated the economies of the games very quickly. Those who play fairly are unable to afford some of the items they need, items that would be easy to buy if no cheating is occurring.
There are no laws stating that this form of gold farming, or any form of gold farming, is illegal. However, many of the games dissallow gold farming in their terms of service. But many times, game developers turn a blind eye because they would like players to stay in their games, even if it means that they use material made or sold by gold farmers. The gold farmers themselves are an extra form of revenue for the game companies, so officials are hesitant to kick these gold farmers out of the game.
Along with simply farming with his automated accounts, Thurman had been competing with another gamer in the "game" of gold farming. But when the other gamer, Blacksnow's account got banned, he thought it was the work of Thurman reporting the rivaling gold farming activity, even though several of Thurman's accounts were banned as well. Blacksnow then reported all of Thurman's accounts, and began sending threatening messages, aimed at Richard and his family.
Along with simply farming with his automated accounts, Thurman had been competing with another gamer in the "game" of gold farming. But when the other gamer, Blacksnow's account got banned, he thought it was the work of Thurman reporting the rivaling gold farming activity, even though several of Thurman's accounts were banned as well. Blacksnow then reported all of Thurman's accounts, and began sending threatening messages, aimed at Richard and his family.
Not all gold farmers take their activity to the level Rich Thurman has. Thurman is an extremely savvy technological player, and has used it to his gaming and financial advantage. Since the threats to the livelihood to his family, however, Thurman has taken a job with a major corporation.
His job? Programming, naturally. The corporation? He won’t say.
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