well, my first foray into the future of Darth Skippie Boobie,
EU virtual maven and poster boy.
thought i'd share.
Kipp Shives buys shopping mall
text taken from columbiacitypaper.com:
Kipp Shives buys shopping mall
Earlier this month, Columbia personality Kip Shives purchased a virtual shopping mall in the online role playing game, Entropia Universe, for over $30,000. Located in the virtual city of Port Atlantis, the Atlantis Mall boasts 36 shops on multiple levels. New players to the game all come through Port Atlantis and all must spend real currency for the virtual goods and services needed to advance in the game (and potentially make money themselves). And the first place they have to visit for necessities like clothes and weaponry is Shives’ mall.
Shives says that most of the retail space in his mall is already occupied by other online entrepreneurs. One real-life business in the mall will reportedly include physical copies of virtual purchases as a bonus to buyers. Other real world companies have ventured into the virtual/real economy, as well, and in May, MindArk, the games’ mother company, sold five virtual banking licenses for a total of $404,000.
Entropia’s economy hinges on an in-game currency called the Project Entropia Dollar (PED) which is pegged to the U.S. dollar at 10 to 1. Virtual items purchased in the game have a real cash value and participants may withdraw their accumulated PEDs and convert them back to real world currencies according to the fixed exchange rate.
Last year, MindArk reported and in-game turnover of $360 million.
Using the character name “Darth Skippie Boobie,” Shives estimates that he’s invested over $6000 of his own money over the couple of years he’s been playing Entropia. Through investing, sales, and canny business deals he’s been able to grow that modest nest egg into something approaching what he considers 6 digits of wealth.
Visit Shives’ marketing video at notjustfornoobs.com
-Fred Richardson