Online bank licenses
p2pnet.net news:- Further proof of the encroachment of the the digital world on the real one has come with the news that five bank licenses have been sold for $404,000. In ‘real’ money.
Entropia Universe says it’s, “taking its real cash economy to the next level,’ ie, cyberspace.
“With a virtual banking license in the Entropia Universe you can conduct business world-wide through the internet, securing clients not only on the virtual planet Calypso, but from all over the world,” says the company. “Provide a round-the-clock banking service for a community of over 500,000 registered accounts.”
Its five license holders have the right to exclusively operate banking services within the Entropia Universe for the first two years.
The licenses will automatically continue afterwards but, “the market may be then opened up to other interested parties,” it says, adding:
“The Entropia Universe is the only virtual universe on the internet whose currency has a fixed exchange rate with the US Dollar. Its currency can easily be moved between Entropia and the real world by making a simple withdrawal from Entropia to your Real World bank account.”
However, Associated Press is calling them pawnshop licences.
” Entropia Universe,” a science-fiction game whose currency is convertible to real-world U.S. dollars at a fixed 10-1 ratio, said this week that five pawnshops will make real loans to people who turn in virtual items like laser rifles and bionic implant chips,” says the story.
“The pawnshop licenses sold for a total of $404,000, according to the Swedish company behind the game, MindArk PE AB, and the holders may be able to extend their services to function like banks, potentially boosting the game’s economic vitality and sophistication.”
Also See:
Associated Press – ‘Entropia Universe’ opens virtual pawnshops, May 11, 2007
If your Net access is blocked by goverment restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at thIs the endSurvey: How Did Copyright Infringement Become Equated with Robbery? (of the Net) nigh?zze University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/p2p.rss | | Mobile – http://p2pnet.net/index-wml.php | | And use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site
Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local politicians. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance. Don’t just complain. Do something!
