So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

[Moaku Hyena]

And demands that you file your taxes.
What? In FFXI?
Yep.
But I already filed my federal taxes!
No, he wants 95% of your Gil that you made in 2006.
Now you're holding a negative Gil balance.
But wait, we have Bush's Tax Cuts, right?

http://news.com.com/2100-1043_3-6140298.html?part=rss&tag=2547-1_3-0-5&subj=news

Why? Now the greedy guys want your virtual money because it's worth something.
I.E. RMT.

This ends today's "OMFG WTF" News.

[Jei]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

Soooo stupid. After all these combats against RMT, soon we'll have to pay real money to the government themselves for what we buy in game. yay

[Moaku Hyena]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

Soooo stupid. After all these combats against RMT, soon we'll have to pay real money to the government themselves for what we buy in game. yay

Looks more like they're taking out of the gil you make, ~_~

So the Gil goes to them Republicans, they can legally resell it or something. I don't know how it works. Either way their wallets are fatter.

[Nandito]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

It's simple really...

Log out everytime the IRS guy comes in and let SE put in a script that lets your Moogle kill his ingame character. 8D

[Mog]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

Looks more like they're taking out of the gil you make, ~_~

So the Gil goes to them Republicans, they can legally resell it or something. I don't know how it works. Either way their wallets are fatter.

Wow.... I mean wow.

I blame it on Bush. He needs to get his ass out of office. Like now.

[Moaku Hyena]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

Wow.... I mean wow.

I blame it on Bush. He needs to get his ass out of office. Like now.

Didn't we say that in 2004 and found his ass is glued to his Oval Office Seat for four more years?

In essence, taxing Gil or whatever is just stupid. But our government has been a little ambitious as of late (TCP, Destruction of Net Neutrality, War for Oil (Not confirmed but who knows), and Voter elections), so I wouldn't be surprised.

However if the service goes kaput, the Gil is worthless--like stocks. But once the Gil is sold, no refunds--like stocks. And believe me, if the IRS...I mean, the investors and corporate owners, see Gil as stocks... Well that wouldn't be too pretty now, would it? So now Gil would actually be WORTH money is the IRS can tax it. The only good I can see in this is that Gil Dupers would get a 40 year sentence since that Gil is counterfeit.

What's even more shocking that unlike TCP or Net Neutrality, this kind of thing is ridiculously easy to implement (Gil, at it's heart, is a variable). Then the IRS opens an account and does its thing--turns the Gil it collects from players to money.

The other thing I see coming is a mob named "International Revenue Service Gentleman", who collects Gil from players on occasion and kills players who don't have enough.

[DieselBoy09]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

I honestly didn't see anything that struck me as something to worry about. If it ever comes to fruition, stop playing for awhile, and go protest. When the games start bottoming out and the companies become furious for their failed ventures putting the blame square on the IRS, there will be revision. Not to mention, these "assets" are not material, and are essentially devoid of value. Sure, you can sell them, but in the same notion no one can buy them, making them worthless except to you in game. Its like trying to tax thought, its worth something, and given to someone who needs it, can be of immense worth, but in the end, its nothing. So don't fret too much, if it comes there will be two possibilites, online materials and worlds will die completely, or the law/tax will be rendered negligable, or heaven forbid everything achieves some status on which it can not be sold. Worry about bigger things, like the sheer notion that they desire to reach their hands into a pile that should never be reached into and the signs of change that this has made evident. When crap like this happens, take a stance and spread the opinion. Government is controlled by the people somewhat, you just have to force your opinion and voice out there by becoming a powerful group.

Also, stop labeling crap like this as a Republican only notion, or a creation from the mind of Bush. Things like this exist in both parties and have little to do with the feeble figurehead in office.

[Karinya]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

Considering it's quite clear in the user agreement that I don't own the gil and can't legally sell it, I don't see how it can be considered income or an asset.

Reportedly there are some MMOs where players *do* have some actual legal rights to things they own ingame, but FFXI isn't one of them. SE owns the servers and everything on them. If any "assets" exist there they are assets owned by SE, and therefore SE is the one that owes taxes on them... but the IRS has no jurisdiction over SE because it's a Japanese company, so unless the Japanese government goes along with this stupidity, nothing's going to come of it.

[Sabaron]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

You can't tax nothing.... Gil does not exist except a corporation's intellectual property. I believe we've had a similar thread before (my response will be shorter this time). All game assets are owned by SE. The only way to tax them would be to put a sales tax on RMT. However, RMT is a violation of the User Agreement, thus all items sold in this manner are already considered contraband and thus not subject to taxation but rather to breech of contract law.

[Mhurron]

Re: So the IRS guy comes to your Mog House...

You can't tax nothing.... Gil does not exist except a corporation's intellectual property. I believe we've had a similar thread before (my response will be shorter this time). All game assets are owned by SE. The only way to tax them would be to put a sales tax on RMT. However, RMT is a violation of the User Agreement, thus all items sold in this manner are already considered contraband and thus not subject to taxation but rather to breech of contract law.

In games like Second Life you do genuinely own the data you create, for instance that person does own that swath of nonexistent land and RMT is not against user agreements in all games (again Second Life for one). However regarding the entire article you are correct, who ever wrote (and writes in the future) articles like this that come to this conclusion is talking out of their ass.