Journal of Virtual Worlds Research, an online outlet for virtual worlds -related "think pieces" and scholarly papers, has published its sixth issue, titled Technology, Economy and Standards. Below is my selection of economy related papers from the issue, with comments.

Markus Falk, Daniel M Besemann, James Michael Bosson

In subscription-based virtual worlds the fee a user pays for participation is clear. However, in worlds in which the provider′s revenue is generated via transactions made by users using a real in-world currency, lack of transparency in the underlying mechanisms can make it difficult for a user to gauge the service fee being paid. This paper studies the payback of mining activities within the virtual world Entropia Universe, with an aim to determine the cost of participation in this activity for the user. Entropia Universe developer MindArk estimates the normal service fee for an active user averages at $1 per hour. We compare our findings to this figure and observe how transactions between