Make money by selling imaginary goods

Can you make a real living buying and selling goods which only exist in the virtual world of an online fantasy game? BBC carries a story on peole who make money by selling imaginary goods.

Mr Dibbell is buying and selling virtual cash, weapons, armour, homes and other artefacts from the Ultima Online game for Earth money from his home in San Francisco. He is trying to get rich by literally “selling castles in the air”.

A typical day starts with a check of the places on the net where money, artefacts and even property in Ultima Online are traded. He looks to see if anyone is giving a good price for what he has to sell or something he knows he can get from other people.

Sites such as eBay, Player Auctions and Tradespot list items, characters and player accounts for sale. The amounts being traded are huge. Figures collected by economist Edward Castronova show that the total dollar value of what is being traded, excluding EverQuest items, runs into the millions.