After studying 314 million transactions within the fantasy world of Norrath in EverQuest II, including trading in-game goods like armor, shields, leather, herbs and food, the researchers were able to calculate the GDP of one of the game servers (the back-end computer that hosts thousands of players in one world). As more people opened accounts and flocked to Norrath, spending money on new items, researchers saw inflation spike more than 50 percent in five months. ‘We have seen that kind of volatility during times of war and in developing nations in the real world,’ said [Dmitri Williams, assistant professor at the USC Annenberg School for Communication]. ‘Our own economy has turned out to be less stable than we’d all assumed.’

(via Slashdot)

The system obtains its energy by foraging – engaging in biologically-inspired, organism-like, energy-harvesting behavior which is the equivalent of eating. It can find, ingest, and extract energy from biomass in the environment (and other organically-based energy sources), as well as use conventional and alternative fuels (such as gasoline, heavy fuel, kerosene, diesel, propane, coal, cooking oil, and solar) when suitable.

Trust Fox News to put a neat twist to the story: Upcoming Military Robot Could Feed On Dead Bodies.

In more important news, Stephen Harper said in an interview with the Globe And Mail:

You know, there’s two schools in economics on this. One is that there are some good taxes and the other is that no taxes are good taxes. I’m in the latter category. I don’t believe that any taxes are good taxes.

The author of the article, Jeffery Simpson, proceeds to vilify the PM for what he said. Even making the link that only “libertarian anarchists” think that way:

Only libertarian anarchists believe that all taxes are bad, and that society can get along without them. But who will pay, if not citizens, for the military on which the Harper government is lavishing billions of dollars? Who will pay for the police, the courts?

[...]

Indeed, the comment hearkens back to Mr. Harper’s days shilling for the National Citizens Coalition and early years with the Reform Party, when he believed that just about everything governments were doing was bad and wasteful and led to huge deficits. Since then, and especially as Prime Minister, Mr. Harper has shelved many of those views, since a distinguishing characteristic of his government has been a reluctance to cut government spending.

It didn’t take long for The National Post’s Terence Corcoran to respond:

But what is really going on here is a mounting Liberal campaign to set the state for tax increases to cover future deficits. Liberals cannot officially plant this idea, and they would much rather have Mr. Harper bear the burden by forcing him to raise taxes. As Rev. Simpson says, donning his economic hat, “economic growth alone will not restore Canada’s balanced budget.”

If that’s true, then the real alternative is is to cut spending. Now that, in Rev. Simpson’s Liberal church, is really, really scary, scary.

Can you guess what do the articles have in common? It’s just as much about ad homiem attacks as policy debate. I want to see an intelligent discussion on taxation, it’s benefits and shortcomings.

(More below the fold)


My current assumptions on taxation are:

• Being taxed sucks. Tax is bad for business.

• Business is good for the people

• I’m not a doctor, nor an accountant, nor a construction worker, nor a policy maker. To make this country as great as we want it to be, we need professionals and experts in these fields work for society, I need to pay tax.

• You get what you pay for; you have more money to work on government programs, the better off society is. This applies to the Armed Forces as much as education.

• The government wastes a lot of money

• The private sector is greedy (it needs to be in order to work best)

• Every human is created equal and should have access to the same resources to achieve wealth

Questions I’d like to see debated:

• To what extent should the individual contribute to the whole, as opposed to relying solely on themselves? What are our goals as citizens?

• Which economic policy work to achieve our goals? Trickle down?

• What is the best balance between business and taxation to achieve our goals?

I don’t see debate as much as people sticking to whatever ideas their peers support. I do not think it is a coincidence that most political divides are geographic, it is living proof that we see things subjectively. I do not claim to be much different, however.

I wish more journalists would try to see things objectively. The problem, however, is that once a conclusion is reached, the other side of the debate will decry the author ad homiem style. Lather, rinse, repeat.

It sucks that we have to get perspective and news from comedy, but at least we have such venues. Here’s an awesome (but long) article on today’s satire in the American Journalism Review. From the article:

When Hub Brown’s students first told him they loved “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” and sometimes even relied on it for news, he was, as any responsible journalism professor would be, appalled.

Now he’s a “Daily Show” convert.

[...]

Stewart and his fake correspondents are freed from the media’s preoccupation with balance, the fixation with fairness. They have no obligation to deliver the day’s most important news, if that news is too depressing, too complicated or too boring. Their sole allegiance is to comedy.

I really do believe that satire is one of the best mediums out there.

Fast forward to today, the Economist runs a story on the decrease in demand for luxury goods. Before expressing sarcastic sympathy for consumers of said goods, I’ll point out that this new trend may actually reflect it’s satirical title, as christened by Jon Stewart. If the rich are starting to panic, you know the shit’s hitting the fan.

Nevertheless, this is a good thing. It’ll hopefully push the rich decision-makers to make more sound choices. Or at least I’d like to think that.