Exxy virtual real estate that's out of this world!

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Saturday, 20 November 2010 16:36

Your IT - Entertainment

OMG - if you thought Sydney house prices were expensive, wait 'til you find out what they're paying for electrons, zeroes and ones representing a virtual night club in the cyberspace of 'Entropia Universe'!

If you think AUD $500,000 to $1m is expensive for a house in Sydney, how would you feel about paying US $635,000 for a virtual nightclub on a virtual asteroid in a virtual universe accessible only through a computer?

As revealed by the BBC, the 'Neverdie' nightclub, purchased for 'only' $100,000 five years ago, has just been sold for US $635,000.

However, while that is certainly a very large sum for virtual real estate, the Neverdie club's now-previous owner Jon Jacobs said the club generates £125,000 or just over US or AUD $202,000 per year.

The BBC does not reveal exactly how that money was made - presumably people are buying virtual drinks or doing some virtual gaming or you can buy virtual items to look good when you're boogying on the virtual dance floor with your virtual 'surrogate-like' body with your virtual friends.

Presumably these virtual friends are indeed real people somewhere else in the world, metaphorically plugged into their PCs, and not friend-bots who have learned to pass the Turing Test.

There is one way to know what Neverdie sells, and that's to go into the virtual world that is Entropia Universe and do whatever it takes to get to the asteroid where Neverdie is based, and take a look around.

No doubt there are some people that will now do this, never having heard of Entropia Universe before, and will now seek it out to kick its virtual tyres and take a bit of a virtual test drive around, so to speak.

This virtual world extends onto a second page - please read on!