The Nature and Content of EVE Online Scams: Bad Bobby and Titans4U
I find the 'Criminal' behaviour in EVE to be one of the most interesting aspects of the game, and one of the reasons why I have been drawn to it. I do not understand why there isn't already volumes of academic papers on EVE. I'm hoping to discuss theft, fraud and scams a little in my thesis and use that discussion as a basis for a paper some date in the future. EVE scams would be a fascinating focus for a PhD. EVE Online defines a difference between scamming and exploits (found here) that basically endorses the 'pirate' activity of scamming, stealing from and tricking other players. This is (as far as i know) unique to the MMORPG genre. The vast majority of players do not play this 'criminal-metagame', but all players are aware and wary of it. The consequence of this is that this 'evil' or 'bad' behaviour is within the rules of the game. The largest of these thefts happened in September 2010, where the player 'Bad Bobby' stole 850 Billion Isk, thats 850,000,000,000 Isk. Thanks to EVE allowing RMT (albiet, only in one direction) we can value that at US$47,000, or the gameplay equivalent of 214 years. I've found the EVE Online forum thread where Bad Bobby discusses his actions, Read More for some great quotes.
Bad Bobby
The first quote reveals interesting insights into Bad Bobby's perception of this type of play...
I have been a pirate for most of my eve life. I hunt the weak and the foolish, I blow up their ships, pop their pods and take their stuff. That reputation is not harmed in the least by this scam. The reputation that I had for honesty and competence in business that was forged within MD was cashed in for 850b. I felt that to be the optimal exchange rate that I was going to get, with time and effort factored in. Also, the only "name in the mud" as far as this is concerned is Bad Bobby and other known alts. I have other names that are not so effected and have plenty of reputation to work with. It didn't take me long to build Bad Bobby and it didn't take me long to build the others. Once you learn the skills to build and sell reputation then it is those that are important, the reputation itself is just the commodity you trade in.
- Bad Bobby (link)
The next two quotes, his motivations for play...
When you have done enough that the majority of people trust you without question then there is little to gain from further developing that reputation. Then is the time to gather as much wealth as you can and run. Any time spent further building that reputation would be better spent on another alt ready for the next scam. For a person who takes pleasure in serving the community, like Chribba, this logic does not apply. Whereas for a person who takes pleasure in defeating others, like me, this is simply effective strategy.
- Bad Bobby (link)
Going from running a 9b isk bond directly into running a 200b+ IPO using a character that is a known pirate, with known scammer sympathies, who has never been audited, who to that point had never returned any invested isk, who has the name "Bad Bobby", who belongs to a corp called "The Dirty Rotten Scoundrels"... I call that a challenge. So if we say that I've just completed the game in hard mode... what does nightmare difficulty have in store for me?
A Question from another player, to which Bobby is responding "Given this, do you expect that you will set up new and different scams with new and different characters, just for the fun of it?" Of course. I need to improve my high score and do so under much harsher conditions. It's a game after all and you haven't completed the game until you've unlocked every feature at the hardest difficulty.
- Bad Bobby (link)
A more recent post which I wanted to put down for posterity,
No, I don't assume a role when playing EVE. I'm just myself. I don't select my actions based on what my chosen persona would do in a given situation, I do what I would do in a given situation. All those situations occur within a game, so I'm not doing what I would do if I was a real spaceship captain, I'm doing what I would do as a person playing internet spaceships. There is no make-believe going on in my playstyle and I don't dress up in funny hats when I go out pirating...
- Bad Bobby (link)
I don't consider morality to be relevant within a game. I believe that those that do are roleplayers. They are giving moral meaning to events within a computer game. I don't consider myself as "evil" within the game, I don't consider the concepts of "good" or "evil" to be relevant or even exist beyond roleplaying and background fiction within the game.
- Bad Bobby (link)
Interesting fodder for discussion.