Virtual economy
A virtual economy is the system of production, exchange and pricing inside a virtual world. It becomes an economy rather than a scoreboard at the point where value earned inside can be redeemed for something outside — without redemption, every participant depends on the next entrant to realise anything.
Sinks, faucets and the exit
Economy design is usually discussed as balancing faucets that create currency against sinks that destroy it. That is necessary and insufficient. A closed economy with perfect sink-faucet balance still has no exit, so its currency is a score. The exit is the design decision that matters most and is discussed least.
Why closed loops collapsed
When earnings could only buy more of the same world's assets, holders had one route to realisation: sell to a new entrant. That is a structure with a fixed failure mode, and it is the mechanism that turned the land correction of 2022 into a rout.
See also
Related entries in the Register. Every see-also is reciprocal — if this entry points there, that entry points back.
Metaverse Group, The Register, REG-008 “Virtual economy”, as at 2026-08-28. https://metaversegroup.com/encyclopedia/virtual-economy/
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