IGE

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For the antibody, see Immunoglobulin E (IgE). IGE is also an abbreviation for the "Eidgenössisches Institut für Geistiges Eigentum", the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property.

IGE (Internet Gaming Entertainment) is one of the largest MMORPG services companies, with offices in Los Angeles, Miami, and China. IGE is one of the main players in virtual economy services, also known in the MMORPG industry as secondary market. Members of the gaming community are often critical of IGE, as its services may allow players to break the rules of online games[1].

The co-founders of IGE are Brock Pierce, a former child movie star [2], and Alan Debonneville. Pierce was also the co-founder of the controversial failed dot-com Digital Entertainment Network (DEN)[3]. Media reports claim that Marc Collins-Rector is a silent partner in IGE[4]. IGE initially used an address in the city of Marbella, Spain, where Collins-Rector, Shackely, and Pierce shared a villa until it was raided by Interpol in 2002[5][6]

In January 2004, IGE acquired its major competitor, Yantis Enterprises, run by another controversial secondary market figure, Jonathan Yantis [7] for an undisclosed sum. IGE's parent company, RPG Holdings purchased Allakhazam.com in November 2005[8] and was announced in May 2006[9]. Allakhazam is a popular MMORPG community site for a wide variety of games that IGE's services cater for; however, the site continues to pride itself on not supporting the trade of virtual currencies in the real economy, typically breaking and/or removing any links to sites (including IGE) that perform such trades. This marks the further expansion of this company's presence in online gaming communities. This purchase followed that of ThottBot.com.

While many users left because of the purchase, the site is still extremely popular with players of many major MMOs.

Affinity Media was the parent company of IGE, though the company no longer has any ownership stake. Affinity Media's senior vice president of business development John Maffei, noted that "we’re no longer in that business." [10] Affinity retains control of Allakhazam.com, Thottbot.com, and has since purchased Wowhead.com [11]

Like all the other in-game currency sellers, IGE's vast majority of the revenue comes from selling the World of Warcraft gold. Its website traffic, and allegedly its revenue has been declining since 2006 for the increased competition from the in-game currency sellers based in China, and the constant bombardment of anti-real-money trading measures by Blizzard Entertainment, the publisher of World of Warcraft.

[edit] Games available

Despite the practice being outlawed in most games, as of May 9, 2007, IGE sells in-game items, money, and accounts for the following:

[edit] References

  1. ^ Welcome to www.gamewatchers.net
  2. ^ Brock Pierce
  3. ^ Digital Entertainment Network: Startup or Non-Starter?
  4. ^ radar.com. Retrieved on 2007-11-15.
  5. ^ vnu.com. Retrieved on 2007-11-15.
  6. ^ nypost.com. Retrieved on 2007-11-15.
  7. ^ IGE - About Us
  8. ^ (May 4, 2006).IGE Acquiring MMOG Sites. CorpNews.com. URL accessed 5-8-06.
  9. ^ (May 3, 2006).Announcing Zam.com) Allakhazam.com. URL accessed 5-8-06.
  10. ^ Q&A: Affinity's Maffei Talks IGE Sale, MMO Media Future. Gamasutra (2007). Retrieved on 2007-12-22.
  11. ^ Affinity's ZAM Network Acquires Wowhead, Confirms IGE Split. Gamasutra (2007). Retrieved on 2007-12-22.

[edit] External links