Newsmakers

Video game economics

Robert Bloomfield, Nicolas H. Noyes Professor of Management and professor of accounting at Johnson, was featured prominently in a story in The Washington Post about video game economics in the real world (Sept. 30). According to the article, Bloomfield’s ground-breaking research into stock exchange behavior in Second Life raises fundamental questions about the usefulness of real-world models of economic behavior. Apparently, online markets are functioning in a manner that might call basic economic theories into question, and scholars such as Bloomfield are continuing to explore the potential of so-called video game economics to explain aspects of real-world market activity.