[geeks] geeks Digest, Vol 56, Issue 41

[Hicheal Morton]

>William Kirkland wrote:
<snip>
> When you file your taxes, do you claim your income that your avatar
> received in 'Second Life'?

the dems in congress are considering this.
the news reports write that the irs considers the sell/transfer of sl assets
outside-of-the-game to be taxable income.  the same news reports write that
the dems want the sell/transfer of sl assets inside-of-the-game to be
taxable.  no payments in sl$, though--only us greenbacks are accepted.

any simulation is a game; you might get paid for the simulation; you might
not.  it's like football; it's always a game.  you might get paid (think
peyton manning); you might not (like me).

chow!  er, ciao!

hungry hike


On 8/1/07, William Kirkland <bill.kirkland at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I am not suggesting the IRS should be "inside" the game, but until it
> is ... it's a game. ... as are all simulations including those that
> cost us tax paying citizens 100M.
>
> On Jul 31, 2007, at 21:24 PDT, geeks-request at sunhelp.org wrote:
>
> Message: 6
> Date: Wed, 01 Aug 2007 00:03:25 -0400
> From: Phil Stracchino <phil.stracchino at speakeasy.net>
> Subject: Re: [geeks] Second Life is not a game?
> To: The Geeks List <geeks at sunhelp.org>
> Message-ID: <46B0060D.70403 at speakeasy.net>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
> William Kirkland wrote:
> > *IF* we assume that "Second Life" is not a game ...
> >
> > When you file your taxes, do you claim your income that your avatar
> > received in 'Second Life'?
>
>
> Congress has been debating that very question for some months now.
> INTENSELY.  The general idea is, "If anyone anywhere is making some
> money, even if it isn't real, we want our share of it."  The basic idea
> seems to be that if any online game world has any kind of virtual
> economy where you can build up assets that can hypothetically be
> exchanged for real money, with or without the blessing of the game's
> creators, then Uncle Sam wants his "fair" share of whatever your virtual
> assets are "worth".
>
> --
> bill.kirkland at gmail.com
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