Originally by: Akita T

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b) concede that the overall "cost" (in manpower, mainly, which translates into money also) of fighting RMT in an all-out war is simply unacceptable, and find an alternative way of "keeping it in check", even if it means allowing (to a very limited degree) everybody to become a (very small scale) farmer

So, yeah, in the end, it all translates back into money, real-life money.

With "the all-out war on all forms of RMT", you lose a percentage of the population that can't or won't pay cash to play the game, and you lose a percentage of the population that can't afford to spend the time to gather as much ISK as they need but won't resort to buying ISK from a RMTer. You will also probably some innocent people just MIGHT get caught in the crossfire, because somebody framed them just so they can get rid of them.
At the same time, RMTers still make their money from the people that are stupid enough to buy from them.

With GTCs, on one hand, you might lose a percentage of subscribers that adhere to the "a)" principles, but that's insignificant compared to the player base you would lose in the "war on RMT".
You will still have the farming ops making a living out of those careless or ignorant enough to still buy from them instead of other players, but that income will be severely reduced compared to the playerbase count.
On the other hand, you gain a lot more subscribers, and you keep the value of in-game ISK relatively high since "player farmers" (as opposed to "RMT farmers") generally rely a bit more on goods-creating and service income mainly (mining, datacore harvesting, manufacturing, hauling, trading, looting and salvaging) than just pure ISK faucets (ratting and mission-running for the bounties and rewards only).


So... yeah... it's only a matter of opinion, in the end.
Thankfully, it's a mater of CCP's opinion.
And they decided to go with option b).

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