Example of Poor Logic

I've been brainstorming ideas for the blog, but today I have an off-tangent to discuss that you may have heard about. It does relate to WoW in a sense, so it is on-topic. For background information, see this article:

http://www.pnas.org/content/106/28/11520.full

This is a scientic study that has been conducted on groups of individuals with varying backgrounds and motivators. The study uses an economic game to study the ability to process fairness against gain.

Essentially, they use two participants in a trade agreement. They have minimal contact or conversation. They each perform one role in the trade agreement. The first person chooses a percentage to divide a profit between both of them. The second person only has the power to veto the proposed trade. Nothing is ventured in these scenarios, regardless of the percent offered both parties will always profit from the trade. When the person with veto power has the power to voice his opinion or anger to the first person, the trade amount is more often accepted in unfair amounts. Here is an excerpt from the findings:

According to the self-regarding actor model typically used in economic game theory a rational, cognitively competent self-regarding responder should accept any proposal that provides some money, no matter how small the amount. A rational proposer who expects this response should therefore propose to give the minimal non-0 amount to the responder. However, the results of ultimatum game experiments generally do not support this prediction.

This tells us a lot!

It explains part of a social dynamic our brains have encapsulated into our daily life that makes decisions or chooses our attitude in situations that involve personal wealth or gain. Lets apply this to WoW, I will be the first person, other players can be the second.

• I offer someone with 20 flowers 50 silver each for them. He can choose to continue to re-list them on the auction house for weeks and fail to sell, too much competition and undercutting. Or he can sell to me and make small but realistic profit.
• I sell a Glyph for 5 Gold that someone else sells for 25 Gold. In response, he chooses one of three options: Buy my auction and re-list, Cancel his auctions altogether, or Undercut me. In all three examples, he is giving up profit because I offered him an unfair trade. The closest of the three options to be profitable is buying me out, but as we know, Inscription is an easy trade to resupply if you do it right, so this method cannot win against a good trader.
• In a raid, 25 people kill a boss and a piece of loot drops. The loot is distributed to player X, and player Z complains that it is unfairly rewarded. Player Z leaves the raid and loses out on opportunity to win the next piece of loot. Subsequent repeat performances remove player Z from the guild altogether, now all loot potential is zero.
• I ask in /trade for a crafter to produce an item with my materials. I offer him a 5 Gold tip for his services. He does not like the amount of the tip versus the time and Gold he spent to level the trade, so he declines to click 1 button for 5 Gold. I find someone else to take my money and move on, second person becomes resentful and continues to refuse Gold for pressing 1 button.

See what I mean? You probably have seen people act this way, if you yourself have not. Identify these traits and choose to overcome them! If you want to be profitable, you have to think profitably! Don't just go with 'gut instinct' because in some situations (such as these) it's dead wrong. As for the last example, if someone is not able to be self-reliant profitable with a maxed out trade, then they are the reason for not being rich, not small tips. It takes work to become wealthy, do not think everyone will just give you free money for being the only person who replied in /trade. Also, many people level trades for their own interests. In this case, how can you justify these costs to level your trade on others, if it was your choice and for your interests?

Thought for the day: If you could work 5 hours for 25 Dollars and enjoy the work, or 5 mintues for 25 Dollars and hate it, which would you choose and why? At what Dollar/Hour ratio does your answer change?