I hate this idea and think it will further pollute the game. Any time you introduce a way to "buy" your way to better gear you put down all of the honest players.

Rather than admit defeat and try to join in they should work on fixing the problem. Make more stuff rare\ex...monitor transactions done by players...there are tons of ways they could stop selling gil\items in the RL economy if they really wanted.

instead taking a huge risk buying or selling a account and getting scammed, this provides a very secure way to do this.

if ppl want to buy e-items and accts they going to do it anyway

this might ruin the ecomony of the game but the economoy is screwed anyway

se banned those accts b/c they were mpking everyone near thier spawn not cus they were selling.

i hope se does this soon

Hmm well as long as they keep it to specific servers I don't see a real problem. My only ethical objection to this is some players having an un-fair advantage over others. I have the same issue when it comes to gilsellers and account sellers.
What seperates FFXI from other MMORPGs to me is that it requires a great deal of dedication and time. All MMORPGs do of course, just not at the level FFXI does. If you want the high level job with the awesome looking equipment you should have to earn it like everyone else.
As long as I don't have to deal with it I could really care less. If people want to take a mortage on the house so they can get a Vampire Cloak thats thier buisness.

Long post here but one with some very good points

Ok this concept is a very sharp double edged sword. I cannot speculate nor can any of you what the real effect of this would be if implemented in FFXI. But I would like to point out some facts.

1) Gilselling already exists on all severs whether legalised or not. The legalizing of this will NOT add something to the game that is NOT already there. We can not stop gilsellers. We WILL NOT stop gilsellers from playing the game, and people already buy and sell online currency and items for RL cash. No matter how much we hate it gilselling and buying is and always will be a part of any MMORPG whether legal or not.
2) That said I honestly don't know if this would have that big of an effect on the game at all. People already have a firm stance on whether they are gil buyers or not. I like to think that most people who don't buy gil will not buy gil if this is added, and I like to think that the ones who DO buy will continue to do so at the same amount they do now.
3) Last I heard 1 million gil is worth approximately $30 Real Life. Now I don't know about you but even as a lvl 64 goldmither and a player of 1 1/2 years 1 million gil is not something that can consistantly be earned at a speed which would make doing this solely for money worthwhile. Many many players cannot make 1 million gil in even a RL month let alone a RL week or less. Lets face it, gil is worth very little in RL currency for the amount you get in game. Even if you farm at a rate of 100k gil an hour you are making $3 RL an hour which is less than half of minimum starting wage in most places. To do this as a way of living is fairly inconcievable.
4) I doubt high end items would stop being sold on AH and such. Personally I play this game for fun and not RL dollars. I would like to think that at least 90-95% of the people playing FFXI do it for fun. And if you are not concerned with RL currency then you will sell your in game items for gil and buy more in game items. You will continue to party and raise the job you want to.
5) Having servers dedicated to this and others to non selling allows segregation towards that which you prefer. If you want to play on a non-currency selling server then do so. You will be playing with like minded individuals. Then the problem of gilselling will most likely be less of a concern because with a dedicated non currency exchange server there should be very few to no clientel interested in gilbuying. If nobody buys it then there is no market so gilsellers will (hopefully) focus on servers where its allowed.

In summary I just want to especially stress point #1 that it ALREADY happens, just on the black market. When you look at probation of alcohol things got better after alcohol was legalized again. Taking the power out of the gilsellers hands may be a good thing or it may be bad, but you cannot KNOW beforehand its result. The effects would have to be seen.

FINAL NOTE: I don't care what this post says Square Enix is NOT owned by Sony. SoE has no say whatsoever in the way SE conducts business. Their share of stock in the company is less than 8-10% if that. SoE has no power whatsoever to make SE lgalise gilselling. I personally do not believe it will EVER happen in FFXI. That said I believe this topic does not even belong on the FFXI board and is totally a moot point. Allakhazam is full of speculations and thats all this is, there is very little chance FFXI will have this implemented ever in my opinion.

Anyways those are my thoughts. /wave to all you folks on the unicorn server. See ya in game.

The good:
If people that wont buy items online have the ability to join a non-RMT server, then the gilsellers or whatever would have no business to peddle there and would have more competition on the servers where it is legalized.

The bad:
people will be legally capable of depending on a game as a source of income, more people overcamping, etc. which ruins the servers where it is allowed

The ugly:
that any game would think of doing such a thing ><

I agree that on servers with this system any item with significant real world value will no longer be avalable as a trade for another in game item. It would be highly unlikely that if two items were roughly the same value that the two people wishing to exchange them would run into eachother. Basically the only good items you could expect to see on anyone would be rare/ex gear. The only character types you'ld see would be theives. Very rapidly you'ld see the value of items like the theif's knife, other +TH and +Steal items go through the roof since they would become RL investments.

Basically the only value to in game currency would be for relatively low value items, purchasing from NPCs, and consumables. This would be very similar to what happened towards the end with Diablo II when RMTs became so rampant that blizard could no longer do anything to block them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sell_out

Will this stop NM camping no, will it make it more appealing probably, do i really care ... yes

Sony only owns around 19-20% of Square-Enix. This is not a majority share. We don't have to worry about them making SE have the same system, because they can't force them to.

I told you so.

I've told many I've known that SE was not cracking down on this harder because they wanted to get in on the action.

They haven't yet and said that it won't happen in FFXI, but did not rule it out for future products.

for 5 seconds put the emotions away and really think about how the system is going to work. sony steps in and takes goods/money from player x and goods/money from player y. when both parties agree, sony exchanges the goods/money. its nothing more than an in game escrow.

i think its a 20-day old april fools day joke

think of the doors this opens though for all kinds of complications regarding property rights and compensation. Lets say there is some kind of ***** up with the server maybe you lose your character or your best sword. well how will they compenstate you for that? Cash or virtual reimbursment? What about when the game is about to go off line? They will have to compensate you somehow for all the effort you put into your vitual goods witch they now say have a legal, monetary value. This is going to lead to some legal battles that are very well going to change the way intellectual property rights are handled for all things virtual.

I can see what they are trying to do. If you can't beat them join them, they are trying to get rid of the 3rd party money sellers by selling the money theirselves. Think about it, another way that they can make money from you the player. It makes sense in a sick way but I don't think it's gonna work. And besides, I really doubt SOE is gonna effect anything that SE is doing... I mean how would it look for SE to start selling gil after banning 800 accounts? Exactly... it's not gonna happen.