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Item flood was a long-time worry for specualtive Diablo fans when faced with the prospect of an Auction House. Item flood consists of a player putting up junk items that had little-to-no value in the auction house in bulk, effectively flooding the market with things that nobody would conceivably want, making searching a difficult and frustrating prospect.
Blizzard has decided to initiate a fee for each item listed, whether it is gold or currency, and this fee is taken out regardless of whether or not the item sells. A similar system is used in the gold-based auction house for World of WarCraft Warcraft and it is fairly effective; in that game, the listing fee is a proportional percentage of the vendor worth of the item in question, believed to be roughly 25%. For low-level items, this isn’t as much of an issue as the fee is fairly small (and nobody bothers to put them in the auction house because they simply won’t sell), however the fees for expensive weapons and armor can often add up.
This also helps to prevent players from grossly overpricing their goods in the auction house. While it will be the players who define the worth of an item, there’s always that one oddball in the bunch who thinks a quiver of arrows should sell for at least five million gold.
This entire subject is rather a moral and ethical, not to mention ‘’legal’’, quagmire. Yet, Blizzard has always opposed these transactions for the reasons listed above, and others. Their reasoning for finally allowing it, in their own game no less, is twofold: they are able to control the transaction, and they are also able to profit from it. A player will no longer feel the need to go to unreputable websites which may contain malicious software that steals their personal or account information. All of these transactions now take place within the game’s client.
This isn’t to say there aren’t many questionable activities that may occur in an RMT auction house, however. With the success of [[World of WarCraftWarcraft]], Blizzard has become a rather large market for gold farmers, scammers, and spammers. With the ability to directly make money from what they are already (illegally) doing, it is extremely likely that if Diablo III is successful, it will attract these less-than-savory elements.
Blizzard has made their stance clear throughout the past ten years or so on RMT transactions, and it has never really been a secret affair. Here is a direct quote (amongst many) from the company in 2007, pertaining to World of WarCraftWarcraft[http://massively.joystiq.com/2007/12/20/blizzard-wont-support-legit-rmt-service/]:
<blue>The game's Terms of Use clearly states that all World of Warcraft content is the property of Blizzard Entertainment, and Blizzard does not allow 'in-game' items to be sold for real money. Not only do we believe that doing so would be illegal, but it also has the potential to damage the game economy and overall experience for the many thousands of others who play World of Warcraft for fun ... While we can understand the temptation to purchase items for real money, we feel that players can find ample equipment and money for their characters within the game through their own adventuring and questing.</blue>