Pricey pixels.

• Position: THE WEB - Brief article

Virtual goods, like the $2.50 Halloween costume in the online game Sorority Life, are no more than collections of pixels on a Web page. But plenty of folks seem willing to spend rear dollars to get ahead in social-network games or send virtual birthday cakes to Facebook friends. Although they cost almost nothing to produce, virtual, goods brought in $5 billion worldwide in 2009. They've tong been popular in Asia, but in the U.S. they've been mostly of interest to serious gamers, who bought things like swords and...