Sony's virtual marketplace

Sony will start a website to allow people to sell and exchange virtual items. According to the article, Sony orginally fiercely opposed to the market in virtual goods but have now decided to get behind it. It was already starting to get weird when companies began hiring people from the 3rd world to play video games for money; however, Sony's latest move is just plain stupid. If Sony is going to run and profit from the primary marketplace for virtual goods, what's going to stop them from skewing the generation of virtual items inorder to manipulate the market. Lets see, not enough people trading --- just make level 30 armor twice as rare... Also, how does it mean anything to have a really uber character because you bought all of your items. I don't know why anybody would want to play in a world like that.