Valve has an economist they work with for TF2, and he blogs: http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/economics/arbitrage-and-equil...

He hasn't blogged in months, though :(

He was a guest on EconTalk a few months back and it was mentioned that he is now at the University of Texas. Most of the conversation was about Valve's corporate structure, http://www.econtalk.org/archives/2013/02/varoufakis_on_v.htm...

Like this:

Economic Consultant for CCP Games - 2007 to Present

I suspect there were plenty of economists already looking at virtual worlds for research purposes.

This Reuters article on their first economist hiring has quotes from him. http://www.reuters.com/article/2007/08/16/us-videogames-econ...

I'm willing to bet that Blizzard has at least one psychologist on board...

I play the game quite a bit, its said that there are some very rich russians that hire people to manage alliances, make money, and lead fleets.