A recent report showed that second life is continuing to experience economic growth. Although fewer new users are signing up for Second Life, the faithful are spending more time and money than ever before. Second Life's in-world economy is growing at a rate of 15 percent annually. User hours, concurrency, and economic transactions all showed robust growth.
Less positive statistics include total avatar population growth of 3.2 percent, the slowest month-to-month growth on record. Also, Linden's premium subscriber base declined for the fourth consecutive month in March. Interestingly, Second Life achieved a gross domestic product of US$300 million, a larger total economy than real-world nations Dominica and Micronesia.
These numbers may show some positive signs currently for Second Life, as the world is continuing to grow amid a tough virtually competitive environment. However, I believe that the new user numbers are still the most important. This is due to the fact that the virtual world is not large enough or proven enough to sustain itself without continuing to attract new users. Hopefully SL will make this a priority sooner rather than later.
2 comments:
In terms of Second Life being financially viable, I really didn’t think that anyone could benefit from it until I contracted with a builder to build our American Avatar auditorium. She began building as soon as I contracted with her, and she was literally in-world for 12 hours a day—this led me to believe that she doesn’t have another job. In one week, she got 150 U.S. Dollars, and according to her, that offer was a bargain—she usually makes more money for a complicated building like ours.
It is somewhat unclear when the economies and dollars are discussed in SL. The 300 million I suspect is 300 linden's.
Yes Eisa is right one has to take this up as a serious partime job to get some decent revenue.
Post a Comment