been wondering....

for those of us in the United States, do you belive that a recession can affect Second Life in anyway?

my 2 cents: yes, aboslutley, with the ammount of the us dollar dropping from the euro, and the canadian dollar, its going to change the exchange rate by a long shot

No doubt about it.

With Gas prices rising, grochery prices rising and all else it is harder to justify spending as much on SL as some of us used to.

yea, thats what i ment, the ammount in spending will do down, Ll will get most of its money from european players and candian players

think it already has.

Agreed. But, as it gets more and more expensive to go out for dinner and a movie, there will be those that may choose to stay in and socialize with their friends in SL. After all, you can still get a fair bit of L$ for the cost of one meal at McDonalds.

May not be an even trade off but may soften the blow just a bit.

I think you are right in that it might keep SL popularity up but there are a lot of people who currently spend more than they would need to be "entertained" in SL ... SO there is still room for reductions in even if popularity grows.

I certainly hope you are all able to ride it out best you can, but agree that when times are hard, you have to tighten the belt where you can.

As a UK resiident, we've had a hike in tier costs due to VAT and can assure you our (RL)vehicle fuel costs have been nothing short of ripping us off for years. In addition, I do know what happens State side does affect us this side of the water too - where I work we've had to make redundancies because we are owned by a US company and had to lay off huge numbers over there so we have to do our bit here too.

So, our sympathies are with you and hope you all are able to stick it out.

Thank you Kaia! I hope things remain well for you over there too.

I think the games that will suffer the most are those with pay for play models. People who spend $15 - $20 monthly just to play will start thinking twice about their budgets. I know the days of my wife and I sinking $60/month for 4 accounts in SWG are long gone.

Maybe. OTOH, it might be that more people will need to find alternatives to spending money on movies/concerts/ball games and such, and find SL a less expensive alternative.

One thing for sure, we are all about to find out.

it won't be long before the U.S. will be at 4.00 a gallon on regular fuel..diesel is already there..
part of our income on our ranch is hay and with a drought last year in the south a bail of hay was already selling for 7.50 a bail and from our ranch 5.50 because it is mostly family when we have a short season

at $4.00 a gallon right now with Diesel fuel we figure at the time we start cutting it will be already at 4.50 the first cut ..we would have to sell at 9 dollars a bail to break even..

now hope there is no drought this season and then add all the other living expenses as someone stated that are affected by shipping fuel prices ..like groceries and anything that has to be delivered.
ya it is already having an impact with fuel prices alone not counting the decline in the dollar.
more than likely we will end up going to round bails and just keep them for our own stock..i'm sure a lot of farms will end up doing the same thing which will leave the people that don't grow hay traveling farther to get it and paying a greater cost than local per bail..

thank god my family owns a construction company also*sarcasm*
we are already seeing holds on houses that were planned to go up this year and some of the people lost their homes that were on our list for us to build them a new one..

from the point of doing so well that they would have us build them a new home while theirs was on the market to the bank recalling a loan on them and they lost everything..
i never felt so bad for someone in all my life when they would come in to cancel with us..
you just wish there was something you could do to help them..

i think in the U.S it will have a big impact on people and their sl and will only be getting worse before it gets better..i know my spending is going to start to slow down..shopping is one of my first loves in sl.

The coming recession is not just a US thing, it will probably affect most of the world. Land prices are dropping already in SL.

Old computers get sick and sometimes die. If there's a recession, a growing number of people won't be able to replace their old computers when they conk out.

Awww, that is a sad story! I really feel for you. I know what it is like, I might be put in a position where I have to sell one of my six yachts, and that means we will probably have at least one less holiday per year. There are bad times ahead for all, I tell ya!

Don't take this as gloating, but for us in foreign lands, it's actually a bit of a benefit, in that the $ exchange rate is constantly improving for us.
Although there's currently a large international presence in SL, the current financial situation may see more "foreign investors" getting involved.

hahahaha

Feel my pain!!!!! lol
sorry i kind of drifted but when it's late at night and i start typing i sometimes can't stop lol

so how much are you selling the yacht for? with us thinking about selling half our horses we may be in the market for one..

I would hate to let it go for less than $2,000,000, but you know, when needs must! Dern, I've only used that yacht twice, so it is practically new! Still, must pay the bills. Maybe I will just cut the wages of the household staff instead.

British sterling is dropping to, its very weak against the Euro now.. Its all going to have a knock on effect..