who's really in it just for the money?

I'm not in it for the money, but it's a nice incentive to spend a little more time each week in-world.

I'm here because the average resident is able to create (in real-time) content, all the while surrounded by a thriving community. WE are building this existence...this Universe. Absolutely fascinating.

Without SL I would be 3d modeling and designing in a vacuum. I would be doing it anyway. But now, I can work in real-time with a budding civilization.

I've done pretty well financially in SL, but it really depends on how you look at it. Had I invested the same amount of time in building my RL business I'm sure I'd have done a whole lot better. If I were to ever compare the hours put in to the money I've taken out it would likely come out about the same as a low paying part time job. That's not how I look at it though. I started creating in SL long before it was possible to make real money here, and had that never happened I'm sure I'd still be making content here (though probably devoting less time to it). SL allows me to do stuff I'd be doing anyway just for the enjoyment of it and make a bit of extra money at the same time. Definitely a win-win. If my sole aim was profit and I was hoping to be the next SL millionaire I don't think I'd be having any fun at all. As long as I have a roof over my head and some food to eat, I'll take fun over money any day.

Chip's post captures so succinctly and perfectly what I hope I would feel were I making the SL money that I am sure Chip does. SL is about fun first, this is the core of its success, all the rest, the business, the education, everything stems from fun.

I believe Chip does 3D and art work in real life, which raises another point. I am interested in 3D art and game design (skinning, scripting, sculpting, etc) and without SL I would not have any outlet for that interest whereas I believe I have heard Chip mention SL is a way for him to keep the fun in what he already does for a living.

Personally I have found that SL business stuff is the least fun of all. Despite your best intentions and diligence projects and SL work are prone to stress and drama--especially if it involves partners of any kind. Beware. Nothing burns people out faster than getting roped into SL work projects that consume every ounce of SL time. I have seen at least a half dozen new people I have befriended come in, get a 'job', get in a fight somehow with someone over it, and leave never to return. It just isn't worth it. Money in any world strains even the best friendships, unfortunately. When you don't have time to enjoy life, real or second, you stop caring about it. If this is happening to anyone reading this, my advice is to explain yourself and get out of it. Unlike real life, you won't die, life won't cease, and real friends won't abandon you.

Having said all that, I do sell a little because there is something fun about selling something I have created, almost like selling my own art. Perhaps it is a neurotic need for external validation. Whatever the reason, selling one's own stuff can be very fun and fulfilling even if I could make more money as a cashier or fry-cook in real life.

Zombie thread alert!!

No I am not here for the money....
I have done lot of things for even made you business card because I had idea about design.
Most things I do no one noticed or cares.
But I do have people/friends who look out for me and care enough so that I can
be here to just create, learn and have fun and not go broke any more being here.
I am very grateful for that.

same here

i came for the visual artistic interest and creativity, got caught up in the money possibilities, didn't make any, and then accidentally found myself hooked socially, but still enjoy creating very very much.

if only i had more time to spend inworld. i love to make random things.

I came here because I had a friend here. She is off somewhere having a baby but I got addicted pretty fast. I am trying to learn how to make clothing, and minus a few bald spots I might actually have something worth selling sooner or later. I dont want to make a ton of money (though, let me be clear, I wont mind it lol) but I want to be able to pay my rent on the little beach house I am living in and have some spending money. Its all about the fun really.

I was also amazed to find out some came here for the sole purpose of making money, until I came across this, (New York Times article - Dec. 13th 2007) *edit: had the wrong date

Philip Rosedale is the one answering the question...

Q: How do people find the time for a Second Life? It seems like most people are too busy working multiple jobs and trying to keep up the payments on their credit cards and upwardly-adjusting mortgage payments.

A: Quit your real job and get one in Second Life! It isn’t possible for everyone, but there are more than 40,000 people who make money in Second Life every month.


If you want to read the whole thing -
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/13/philip-rosedale-answers-your-second-life-questions/

Are you saying he neglected to mention that 38 000 of them are making under $200 US per month, of which 23 000 are making under $10 US per month? (Data from June 2007)

And the most valuable response to Philip's answers:
Quoted for truth!

Maybe people don't read beyond what they want to hear, lol. They see $$$ and jump right in without doing any research...
I'm not here for the money, and I know myself enough to realize I just don't have the patience (or even knowledge, yet) to create any kind of business. Maybe next year I'll give it a try - for fun not money.

"Analysis" is a bit difficult to do, though. As mentioned above, making money in SL depends a fair bit on being innovative, and that requires having a good idea - and that's essentially random; you never know when or even if you'll have one. So it's a bit difficult to plan ahead to make money!

I haven't read all the posts in this thread - I've skimmed - but I get the impression that the consensus is that it's not easy making money in SL. I'll quote part of a quote from Cristalle's post:-

I agree with the first sentence, but not with the rest of it. I've been in SL for a year now, and I started in business not many weeks after I registered. It only took a few weeks to cover my tier, and not much longer to make a profit. I grew that business as far as I wanted to, and whilst doing it, I stumbled into another business that earns me a decent livilihood - almost accidentally. I had to have the amount of US$ I am allowed to buy put up to $5000 a month because the default $2500 wasn't anywhere near enough, and the way it's continuing to improve, I'll likely need it put up to $10,000 a month in the not too distant future - unless I lose some interest, which is quite possible.

I'm not boasting. I'm making the point that, I started without knowing anything much - no research, no knowing what I was doing, no plan, no great commitment, no innovations (it was skybox rentals), no mastering of marketing, no mastering of customer service. In fact I started with none of the 'required' attributes in that quote, and I succeeded. I succeeded by simply doing it, and learning what I needed to know as I went along. It only took a few hours to learn how to make a simple skybox, and I bought 2.5k of land. I was told how to advertise, and that was it. I didn't even know how many skyboxes I could rent out on that bit of land when I started. That business is no longer being promoted, and is being allowed to fade away in favour of the other business that I accidentally got into. The skybox business makes real money profits, but the accidental one makes a decent livelihood.

Imo, anyone can succeed in business in SL if they have just one thing - a strong enough desire to do it. It does require some time put into it, and if a person's SL life is about socialising almost all of the time, it's unlikely that they will make much of a business, but if a business becomes a real SL hobby, so that a reasonable amount of time is put into it, then anyone can succeed, and the more desire a person has, the more money can be made - livelihoods.

I disagree

One of the most bought lines in SL is female clothing. Is there any reason not to learn how to make female clothes and open a small store selling them? Is there any reason not to learn how to create animations and open a small store selling them? Yes, there are some well-known stores for those things, but that's no reason not to start in competition. How many people use search to find them? A *lot*. So all you need to do is be up there in the search results, and you'll get people coming. And if they like what you have, they will buy. And we all know that girls talk about their dresses, and pass LMs to places where they got them from.

I'm glad that you're doing well, but I think that you're an exception; and you've admitted that the business that actually makes you a living was an "accident". And, just because you did skybox rentals in general doesn't mean there was no innovation! In fact, there definately was innovation in your case - you mentioned that you built the skyboxes yourself from scratch, and thus they were a new, innovative design.

Now you might say that that wasn't very difficult for you, which might be true, but you still had to have the idea of that design. Having ideas isn't very difficult - if you have them. If you don't have them, it's impossible. If it wasn't for your idea, you would never have had the idea of building your own skybox and wouldn't have done so. Or you would want to build a skybox but have no idea what it should look like, and would still be dragging prims around in the sandbox trying to decide where exactly each one should go.

Is there a reason not to start competing in the female clothing market? Well, yes. It's a lot of work to get started and learn to make things, and you might need to buy art or texturing software to be able to produce anything good looking, and if you can't compete, all of that time and effort will be wasted. In fact, word of mouth can work both ways - opening with bad products can mean people start avoiding your store, and don't notice when you have good products in the future. And, again - you might not have any ideas. In which case, you can start up the latest version of Photoshop with the best produced clothing templates, and even maybe having studied art for a few months or even years.. but then can't decide what to actually draw.

This is a good point.

At some time in the future it might even make sense to remove some of the tools that come with the standard download.

That way the typical user who isnt into any building / etc doesnt have a bunch of complexity they don't need.

They don't for example build Microsoft Frontpage into Microsoft Explorer.

Plus it will stop people from accidentally texturing their entire house with their RL pics or something.

You can make money in Second Life.

But its not as easy to make as much money as it used to be.


Thus you will have to work even harder to get the same results as a couple years ago.

Or come up with something really desirable, fad items always defy any economic trend.

I agree that I'm an exception, Yumi, but only because my desire turned it into an actual hobby that I put time into, and I pressed on with it. I strongly suspect that many/most of those who don't succeed, fail because they haven't put the time into it, or give in at the first hurdle. Someone mentioned in another thread that the rental business is very good right now. It doesn't take much time at all to get into that and succeed with it.

My skyboxes weren't innovative at all. In fact I copied the basic layout from a skybox I was renting at the time. I made it smaller to save on prims, but it wasn't innovative. Months later when I'd learned much more they became innovative, but not at the start.

Learning to make good clothes takes much more time than skyboxes, but if a person wants to do it successfully, they'll put the time into it, and learn to make good clothes. Then, if they are bold enough to dive in by buying a plot of land for a store, and advertising it, they can begin to earn money. It would take time to build the business up, but it can be done by anyone whose interest is sufficient to actually do it.

Incidentally, the 'accidental' business wasn't as accidental as it probably sounded. I had a spare piece of land, so I set up a selling area for my tenants - where they could sell their stuff free of charge. I added some of my stuff, and I just kept on making and adding. I'd no idea that such a shop could make the amount of money that it does, or I'd have done it much sooner. That was the accidental bit - it grew from a free selling area becuse I had a spare piece of land.

In a nutshell: If you make things that some people like, and if you do things to get people there, then people will buy. It's just a case of putting some time in to learn to make good things, and then being bold enough to dive into it as a real business. Pussyfooting with rental mall shops isn't exactly being bold and diving in - it's hedging the financial bets, and the chances are that it won't be successful.

Anyone can have some measure of success in SL business, but for those that want to make a living off of it, they're not going to do it by accident. One can fall into the trade by accident, but without some basic common sense and business sense to continue the drive, you're probably going to end up making money to cover a few dinners out per month.

Making significant money in this game requires a significant time investment, and it may require a significant money investment. This isn't to say that small SL business ventures aren't successful or can't be, but business sense and common sense give you what you need to plan and adapt to whatever your industry is. If you aren't committed to it, it will also fail.

Telling people who cannot even parse the rules about land tier to go out and do it is bad advice. They lack the tools to adapt and will likely fail, or will be wholly frustrated the entire way.

You know, it's funny. I first started out with my shop reselling designs from other people (split pay thingy) but very quickly I got into making my own stuff. Now the money's good, sure, but I have this dream of making my shop a living museum... showcasing all the ethnic styles from around the world, including those from ethnicities that are in danger of becoming extinct to McDonald's and Levi's. I want people to be able to say, "yeah, hey, I'm Kenyan, and I can wear my country's national dress here in SL..." For me, it started out being about the money, but it's grown far beyond that, into a dream that will keep me busy for the rest of my life, if SL lasts that long. I'm in love with the possibilities that SL offers to the world. It's a constant challenge to improve and to bring ideas to SL citizens.

Well theres always that luck thing too.

Somehow you make something not so different than others, but for some reason hard to figure your product becomes the favored one.

Since word of mouth is pretty important in a world where the only thing to really do is yap ...

Luck matters quite a bit.

I agree with that - almost

I think it's fair to say that most people have a reasonable degree of common sense, and that many people are not naturally business minded. Those that are not business minded, probably won't fail because they won't even start, but people who enjoy doing business can succeed in SL if they want to.

My experience is that the people who really are "in it just for the money" usually head towards real estate within 30 seconds of their first log in. It is pretty much the only area in SL where you can make an initial financial investment and profit IF THE TIMING IS RIGHT.

Content creation is the slow growth business that requires long hours and some creative talent. There is an awful lot you can do using free tools without ever needing Photoshop or Poser, but time is the real investment.

It is also true that in order to really succeed you do need some business sense and skills - making the stuff is only half the battle, Marketing and customer service are the less glamorous but equally critical components.

I'm just here for the spending and XP