ECONOMY and SECOND LIFE - the quick and dirty explanation
by Philip Rosedale and the Second Life team
Intial Allocation and Stipends
-----------------------------
New users start out with around $3500. The amount changes a bit with
the total number of online simulators / users.
Every week, a stipend (think of it as a portion of the overall economic
'pool') is granted to each of the current users. The amount of this
stipend is determined by two things: a base amount (which is the same
for all users), and a bonus amount which is based on your reputation
score. The amount of this bonus can be substantial (much larger than
the base amount) in the case of very high reputations. The exact base
amount varies by the amount of money in the global pool, but is
generally around $1000/Wk/Resident.
Land Cost and Taxes
----------------------
The price of land is initially around $3/square meter, and has a tax
rate of $1/square meter/week to keep. So a typical plot of 16x16
meters would cost $768, and you will be billed $256 a week to keep it.
As the % ownership of land with a region increases (you can see this on
the map as the little green bar in the right lower corner - hover over
it), the cost and tax of land will increase for new purchasers.
However, the tax rate will not change for existing owners (so get in
early!!!).
Object Cost and Taxes
-----------------------
Anytime you create anything in the world (either by dragging from your
inventory or building with the create tool), you are charged $10 per
shape/primitive in the object you build. So for example, a pair of
sunglasses might have 5 primitives and thus cost $50 to bring from your
inventory into the world.
When you delete any object that you own, you are credited back the same
$10/shape creation cost. So it doesn't cost you anything to 'play' -
making objects and then deleting them.
Objects in your inventory are not in the world and are therefore not
taxed. They cost you nothing - you can have as many things in your
inventory as you like.
Any object that you own, anywhere in the world (whether on your land or
not) is taxed on a weekly basis. You can see the owner of an object
when you hover over it - if it belongs to you and is there for a week or
so, you will be taxed for it. As with land, the tax rate changes by the
density of objects in the simulators. Additionally, like land, these
changes (generally increases) do not apply to objects already in the
land. However, they do apply to all newly created objects.
Objects that are lights cost more... the extra weekly tax is show in the
edit panel.
Managing your account
-----------------------
To see a most recent summary of charges, select view->account history
from the menu. You will see a list of most recent charges/stipends, and
at the bottom an estimate of what your charges will be in the next
period. This should be helpful with planning.
Summary - what this means to you
-----------------------------------
Clean up after yourself by deleting 'test' or temporary objects,
regardless of where they are in the world. They will cost you taxes -
even if they are at a friends house.
Keep things you don't want to be paying taxes on in your inventory, not
in the world.
Build things / buy things efficiently - less primitives means lower cost
to create and/or keep things in the world. Building a house out of
toothpicks or having 'real' mullioned windows will impress your friends,
but only because they'll know how much tax you must be paying.
Be mindful of how many lights you use in building - they will cost you
extra taxes.
Don't buy more land than you need, unless you really want to have a big
yard!
Watch the little indicators at the lower right of the map as an
indication of how loaded (and therefore expensive) it will be to buy
land or create objects in the current simulator.
You can check out the charges on your account by selecting view->account
history.
