One meeellion $L... how did you make it?

While I know many would likely be too 'polite' to discuss such a rude topic as how they made their first million $L, I'm searching for insight into the SL economy and business wisdom in general.

I cover tier, but sure haven't made anything close to $L 1M yet. But doubtless, there are many people in the forums that have.



Would anyone be willing to share their success story? Use an alt, if necessary... I am sure such stories would be insightful and telling.

I'm not sure I buy into the 'early adopters make all the money' concept, or that sex and gambling is the big seller. Maybe they do, prove me wrong! Could even be that someone's good news is that they saved money at Ginko.

So... barons of SL, how did you do it?

- gambling industry?
- sex industry?
- clothing industry?
- land?
- mafioso 'muscle'?
- mad scriptor sk1llz?
- 'camping chairs'?
- or?

And... how long did it take?

- a month? six? still waiting for that first $L 100 sale?


Lastly... was it worth it?

- did you make it the 'hard way', or was it as easy as getting a noob to put a plywood box on his head?




Also... if anyone LOST $L 1M and is wandering around SL drunk and homeless, that might be one cool story too.

I await any replies with anticipation.

Judging from my paypal account history over the past two years, I've "made" (as in, not given away to charity, bought stuff, etc.) roughly $L400,000. My gross $L takings probably are around $L750,000, but I've cashed out on $L400,000.

Primarily done through custom building jobs, although now I'm focusing more on my prefab business, small as it is.

Was it worth it? Sometimes. I'm always driving to make the best building I can, and as a consequence I'm always unhappy with my previous works for one reason or another. I'm a bit burned out on doing building jobs for others right now anyway, as currently the payscale sucks for someone my skill level, and the time investment is impossible right now due to RL stuff.

I love making stuff, I always have ever since I was a kid. I'd be making buildings and other widgets if I were being paid for it or not; it's a creative sink that I absolutely need in order to stay sane.

So, that's that, I suppose.

By working a little overtime in RL and buying them. ~ That's only about $3700 bucks, man! My crack habit is more than that, not to mention my contributions to Vampires for Jesus! Oh, I wasn't supposed to mention that.

For me it's all been through clothing and skin sales. Mostly from skins. My sales vary a lot over time though. I'm mostly rich because I usually cash out only enough to cover my tier and let the rest build up. Only a few times have I done large cashouts because I was a bit desperate for money in RL (heroin is expensive ya know!).

The construction industry did wonders for me. I was able to tap into a niche market where I was able to provide quality themed builds for people instead of the relatively boring generic modern builds, and I raked up around 1.7 mil in around 6 months from May to now.

After making 1.7 mil I just invested in various ventures around SL, and that yielded me another .8 mil so that pushed my net worth to 2.5 mil. So I guess it was a combination of both that got me here.

It is hard work though, trying to please various clients will take hours and hours. But considering that my profits off SL helped me greatly with strengthening my RL finances, it was darn well worth it. Never looked back.

Scripting and building I'm not making money on land rentals.

A seldom spoken SL truth is that the largest fortunes have been made in the SL sex industry.

Fascinating answers, so far!

It seems that honest sweat and effort seem to be the way to financial success, in here as most elsewhere.

My experiences, though I'm still clearly in my 'early days', seem to be running along the same lines - in fact remarkably parallel to Lordfly's.



I would love to hear from someone in one of the entertainment fields - is it really true that gambling, or escorting brings in real cash?

Well - for the right person - I don't think anyone wants to hire me as an escort any time soon.

I have long wondered about the gambling... as it is unregulated, diddling the odds on every 5th slot machine, say, might go completely unnoticed for a long, long time.

Especially if the machines were rotated a bit. Though I doubt anyone would even need to do that to make a profit as a casino owner.


Anyone else willing to share a story?

Perhaps log in as an alt and tell a tale of high finance, back rooms, scandals, and dark secrets?

Forget it, Jake! It's Chinatown...

It's true ... the house always wins, in the long run. It is not an easy job though. SL is not the most stable platform for such a business, and that means lots of support requests. I can tell you that I spend most of my logged in time responding to help requests or deploying/moving around/updating games for my affiliates. Keep in mind, I am not in the business of selling games, just deploying them and payout out profits to casino owners.

You're right that gambing is unregulated in SL, but so is everything else, and so it comes down to how much fun people are having playing the games, whether or not they *think* it's fair or not. The fact of the matter is, even with a 99.9999% payout, the house will always make money in the long run, so there really is no reason to cheat the players unless you're just in to make a bunch of quick cash and kill your business.

I do not think that it is the most profitable business in SL, by any stretch of the imagination. I maintain a high level of L$ in my account so that I can cover and immediately pay out big-win jackpots (L$1m or more in some cases) on my games. I have good weeks and I have bad weeks -- I rarely look at one single day of gameplay because it really means nothing. I have made more money on a single week of land sales than I have made in an entire month on gambling. I don't know if that makes it the most profitable, though, it is the only other business I have experimented with.