Unclear on the concept...land sales

So here I am, trying to grok the land sale aspect of SL.

It seems that one can buy a huge plot for US$, then resell it for US$. But isn't the initial cost actually a monthly fee?

Are we looking at the virtual equivalent of subletting or assigning a lease to a third party?

Essentially, if someone wins a bid for land with US$, don't they then have to pay rent on that land?

You're halfway there.

The monthly tier fees are paid to Linden Lab for rights to use an amount of land. This could be any land, it's not tied to a particular piece of property. That's just for ongoing use.

There is also the initial purchase of the actual piece of land. You can buy this in an auction, or from another player. Some of the auctions are for $US, but if you buy anywhere else you can't pay $US directly. You'll have to get $Lindens for that.

Remember Tsarist Russia? It works like Russia. The serfs were freed and allowed to buy land or given land...but then they still had to pay what was called "quit-rent". Maybe it was supposed to be paid off some day, but in fact they could never pay it off.

Or, to use a more modern example, the "maintenance fee" on New York City apartments which are as just as expensive as just paying ordinary rent without having bought that expensive co-op.

So yes, you put all this cash up front on the auction, but yes, that only gets you in the door to then pay rent on the server space in perpetuity, in increasing increments depending on the square meters. You are arguable paying for server functioning, not land per se -- you took the title to that land on the server, but it's like God or Nature -- something higher has to provide oxygen for you to breathe while you are on the land you bought. In the Linden God-game, they make you pay for that privilege of occupying the servers they maintain, which is your "oxygen". They do provide refunds occasionally when their servers are done for extended times.

Soooo... the Lindens attempting to sustain the growth of the game by earning revenue is equivalent to the oppression of the serfs?

Yus. Evol Pinko Lindens!