Been doing some calculating....

Some basic facts to begin:

One premium account: $10 a month, 512 sq m of land and L$2,500 on a five week month.

Two premium accounts : $20 a month, gives you 1024 sq m of land, and L$5,000 on a five week month.

Four premium accounts: $40 a month, 2048 sq m of land, and $10,000 on a five week month.

Five premium accounts: $50 a month, 2560 sq m of land, and $12,500 on a five week month.


Some financial facts:

L$2,500 (one account) is worth $8.50 on Lindex right now.

L$5,000 (two accounts) is worth $16.70 on Lindex right now.

L$10,000 (four accounts) is worth $33.09 on Lindex right now.

L$12,500 (five accounts) is worth $41.29 on Lindex right now.


Now, assuming people have the above amount of accounts, keep the land and join their land tiers, then dump the money on Lindex, where does that leave us?


One premium account plus a 512 sq m tier is L$15 a month minus $8.50 worth of currency, meaning it costs you $6.50 to play.

Two premium accounts is $20 a month minus $16.70 worth of currency meaning it costs you $3.70 to play (divided by two accounts is $1.35 a month per account).


One premium account plus a 2048 sq m tier is $25 a month minus $8.50 worth of currency, meaning it costs you $16.50 a month to play.

Five premium accounts is $50 for 2560 sq m of land, minus $41.29 worth of currency, no tier, means it costs you $7.71 a month to play. I believe this is the 'optimum efficiency'.


However... two premium accounts plus 2048 sq m tiers is $50 a month minus $16.70 worth of currency, meaning it costs you $33.30 per month to play - but 10 premium accounts to get the same land costs $100 in accounts minus $82.27 (L$25,000) meaning it costs you $17.73 per month to play.


One premium account plus a 4096 sq m tier is $35 a month, minus $8.50 worth of currency, meaning it costs you $26.50 a month to play.

Eight premium accounts costs $80 a month, gives you 4096 sq m of land, no tier, minus $33.09 of currency, meaning it costs you $46.91 a month to play.


One premium account plus a 16384 sq m tier is $85 minus $8.50 worth of currency, meaning it costs you $76.50 to play per month

Thirty two premium accounts is $320 a month for 16384 sq m, minus $262.60 of currency (L$80,000) meaning it costs you $57.20 per month.

Thirty three premium accounts is $330 a month for 16896 sq m, minus $270.80 of currency ($82500) meaning it costs you $59.20 to play per month.


Could this be why the amount of 'residents' is increasing so fast? It's mostly alts and money farming? I haven't worked out whether there's a point where LL are actually paying you to play yet.

Any thoughts?

Lewis

But you'd have to tier down after that time? Is the 2,500 from a referal? If so, that's only one time, not monthly, so it would only benefit you for a month.

2500L is 500l /week in a 5 week month

Working this all out on 5 week months makes the figures decidedly shaky from the start and not at all like the reality. Sorry, but I don't see why you'd pick 5 week months for these calculations.

All my calculations (assuming that I got them right) are on a month by month basis, with no carrying forward from the month before, and no inclusion of referrals.

Lewis

A couple things:

1. There are three 5-weeks month in a year, on average each month you get $500 x 4.333 = $2,167 at 300L to 1 USD that's: 7.22
2. Priemum account comes with a free 512 m2 tier.

We can only really compare when we look at this at a tier point of view:

512 m2: a wash

1024 m2:
single account $15 - 7.22 = 7.78
2 accounts $20 - 14.44 = 5.56

1536 m2
single account $18 - 7.22 = 10.78
3 accounts $30 - 21.66 = 8.34

2560 m2
single account $25 - 7.22 = 17.78
5 accounts $50 - 36.1 = 13.9

4608 m2
single account $40 - 7.22 = 32.78
9 accounts $90 - 64.98 = 25.02

8704 m2
single account $50 - 7.22 = 42.78
16 accounts (10% group land bonus) $160 - 115.52= 44.48

16896 m2
single account $85 - 7.22 = 77.78
30 accounts (10% group land bonus) $300 - 216.6= 83.4

While you do pay relatively less for the land tier (plus the 10% bonus for group land) You would still pay more as you size up in land and reverse the trend once you go up to the tier of 8704 m2

Now on the other hand if you go for a full year, RBD had already worked out the math that unless L falls below 361 you actually make money. (Kinda... his calculation assume 0% APR, inflation and actual return should really be looked at more carefully)

Sorry, didn't read too far past noticing you're talking about cost per month (which has, on average, ~4.3 weeks) using figures based on 5.0 weeks. At that point, one assumes you're baking the figures to bias the results towards some conclusion or other (don't know what, didn't read beyond noting that you're doing it)...

Five premium annual accounts.

USD Cost: $360.00
L$ Income: L$130,000

USD Income From L$ @ 300: $433.00
Free Money: $73.00
Free Tier: 2,560m2

USD Income From L$ @ 250: $520.00
Free Money: $160.00
Free Tier: 2,560m2

Paid to play! Nice! And people wonder why the L$ valuation declines in spite of a booming economy. If you could pay your annual premium and get your full L$26,000 immediately, the rate would be 361 immediately.

What's most interesting though, is that this free money isn't comming from LL. It's coming from L$ buyers. In other words, by purchasing this L$, the COMMUNITY is paying these people to do nothing but submit their own premium payments to LL annually. Paying USD to LL is not much of a community service, if you ask me.

Now that I've given this some thought, it's a terrific reason to slash those premium stipends.

No bias or baking, just a simple miscalculation on my part. Even working on a 4 week month, the figures are still in favour of multiple accounts and selling the L$ up until a certain break-even point, as others have speculated.

Of course, paying quarterly or annually gives an even greater 'opportunity for profit'.

Lewis

The one year preimum account is more like a short term bond, However there are a few things need to be considered.

1. the 3.5% transaction fee
2. this stipend bonus pretty much a open knowledge
3. Unstable/ specualtive market. Over last 6 months price had wetn from 260L per usd to 300L per usd (~15% drop)

Assuming the current exchange rate hold: the return per year is ~20%. minus the transaction fee and estimate 3% APR inflation you have a return ~ 13.5%. now look at how much ~L has devalue in just 6 months... want to risk it?

Isn't keeping LL in business pretty much the most important community service there is?

We're not talking about keeping LL in business. Nice spin, but that's not the point. The point is that those with five premium annual accounts are being PAID by everyone who buys L$ on LindeX to do NOTHING but pay LL. That's mind boggling, lol. So, how many premium annual accounts do you have?

When the L$ gets to around 350 (rough estimation off the top of my head), 5 premium accounts will be a break-even proposition, without considering the 2,560m2 of land tier. Until then, I think I'LL risk it. I'll order a 5th account later today.

So, how many annual premium accounts do YOU have?

I calculated my figures based on a 52 week year. It adds up even BETTER!

Zero, SL to me is a hobby not a job

Don't forget other investment would could have spent the money on. On the other hand $360 a year is a drop in a bucket in RL investment spending.

Forgot one more thing, $1 fee to transfer money to paypal account which work out to be another 1.4% cost (assuming annual gain is $73 bucks)

some number crunching in this thread. link

Um.. they're being paid for converting a less popular way of obtaining money (regular, relatively small, payments over a long period of time) to a more popular one (quick fixes of large amounts of L$). And, of course, they're taking a risk (if they can't sell their L$, or the L$ falls, they're still locked into premium for 12 months).

I think it's like that old puzzle with the two bars at the US/Canada border.. it seems that no work is being done but there's value in the transaction process anyway.

Do lifetimers get premium stipend?

D'oh! Sorry, brain fart. I was thinking weekly.

I think compared to the number of residents the actual amount of people bothering with stuff like the original posters scenario is going to be very small.

Remember for a modest amount of concentration, effort and a bit of inventiveness you can easily bringing in far more that the $ 2500L a month a stipend gainer would get in a month.

Bear in mind, however, that a person who did that would likely be gaining an L$2500 stipend as well.

In fact, they'd be more likely to cash it out, because it wouldn't be their only source of money to buy in-world items with.

Let me get this straight, you based all of your calculations ... and a lengthy post on ...

... a five week month?

perhaps, but I still doubt multiple Premium accounts are all that rampant a problem.

The principle remains on a four week month as well, if you'd care to run the numbers. There is basically a point where SL is cheaper to pay for multiple accounts and sell the excess L$ than to have one account plus land tier.

I consider an 'account' as a premium, basic freebie accounts are just trial accounts in my eyes.

Lewis

Probably not. However also bear in mind that, unlike earning money in SL, they aren't limited. There's no limit to the number of Premiums SL will sell, but the number and amount of business earnings is limited by the economy. Because the economy is growing, the limit is constantly rising, and SL wasn't close to it anyway, so this shouldn't put anyone off - but the economy can't run away with people earning money. It can with multiple Premium sales.

Its your thread and your point Lewis. You might want to re-adjust your numbers for us...and make them accurate and applicable.

Accuracy and correctness goes a long way toward making your point credible and worth reading