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Second Life Scores $11 Million
News.com reports that Second Life, the virtual world run by Linden Labs, has netted $11 Million in venture capital funding from the Globespan Capital Partners group. From the article: "The company makes its money by charging players use fees for land they buy and build on. For now, the company isn't profitable, and it's not clear when it will be, said Catherine Smith, Linden Lab's director of marketing. However, she told CNET News.com that Linden Lab plans to use its new funding for aggressive international expansion, as well as for hiring intended to boost its infrastructure. "
It's basically an IM client built around an RPG game engine. "fun" depends on what you do in it.
I've been playing SL for aboug 2 1/2 yrs now. I dont play every day but I am active. I used to buy land lots, build homes on them and then sell the lots for $. Recently I converted most of my linden dollars (game $) into USD. Ive made enought to pretty much cover my last 2 yrs of costs. It has a huge social network, much of what goes on there centers on social events.
The entire SL universe is the result of player creativity. Everything there (except the land itself) consists of creations by players. You name it, its probably available in SL. There is even a turned RPG called Dark Life. (or was not sure if there anymore)
I will admit its not a game for everyone. And I suggest to anyone trying to try it for a few weeks before making a decision. The "game" is unlike anything else that I can find.
But I really do enjoy it.
You're misreading the account structure.
:) If you're not the creative type and you get bored unless there's some monster that needs slaying, then don't even bother installing SL. There's nothing for you there.
Free accounts are just that, free. They last forever, and they earn L$50 a week if you log in during that week at all. They don't expire, you can continue using the free account for as long as you like. The limitations include lower limits on the currency trading system and the inability to own land outright, although there are many people in SL who will gladly rent you land.
Premium accounts earn L$500/week weather you log in or not. They cost $10/month. You also get 512m^2 of land ownership (tier). This means you can own 512m^2 of land (after you buy it). If it's your first account, you can buy "first land" which costs L$1/m^2. If you want to own a larger plot of land, you have to tier up, which basically means paying more to LL each month to own more land. Eventually you can get to the point where you own an entire server's worth of land, but it'll run you an extra $200/month. Tier is the primary way LL makes money on SL.
There are other limitations. The complexity of the objects you can build permanently on the land is limited by how much land you own. All objects in SL are built out of simple geometric shapes called primitives (prims). There is a limit of a bit over 100 prims per 512m^2. While you can make some fairly interesting things with only 100ish prims, most of the really impressive stuff in the game uses thousands of prims.
SL is less of a game and more of a toy. If you love building stuff out of blocks, this is seriously the game for you. It's like getting to play with legos and then showing it to the whole world. One thing I should point out before anybody gets the wrong idea: You can distort a prim quite a bit, making it far more interesting to play around with than simple static blocks.
I read the internet for the articles.