Second Life - Different Ways to Make Money in the Second Life Virtual World

Second Life should be thought of as a community more than a game. While it may have some things in common with MMORPGs, allowing massive numbers of players to interact with each other online, what Second Life doesn't have is an end game. There's no level 70 to hit. Competition certainly exists inside the Second Life virtual community however, just like it does out here in the 3-D world and like our own reality, that competition tends to revolve around money and the things that money translates into, most notably - property.

Once you create your own Second Life avatar and start exploring, you'll soon realize that all the cities, the coffee shops, the clothing that people wear, the homes their character inhabit, were made by other residents just like yourself. The shops that items are displayed in may be owned by the creator of the items or it could be owned by a landlord, but someone has definitely bought the land where any shop is built. The same goes for nightclubs and houses. Some Second Life residents own entire islands.

The currency of Second Life is the Linden. They work like dollars and you exchange them for good and services within Second Life. Linden dollars can be purchased online or they can be earned within the community. There are lots of different ways to make money in Second Life and some people participate in Second Life primarily because they want to exchange the virtual dollars for real dollars. This is all perfectly legal as well and appears to actually be encouraged by the creators, Linden Labs.

There are lots of different opportunities to make money in Second Life, depending on what your skills are. Many designers who are great with graphics design the clothes and accessories that the avatars wear. Someone else might decide to run a nightclub and collect admission fees. Another person could simply be a bartender in that nightclub, working for a wage. The opportunities are endless and resemble how things work in the real world, but all of this is now done virtually.

The best way to get to know Second Life is to just go ahead and sign up, build an avatar and start exploring. The Second Life website at secondlife.com actually has a lot of great information about how the economy works and they even run an economy blog and keep statistics on their economy, much like economists develop statistics for the US govt on our economic health. Once you get to know the virtual world a bit better, it's likely you'll come up with your own niche and ideas for making money and can start exploring how to best find opportunities - whether you want to simply have fun and build up your own stakes within the game, or want to start trading virtual money for the real thing.

To jump start your money making endeavors on Second Life, check out the Second Life Riches guide to making money in the virtual world.

Many people buy and sell Lindens and other Second Life stuff on Ebay, so you may want to browse some of the Second Life auctions just to get an idea of how virtual money is translated to real money.

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