Found this article about Second Life pretty telling...

http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2011/11/why_second_life_failed_how_the_milkshake_test_helps_predict_which_ultra_hyped_technology_will_succeed_and_which_won_t_.html?fb_ref=sm_fb_like_chunky&fb_source=profile_multiline

They're saying it's "failed" and proceed to lay out, in their view (or rather someone else's view) why. Makes me glad I never bothered with it. It always seemed a bit too sketchy and, more importantly, a huge pain in the ass/time sink just to learn. What's interesting is when I read it, one of the most recent comments quite predictably said "it doesn't help that it's a haven for furries and other deviants". Is that really a factor? The internet in general is, as are sites like Deviantart. But no one seems to shy away from those, or Facebook just because of who uses them. Does Second Life lack block features or something? As a bit of an aside, are "deviants" more likely to invest in things that seem to be of some benefit specifically to them, real or imagined, even when it's a huge pain in the ass and possibly a serious risk? It'd explain sites like Furaffinity still being somewhat successful in spite of themselves at least...

1-million users logged in?

...Yeah, that sounds like a flop to me. Given the amount of money people pay to get "land" and "products" and "sex" in that world, I would not for a moment call that game a business failure. Just because the real-world-market representation aspect fell through, and they don't get yearly payments from Reebok, you can't say a game which allows such magnitudes of users to engage in their (often) bizarre fantasies for a hefty fee is a failure in my book.

As an example, at this moment, there are 60,000 people playing Counter-Strike right now, on Steam. Assuming that same number of players log on every day for a month, and every player every day is unique (they're not), that would only be 1,800,000 people. In other words, SL would have half the playership of the most played game on Steam...

That's a shitload of virtual cash right there.

I have an account.
No patience, and my computer is horrendous.
Thus I don't use it much.

Riv wrote:

a game which allows such magnitudes of users to engage in their (often) bizarre fantasies for a hefty fee

I think this is basically the reason they want to call it a failure on any grounds they can find, even if it means digging the bottom of the barrel for some "milkshake test", which I stopped trying to understand halfway through the article, proceeding to just scroll down to the comments and sure enough someone mentioned furries. I think sometimes sites like Slate just write the articles they do so their readership can feel better about themselves/vent in the comments about what pisses them off. If they wrote articles basically just doing that they'd get more comments about lack of professionalism than they already do.

wolf-bone is just all sour grapes w/ Sl because he coudn't get a dreadlocked wolf skin w/ interchangeable sheath

It's just a glorified 3D chat where people can fuck each other with their murry purry murrsonas and spend all their money on useless virtual shit :V

melomethis wrote:

wolf-bone is just all sour grapes w/ Sl because he coudn't get a dreadlocked wolf skin w/ interchangeable sheath

and you're just all butthurt because a certain someone else is butthurt...

melomethis wrote:

wolf-bone is just all sour grapes w/ Sl because he coudn't get a dreadlocked wolf skin w/ interchangeable sheath

If I had any doubt in the existence of such things, I'd look it up and post you a link. But in order to save time I'll just accept that such products do definitely exist in SL and I'll leave you to find them.

Riv wrote:

melomethis wrote:

wolf-bone is just all sour grapes w/ Sl because he coudn't get a dreadlocked wolf skin w/ interchangeable sheath

If I had any doubt in the existence of such things, I'd look it up and post you a link. But in order to save time I'll just accept that such products do definitely exist in SL and I'll leave you to find them.

I had an afro and people creep me out in that game...why the hell would someone make a cock launcher?

Trey wrote:

Riv wrote:

melomethis wrote:

wolf-bone is just all sour grapes w/ Sl because he coudn't get a dreadlocked wolf skin w/ interchangeable sheath

If I had any doubt in the existence of such things, I'd look it up and post you a link. But in order to save time I'll just accept that such products do definitely exist in SL and I'll leave you to find them.

I had an afro and people creep me out in that game...why the hell would someone make a cock launcher?

The griefing in that game is top notch... I was once given a machine gun for free. Naturally, my first response was to fire it. Alot. Unbeknownst to me, each time you fired it, it released a time-delayed spam particle. After about 20 seconds, I was shrouded in dozens of annoying flashing technocolor squares.

Not to mention caging... Annoying as fuck.

Riv wrote:

Trey wrote:

Riv wrote:

melomethis wrote:

wolf-bone is just all sour grapes w/ Sl because he coudn't get a dreadlocked wolf skin w/ interchangeable sheath

If I had any doubt in the existence of such things, I'd look it up and post you a link. But in order to save time I'll just accept that such products do definitely exist in SL and I'll leave you to find them.

I had an afro and people creep me out in that game...why the hell would someone make a cock launcher?

The griefing in that game is top notch... I was once given a machine gun for free. Naturally, my first response was to fire it. Alot. Unbeknownst to me, each time you fired it, it released a time-delayed spam particle. After about 20 seconds, I was shrouded in dozens of annoying flashing technocolor squares.

Not to mention caging... Annoying as fuck.

Yea I actually had an admin nearly ban me from the area cause the free machine gun I had was lagging everyone so much that he thought I was trying to troll everyone, that and it had some sorta chain reaction to a few things I was shooting which send crap flying everywhere xD

My problem with anything like Second Life is that if I'm going to get involved in it, I'm going to want to go in big. That means learning the scripting language, making my character exactly what I want, establishing my own server and probably taking a shot at my own business. Except that's a ridiculous investment of time, and if I'm going to be learning a computer language, C++ or PHP or any of a dozen others have a much better ROI. So Second Life would basically just be what I did if I didn't allocate my time effectively, or if I was attracted to the aesthetic. I have to admit, Second Life is reminiscent of the Metaverse from Snow Crash, so there's a certain cyberpunk kitsch to it. A lot of things have that though. Electronic music production, for instance. And while that's a ridiculously saturated market, it would still be a saner gamble to learn to produce it probably than to try and make money selling virtual furniture or whatever.