A Second Life For Fun & Profit

If you have some Photoshop skills and a lot of patience, you can become a designer on Second Life with reasonably few start-up costs. You could make fabulous clothing, furniture, houses, plants, art, makeup, or even body parts for avatars. Anything you see being sold in a shop is something that another player has made, so you could make it. 

Much like in real life, land is at a premium in Second Life. Before we even get into this one, let me warn you: Becoming a land baron has a significant up-front cost. It has an an excellent rate of return, but you need to have money to make money buying and selling land on Second Life.

Land works a little differently in Second Life to the way it works in the real world, since it's a virtual platform and all the land is equally virtual. In real life, we have a limited amount of land and you can't really go beyond that without having to clear farmland and destroy forests and what not. But, in Second Life, if you want more land then Linden Labs will simply... make more land for you.

There are two types of land in Second Life: Mainland and Regions (also known as Private Estates or Islands).

Mainland is owned and operated by Linden Labs themselves. In essence, there is a large continent of virtual land that already exists, and rarely gets changed in any way. Players and buy, sell, and rent this land, but it is still owned by Linden Labs and when you "buy" a parcel of the mainland it's more like you're leasing land rather than owning it outright. Mainland is generally cheaper, but there are lots of rules and limitations you need to be aware of, and Mainland is famous for being very laggy. Plus, Mainland is never truly private, because anyone can wander by and peep in your window.

Regions are small islands of private land that you pay Linden Labs to build for you. They are completely separate from the mainland and run on their own dedicated servers at Linden Labs HQ, so they're generally much faster and more versatile. You can change the landscape as you fit, and make yourself a mountainous retreat or a beautiful tropical beach, whatever strikes your fancy. You have full control over your island, what happens there, and who can access it.

Alternately, you can divide your island up into parcels and rent the parcels out to people that can't afford to buy their own islands, or don't want to. This is how most land barons make a profit.

You can buy an existing island from the Land Marketplace, or you can commission Linden Labs to build a new island for you. If you choose to commission a new island, then you have to pay an up-front fee (which covers the creation of a new physical server to host your island) followed by a monthly maintenance fee. If you buy an island that already exists, then you just pay the monthly maintenance fee, plus whatever commission the current owner of the island is asking. Some islands are worth more than others due to different factors, including the name of the island, the size, and the number of avatars it can host.

If you want to become a land baron, I highly recommend looking into a few classes on land management in world, to get you started on the right foot.

The Second Life Marketplace is kind of like eBay for Second Life. You can buy and sell just about anything on there. For example, I buy and sell rare gacha items for a small profit to help fund Cheeky Kea's in-world endeavours. You can take a look at my shop here. 

Starting a Marketplace store is a relatively easy and cheap way to get started as a business owner, but it has become more difficult since Linden Labs banned Gachas in late 2021. But, it can also be an alternative to having to rent expensive land for items you're making as a designer, while you're still learning your craft.

This one isn't as lurid as it sounds, I swear! Breedables are kind of unique to Second Life, but they're very popular and quite fun. They're essentially little animated pets that come with different genetic traits coded into them. You take care of them and eventually they get old enough to have babies, and the babies may have a rare or valuable trait. You can then either sell your pet to another breeder, or you can breed it yourself to try and get more and more valuable traits.

There is a huge community of breeders on Second Life, breeding everything from cats to horses to fantastical dragons. If you have a look at the Breedables Category on the Marketplace, it will give you an idea of just how many different types of Breedables there are.

Breedables generally require access to land and you usually have to buy consumable food to feed them, so it can incur a bit of expense before you'll see anything back. You also need to pay out for your original starting "pair", and you'll most likely want to add new genes to your stable from time to time by buying new pets.

Breedables are expensive, but if you're stubborn and lucky then you can make quite a lot of money from them. Just make sure you check with your landlord before you start breeding, because not all areas permit breedables!

If you have any desirable skills, you can be sure that there's someone on Second Life who wants them. For example, if you're a programmer you could learn LSL (Linden Scripting Language). It's very similar to Java and C, so you'll have no trouble picking it up. Or, say you're a web designer. You could offer your services for people who want websites related to their Second Life businesses. Just about anything really. Whatever is is that you do, someone, somewhere, wants it. 

Live music is popular on Second Life, so if you have the skills to play an instrument or sing then you may find people willing to hire you to play at their club or event. Much like in the real world, live music gigs are all about who you know, so get networking!