• Official Linden Blog, Monday, February 12, 2007 11:01 AM

Second Life, the virtual world that's built by its users, has released census data. Key metrics have long been available for the site's home page, but the release of more granular figures last week suggests the site is trying to open up to the ad community a little more. The top five countries represented in Second Life are the U.S., France, Germany, Britain, and the Netherlands. Interestingly, Linden Lab, the game's creator, has also published the age and gender data that residents provide when they sign up.

At any given time, there are 30,000 residents logged into Second Life; the ratio of logged in residents to total registered users grew 38% from the last census in December. But this still isn't big enough to advertisers. Event sponsorships in the world remain the most attractive marketing option, but for national brands only.

Meanwhile, growth continues at an incredible pace: Second Life has 3.1 million registered users, up from 124,000 a year ago. However, remove duplicate accounts and there are around 2 million users. Still, Linden Lab actually sold fewer Lindens (the world's currency) overall in the same period, suggesting that residents are content to play with the money they've currently invested.

Read the whole story at Official Linden Blog »