Friday 4 July 2008

Uptown top banking

According to the AvaStar, the banks are back, though only those that have been accredited by Linden Lab.

Can anyone explain what the use-case is for using a Second Life bank? I can't really see why anyone would want to do so unless they are somehow able to offer better interest than I could reasonably get in RL. Am I being thick? Is it just to cater for residents that "do not have Paypal or a major U.S. credit card account in USD"?

Quick experiment... LeeX (a European SL-accredited bank) is offering a special deal right now, L$10,000 for 27.40 Euros - that's US$43.01. I'm assuming that this includes any transaction charges - I did try signing up to LeeX to confirm this but I couldn't make the Web site work properly.

Whatever... on LindenX (i.e. buying L$ thru the Second Life Web site) I can get L$11275 for $43.01. So, on the face of it, LeeX looks like a bad deal.

In both cases I will be charged some commission by Paypal because I bank in UK pounds sterling in RL and I'm buying L$ in either US dollars or Euros. I don't know if I am charged the same commission for US dollars and Euros.

OK, I'm confused... I still don't really understand why I should care that there are banks in SL.

Can someone enlighten me??

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