First Meta provides value in many other ways too, from Second Life events, tools for vendors, a community, and sales promotions. Using and participating is completely optional, but many people agree with it and find it useful.

Why in gods name would I want a Credit Card in Second Life? The only reason I can think of to even have one in Real Life is that there are some things that you just can’t afford to buy in one sitting like a house or a car, or so that I don’t have to carry my cash around with me all the time (which a Debit Card works fine for). But, in SL you always carry your cash around with you very conveniently and safely, and there’s really not much of anything in SL that can’t easily be bought in one sitting.

Not only that, but this thing won’t even work everywhere. Only other merchants who are dumb enough to get involved with this scam (though, I suppose how dumb they are depends on which side of the scam they’re on), so not only does it really do nothing for you, what it does do it doesn’t even do well.

If this plan actually goes through and starts running (is it running now? I don’t know), here’s my 10 dollar bet that by the end of the year, there’ll be a story with a headline like:

“Meta Card users defrauded for millions of L$, JP Moughin and Tyra Fierrens nowhere to be found”

well when renting shitty houses on the mainland becomes against TOS and you do things differently to avoid breaking the rules, then maybe they’ll do it to you too. But honestly the way you conducted yourself at the Stanford Metaverse meeting yesterday, isn’t it any wonder why no one wants to chat with you?

Instead, there is journalistic shorthand from the non-lawyer-turned-virtual-economist Jessica saying “LL reviewed their business plan” and they “met with Cory Linden”. Gosh, where do I sign up to get a meeting with a Linden and a review of my business plan?!

There’s another way to have “just one charge on my credit card” were I to desire it: buy a bunch of Lindens at the start of the month and keep them in…my account on my avatar lol. I’ll get one line-item at the end of the month on my regular credit/debit card.

There’s also the empty vow “to take whatever regulatory steps are necessary” which no one can check, and which covers up the fact that…they don’t have a license *now*.

Do you need a license if you don’t offer interest? Well, I guess not, but gosh, isn’t some regulatory agency likely to ask at some point what right this entity has to come and take everybody’s money and hold it? Because…while the Lindens don’t allow you to offer interest, what’s to stop you from taking the float from everyone’s money and putting it in PayPal after cashing out and earning interest there? Intending to make it instantly available, of course, if you get some sort of demand for withdrawals.

All you have to do to get a grip on how bad a business idea this is, is to look at the economic statistics page. There are only 360,000 people who spend more than $1 a month. A good number, a real number, a growing number, but…not a barn-stormer.

Then…look at that same very steep pyramid to see how many spend more than $20,000 — is it 2000 people or something? I mean, it’s hard to imagine that you could make a banking service without interest, assuming you even captured the entire market, of 2,000 people spend $50 or $100. How could you possibly pay payroll for 15 people here???

The credit system itself IRL is a really dumb idea, a legalized scam.

Why bother doing it in SL? Not so much a dumb idea for the people who work it, but for the idiots that buy into it.

It’s why the economy is falling apart in the US right now. People buying things on borrowed money, losing their homes, etc.

Tyra’s pic scares me.

Either way though, im surprised its taken this long to offer such a product in LL, ChingChong Chung bought the rights run the exact same kind of banking operation in Entopia.

Still an interesting article and worth checking into in-world. I could see how a person with multiple businesses and or avatars could use such a service to separate and track expenses and incomes by having a “credit card” for each business.