Second Life's virtual economy over $500M a year - San Francisco Business Times:

Second Life "residents" have done more than $1 billion in transactions with one another to date and spent one billion hours online, according to the virtual world's maker, Linden Lab.

In 2008, Second Life users spent more than $360 million on virtual goods ranging from land to designer shoes to lavish homes. The Second Life economy almost doubled in size - 94 percent up - between the second quarter of this year and the same period in 2008. User-to-user transactions now amount to nearly $50 million per month, Linden Lab said in a press release...