What RL Country Has the Most SL Spenders By Proportion?

Quaintly Tuquri, an SL Resident living in Malaysia, looked at the most recent Second Life economic statistics, and noted something interesting: Her compatriots are responsible for 4% of in-world user-to-user transactions. That would not seem like much, but then, Malaysia only has a population of 28 million. By comparison, Japanese Residents also account for 4% of in-world spending -- but Japan has a population of 128 million. (This may have something to do with the fact that SL users in Malaysia can buy their Linden Dollars with a pre-paid debit card sold at retail -- but Japanese cannot.) This makes me wonder which country has the most Second Life consumers by proportion. My quick eyeball guess is Hong Kong, whose citizens account for 3% of in-world spending -- drawn from a population of only 7 million. Or am I missing another country which proportionally counts more big virtual spenders? Image: quirkyquaintly.com

Comments

[Claus Uriza]

Hamlet, somehow its surprising Denmark w. its 5 mill. population is included in the pie with 1%

Surprising since next to nothing coverage in media and if any VERY badly informed journos still telling SL is totally dead and out.

[kenzieh]

I come from Hong Kong and staying in SL crossing the third years. I also spot out the spending percentage is such high when comparing to the SL resident number here. Actually, it is really very very few HK resident in SL. And I suspect 90% of them actually freebie lover. The high transaction rate may not truly reflect the consumption amount in SL by resident. Some technical money transaction existing in SL between resident's alt accounts. This may be a misleading factor.

[Archie Lukas]

I'm surprised

The Germans outnumber the Americans in active users; yet they are way below the US in expenditure.

Are the Germans the new Scots?
(mean with cash)

[Quaintly Tuqiri]

Thanks for posting this, Hamlet! I'm still looking for other Malaysians. In nearly 2 years in SL I've only met one other Malaysian... how is it that we can account for 4% of SL spenders!

[Jura Shepherd]

I don't know how First Meta's card works but if there were Linden gift cards, I think people would buy them. I have rl friends who don't care anything about SL but would buy me a gift card because they know I do.

/me points to holidays on calendar

[Ciaran Laval]

That 4% for Malaysia, it's nearly all Quaintly, I'm telling ya, I've been shopping with her!

[Pixel Dunst]

just a wild guess ... could it be that Chinese and other south east asian countries pop up as Hongkong-nese or Malaysian because of the only 2 internet server locations that connect them to the world?

[Nyoko Salome]

:0 interesting - it'd be interesting to compare a) country total rl pop to b) sl by-country pop, then to c) the provided spending per-country percentages...

[Quaintly Tuqiri]

Ciaran! Lies! Lies! *sues for libel*

@Pixel - I think they go by IP address, although I'm not sure...