I Should Have Played More Video Game
December 26th, 2006 by Andrew Chen
When I was in high school, every time when my dad found me playing video games I was given a lesson on what a waste of time doing that and how important it was to put my time on studying. “You will regret it when you get old if you don’t study hard when you are young “. My father always told me that. He is still telling me that once a while when I call back home even now that I am no longer young. So today I have no interest whatsoever into video games.
A while back a Chinese company called Shanda Interactive went public in NASDAQ. Its stock price soared to forty dollars a share after debut and the owner who was his thirties became the richest in China. (The founder of Baidu later took his position I think). What Shanda does? It operates and produces online video games. I later knew about a company called Electronic Arts. You probably knew it very well already. It is a video game developer which has a market capital of 15 billions in NASDAQ. I felt wow, a lot of money was being made on video games.
What surprises me more is that the thriving video gaming industry has bred a new kind of professional — professional video game player. They earn money by winning prizes of varies video game competitions. Just like Michael Jordon plays 
basket ball. Of course the money they make is no where close to Michael Jordon. But like Tom Taylor, at the age of 19, can earn $120,000 to $150,000 a year on prize money.
One of the best among them was Dennis Fong(the middle in picture). He won every tournament he attended over a five year span starting around 1993. Using his prize winnings and endorsement money, Fong and his brother started GX Media, the parent company of Gamers.com which was acquired by an American magazine publisher and Internet Information company. After that Fong co-found Xfire, an instant messenger and social networking site for gamers which was sold for 102 million in 2004. By then Fong was only 27. If I had played more video game I might have had the chance to be like Dennis Fong. I regretted that I have put too much time and energy into studying when I was young. 
Of course I didn’t feel that way. I know I had to make that choice at that time in that environment for myself. I am just wondering am I doing the best thing for myself right now. When I read this kind of story I will look at my past and think what I can do for my future.
Once again what is your talent to make millions? Or do you have any. If you ask me that question, the answer is obvious.
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