RPGnet Columns
08-08-2001, 08:55 PM
Post originally by Sandy Antunes at 2001-08-08 19:55:49
Converted from Phorums BB System
Hi,
Okay, confession time. This article was originally a stand-alone for a different magazine, which failed. *sigh* So, I thought I'd use it as part I of a series on valuation of internet gaming sites.
Being a) short on time due to a newborn in the house and b) a generally evil person, I thought I'd put it up without an intro, just to see whether it could be seen as sarcasm or truth. Perhaps this was an unwise choice, since (unlike its original venue) this was not its original intended venue and so some framing for RPG-ish concerns is useful.
So here's the framing: from 2000 through now, I've had contact with a variety of internet websites, paper millionnaires, and possible investors. At the same time, newspapers like the Washington Post and magazines like Wired were writing about 'Instant Millionnaires'.
So one one hand you have the real world (programmers wallpapering their apartments with their worthless options), and on the other, you have the clueless media talking about how 'easy' the money was.
This article is a satirical piece about the myths of the so-called "Gilded Age", or dot-com era. In an upcoming piece, I'll be talking about some more accurate valuations for websites, using rpg.net and other cases as examples.
The ultimate goal is to disbuse the notion that starting a gaming website is a good economic move, while supporting the notion that starting a gaming website can be fun and, on occassion, mildly profitable.
Cheers,
Sandy
sandy@rpg.net
Converted from Phorums BB System
Hi,
Okay, confession time. This article was originally a stand-alone for a different magazine, which failed. *sigh* So, I thought I'd use it as part I of a series on valuation of internet gaming sites.
Being a) short on time due to a newborn in the house and b) a generally evil person, I thought I'd put it up without an intro, just to see whether it could be seen as sarcasm or truth. Perhaps this was an unwise choice, since (unlike its original venue) this was not its original intended venue and so some framing for RPG-ish concerns is useful.
So here's the framing: from 2000 through now, I've had contact with a variety of internet websites, paper millionnaires, and possible investors. At the same time, newspapers like the Washington Post and magazines like Wired were writing about 'Instant Millionnaires'.
So one one hand you have the real world (programmers wallpapering their apartments with their worthless options), and on the other, you have the clueless media talking about how 'easy' the money was.
This article is a satirical piece about the myths of the so-called "Gilded Age", or dot-com era. In an upcoming piece, I'll be talking about some more accurate valuations for websites, using rpg.net and other cases as examples.
The ultimate goal is to disbuse the notion that starting a gaming website is a good economic move, while supporting the notion that starting a gaming website can be fun and, on occassion, mildly profitable.
Cheers,
Sandy
sandy@rpg.net