Comments on: PlaySpan Takes $6.5m Series A, Founder In Grade 6

By: Monday Fundings: Live Gamer Raises $24 Million, Streamezzo Raises $22 million — hometown.at

Wed, 19 Dec 2007 02:56:36 +0000

[...] used in online worlds and videogames. It faces fierce competition from 6th grader Arjun Mehta, who raised $6.5 million in September for MMOG marketplace PlaySpan. Streamezzo Loading information about [...]

By: Monday Fundings: Live Gamer Raises $24 Million, Streamezzo Raises $22 million

Monday Fundings: Live Gamer Raises $24 Million, Streamezzo Raises $22 million — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 22:45:44 +0000

By: It won’t be long before we all kill Web 2.0 « Boston Internet Marketing

Tue, 11 Dec 2007 16:33:38 +0000

[...] 24, 2007 The irrational exuberance building in the investment world related to all things Web 2.0 is spilling over into the world of [...]

By: The Reboot: Women and Video Games | PodTech.net: Technology and Entertainment Video Network

Wed, 17 Oct 2007 23:58:55 +0000

[...] is back to finish the fight on Halo 3, Playstation Portable sales are on the rise in Japan and a 12-year-old gamer gets his company $6.5 million in [...]

By: robert

robert — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 19:06:00 +0000

Salar, your numbers are wrong. 33% does not come from gold farming, and it isn’t worth billions of dollars.

By: Fun Times In Houston « Auto Industry Startups

Fun Times In Houston « Auto Industry Startups — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 17:07:52 +0000

[...] September 22nd, 2007 · No Comments Starting a company can feel a like isolating sometimes; after all, I spend most of my time on the company, either working on it or thinking about it. So it’s great when I get a chance to meet other entrepreneurs in Texas. Especially because the Texas startup environment is not as robust as California’s, where they fund companies started by sixth graders. [...]

By: Salar

Salar — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 20:01:46 +0000

http://www.clevercomm.com is PlaySpan’s PR firm. This may give you all a little insight on what’s going on here. Sure the kid found an underserved segment of the MMORPG market while playing WoW. He said daddy, daddy I have a great idea…I wish this and that were possible. Aha! Tech daddy says, “you are on to something son”…then he puts together a team of MIT and Stanford engineers and managers and it is really that simple. Don’t think too much about it…the kid is smart and will do great things in his life, but the daddy is smarter and is doing them now. Plus this concept is stellar. Over 33% of Online Videogame revenues come form “gold farming” which this company obvisouly has a business model to capture. That is equal to billions of dollars in sales ladies and gentlemen.

By: Sticky

Sticky — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:40:03 +0000

be* (spelling correction for you overly analytical people)

By: Sticky

Sticky — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 19:37:19 +0000

Does anyone ever remember being young and having a great idea that nobody would pay any real attention too? And if the answer isn’t yes then you are probably not a true entrepreneur, or you had parents like this kid has. So you must me filthy rich by now. And if not, then you probably can’t understand how something like this is possible. Obviously the kid isn’t sitting down planning every move the company needs to make. Even if he had been 21 years old and started a company, the founder usually doesn’t do alot of the work that is involved. That is why it is called a “company”. Compromised of different individuals who all put in to do something great. I know to some it is a hard concept to grasp, but not giving this kid the appreciation and support he deserves would be wrong, and for those of you who do have that type of view, I hope you do not have children. I think this kid is great and obviously so do alot of other important people. Rock on dude!

By: Chris Hughes

Chris Hughes — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 18:21:09 +0000

After seeing the story on slashdot, I forwarded it to me two kids, with a pithy comment about “when does this kid have time to study?” Yes this is surely all about “marketing”, with the grown-ups behind the scenes pulling all the strings. But, it never hurts to plant the seed that one is never too young (or old for that matter) to run with ones dreams.

By: Techieid

Techieid — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 17:51:30 +0000

Whatever the truth is, one thing is for sure… they are getting attention. And that is not a bad thing for a startup. $6.5 mil is not bad for Series A anywhere.

By: TekWek

TekWek — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 17:21:10 +0000

Can’t believe every TC article has so many hate comments…..it’s obvious that some adults are involved, but give the kid the due respect……he won items in those conquests and he’s selling them in virtual world…..that’s a pretty good business…..now if his Dad or whoever wants to build a real business around it that’s fine…..but the idea came from the kid…..so he’s the founder….

Duncan great story man…..

By: Mark Sutherland

Mark Sutherland — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 14:21:49 +0000

I have seen some posts referring to child labor laws. Please take note that in some states (Delaware being one of them) there are no age requirements to incorporate a company. Since anyone can own a company in said jurisdiction the idea of child labor laws would not come into play here as the owner of the company has the right to manage the company. He would in turn need someone to enter into the contract on his behalf as the age required by law to enter into a contract is 18 in most if not all states. In the end he could easily establish a company and then have mom and dad assist in forming contractual relationships with other individuals and companies.

Just some food for thought.

Mark Sutherland
http://www.asset-protection-international.com

By: Derek O'Hara

Derek O'Hara — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 07:19:02 +0000

Yeah, he is a 6th grader and that just isn’t possible and an adult just MUST be behind it all.. yadda, yadda, yadda. Either way, the little guy is smart with smart parents and they are still amazing folks. Those who are jealous of this are simply trying to compensate for their own shortcomings. Wake up and find out how these people find success and stop making excuses for where you fall short.

By: Mariachi

Mariachi — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 02:18:59 +0000

“Aaron
read their website, the details of the kid were taken from the direct linked page. As for background it’s hard to write much about a company that doesn’t have a product yet, or hardly a thing on their site.”

Yet you managed to do it anyway. Ace reporting there, Duncan.

By: DJ Barney

DJ Barney — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 01:15:52 +0000

Jeez,

That was a nice positive story until I read some of the comments here. Now I feel like throwing myself out the window .. haar haar !

Goodluck to this endeavour.

By: CZ

CZ — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 22:39:01 +0000

I have been interacting with this team for the past 9 months or so and would like to add some clarification to some points. Playspan is not trying to be a “seller” of virtual goods but rather they are creating a platform to be a central marketplace for users to buy, sell, and trade virtual assets and will be working with many different publishers to be supported by numerous different games.

The other point that needs clarification is yes the general idea and creativity behind playspan was developed by the kid, but of course there is adults involved with the company, but he is the creative brain behind the project and you folks should respect him for his ideas and the parents for being open to listening to their kids ideas and try to make his dream into a reality. Playspan will be charting new ground in virtual asset management for video games and I look forward to seeing their continued progress.

By: John

John — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 22:29:50 +0000

Give me a break. There’s no way a 6th grader can run a company let alone bring enough experience to the table. Shouldn’t he be doing homework? I have to agree that this is either a publicity stunt or this kid’s parents are exploiting him by making him the “front man” for their business startup.

By: Travis Berthelot

Travis Berthelot — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 21:15:38 +0000

I have several programs. One of which has a >6 million dollar slocount value. Yet, I am in my thirties and can’t get a dollar in venture money.

I hate publicity stunts like this. It gives people bad ideas about how money is made.

Warren Buffet = Money from parents
Bill Gates = Money from Government through IBM
Rockefellers = buy of legistlature to steal property for railroad
This Kid = Money from publicity stunt

Oh wait that is how money is made. Never mind. Smart Thieves win. Idiot Thieves and Good people LOSE.

By: PlaySpan Takes $6.5m Series A, Founder In Grade 6 - GamingCrazy.net

PlaySpan Takes $6.5m Series A, Founder In Grade 6 - GamingCrazy.net — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 20:47:57 +0000

[...] grade at Challenger School in San Jose. No word on when PlaySpan will be launching. Source: PlaySpan Takes $6.5m Series A, Founder In Grade 6 Wauw, the site isn’t even launched yet! My god, Bill Gates watch out! Read the Rules. Do [...]

By: Aaron

Aaron — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 20:41:10 +0000

Matt - there’s a major difference between a bubble and VC’s throwing their money around. Since this isn’t public money - no IPO - and no employees relying on the company to pay their retirement benefits (yet), if the whole thing goes down in flames only handful of already-wealthy people lose their shirts. And they have lots of shirts in their big closet… of shirts… so they’ll be fine. Yes, that was a poor analogy.

So anyway… bubble bubble bubble, everyone wants to call it so they can be smug and say “I told you so” when the companies fail.

It’s just the Invisible Hand getting a little too frisky.

I know the idea of the Invisible Hand touching a thirteen year old boy sounds scary at first, but we don’t have all the facts in.

(Actually, I’m just kidding about that. LOL @ Invisible Hand touching people inappropriately.)

By: Nerdalicious

Nerdalicious — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 20:19:47 +0000

in 1972 My older brother was the one who invented the term “Duh !”, and “a-Doi !”.

By: urmom

urmom — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 20:09:39 +0000

lawl noob

By: Matt

Matt — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 19:41:51 +0000

If this doesn’t give an indication of a bubble I don’t know what does.

By: A.S.

A.S. — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 19:34:13 +0000

another lame duncan article - unsubscribe.