At the same time during those years, Rick Schwartz was getting started. In 1996 he bought many great domains for registration fees and even some in the aftermarket, million dollar names for $100 a pop. In 1997, during my time playing Chess, Scott Day and others were also building their own future. They figured out how to register expired domains, and were collecting million dollar names on a daily basis. In 1998, while I was still playing Chess and hanging out in chat rooms, Roy Messer, Yun Ye, and others were also getting started. Yun Ye later ended up selling his portfolio for around 164 million dollars to Marchex. I got in the game late, when the secret was out, and the whole world got to know about the domain business because of the Business.com sale. Nevertheless, I made my way, I put the time, the hours, the energy, and for once, it was not for nothing, and there was no more “killing time”. Now it was spending time “building a future”.
It’s astonishing to hear Zynga’s numbers. Many are doing what I’ve done, killing time. Many are struggling in their financial lives, many are unemployed, many are young adults. The same time they spend on games could be spent on building a future, on being productive. I know it is more difficult to get into the unknown, into new beginnings, and I guess it’s why many hear about new ventures (like the domain business) and never get into it. They explore it for ten minutes, maybe an hour, or even a week, and call it quits. Saying to themselves: “It’s not worth it”, “Only a few get lucky”.. their reasoning may be infinite.
The truth is, whatever you invest your time in, that thing will grow and evolve, likely for the better. If you invest your time in games, you will undoubtedly become a better gamer. If you invest it in your future, you will have a better future.
Have a great weekend !
Sahar
Superb post. This is the same reason why I stopped playing COD ( Call of duty ) and Poker online a couple of months back. Just realized it wasn’t worth spending this much time on a game and get nothing productive out of it.
This is one post that people can learn a lot from.
Well said Sahar,
Everyone is looking for a shortcut, patience and hard work are virtues, something that is lost on today’s generation.
They should read the story of Jacob and the 14 years of work he put in just to get to marry Rachel.
Happy Hannukah!!
Gil
Totally agree, Sahar. Well said.
Well said indeed Sahar
As you know we have been in Florida for just sixe months and the other night attended our first funeral service for a new (albeit short lived) friend that we had made at the Golf club.
The very next morning my programmer emailed to apologize for being late with a project saying that his mother had just suffered a stroke the same ailment that killed our new friend suddenly.
My message to young Americans
“If you are ever going to make your future brighter today is as good as any to start”
and
“You can’t do much about how long the seeds takes to grow but you can decide when to plant those seeds”
And as you now realize when you begin to realize your potential the whole world gets the benefits. Good examples are BIDO and this blog.
Write more posts like this- rather than a constant stream of BIDO related stuff- and I might actually start reading this blog again…
Well said.