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As I wrote at the beginning of this year HereBlockchain and Intellectual Property (IP) are a probable combination. The gaming industry has exploded, particularly with regards to digital games. GameStop & nbsp; earn billions every year from resale & nbsp;physical& nbsp; games – representing only 24% of all games sold. The remaining 76% are digital games and the trend is moving further towards digital games. Steam, the main distribution engine for digital games, now possesses all the power of personal computing games. & Nbsp; When consumers "buy" a digital PC game, this is tantamount to leasing (but it costs the same as buying) because they can not transfer that game – so consumers are really trading their property rights on Steam in exchange for convenience.
I recently learned about & nbsp;Equity Games, a New York company that is creating a new standard for digital game ownership, as "true digital assets" using open and universal licenses. I spoke with Tony Caputo, founder and CEO of Equiti Games, to learn more about what they are doing, what they have learned along the way and what suggestions they have for other startups.
Happy young man at home playing video games
Mary Juetten: where are you based and when did you start?
Tony Caputo: We are Equiti Games based in Katonah, NY – just north of New York. & nbsp; We also have a small team in the Bay Area. The idea started to spread in the first months of 2017 and in October we started to give the company a more complete impulse.
Juetten: What problem are you solving?
Caputo: & nbsp;We are bringing property back to digital games with the ability to give your game to a friend or sell your game after you have finished playing it. We are also facing the loss of revenue of game publishers in gray markets by giving developers a percentage of used game sales. In 2017, GameStop earned over $ 2 billion in pre-owned sales and game developers did nothing.
Juetten Who are your customers and how do you find them?
Caputo: Our end consumers are made up of three main categories: players, game developers and third-party markets. Players are mainly on social media groups, game news sites, streaming platforms and game communities. We keep in touch with a network of game developers and publishers that we already know from experience and are contacting new developers by compiling public lists of catalogs and game developers. We reach directly in addition to gaming conferences and our personal network. Finally, we work with third-party markets through game community sites, which are distributed organically through networks of different social and gaming networks.
Juetten: How have past projects and / or experience helped with this new project?
Caputo: I founded leaptrade.com in 2011 as a reaction to players being robbed by dealers when they traded in their games. & nbsp; For example, trade in your $ 50 game, get $ 25 from the retailer and ask them to go back and store it on the used shelf for $ 55. & Nbsp; Leaptrade is a P2P games trading platform for physical games (discs and cartridges), which allows players to get real value for their games ($ 50 instead of $ 25 from a retailer), save money and play more games.
Building Leaptrade has given me an invaluable experience on how markets work, manage a virtual economy and what users look for when they buy and sell used games. Managing a virtual resale market using digital currencies has led me to appreciate what makes the secondary markets of the game different from the consumer's point of view, and how much rides the maintenance of loyalty through well balanced incentives.
Juetten: who is there in your team? & Nbsp;
Caputo: I have a co-founder, Nicole Allen, who is the director of relations with developers. Nicole has experience in the media and social aspects of the gaming / technology industry and has also edited her personal brand, Nixie Pixel. Also, I have a group of very talented people who complete my team.
Juetten: have you raised money?
Caputo: Yes, we have collected $ 750k so far and recently we have won the Founders' World Championship which includes a $ 1 investment premium and another $ 1 in services – bringing our current total to $ 1.75 million. Details of the competition are available Here. We are also conducting a sale of private tokens.
Juetten: Startups are an adventure … what is your favorite boot story?
Caputo: One of my favorite stories is how we started working with our first game publisher, a distributor of indie games called tinyBuild. We wanted to receive information on our platform as soon as possible, but we did not have a website up, our marketing material was not finalized and we had not even moved into our office, but we understood why not give it a try? We were big fans of tinyBuild because they talked about the problems we were trying to solve with sales of gray market games. After only one phone conversation, the technology and concept were so convincing that Luke Burtis immediately joined. With the current set of tools that limit the available platforms, Luke could not manage his business as he wanted and we were the only platform that provided viable alternatives. The result of Luke was to have a direct knowledge of the problems of publishers of indie games, which in turn have allowed us to refine our platform to solve critical points specific to the industry.
Juetten: how do you measure success and what is your favorite success story?
Caputo: For us, success means changing industry. As for my favorite success stories involving entrepreneurs and companies with a vision, I think Tesla is really a good thing. Maybe we do not remember now, but Elon Musk took a big risk building high-end electric cars. It was a niche market, few thought it would be successful and people continue to question the financial perspectives of their companies. Elon builds a lot of things you would not do if you're just trying to earn a lot of money, but he proved that people needed and wanted electric vehicles. In this way, I think that success is measured by making an underlying change: while Tesla's company could bend, electric cars have become very popular. Tesla has created a technology that anyone can use.
Juetten: Any advice to add to the founders of the first phase?
Caputo: Move the needle forward every day. Even if you think it's not perfect, take something out there. You have to break the mistake that a startup must look like a well-established company because you have to move forward, get traction and go to the next step. Things are never perfect and you will never be ready as you wish. People will be enthusiastic about what you are doing and will cut you a little bit of flexibility. People want to believe in what you're doing, so be honest and do something every day. If you are putting yourself out there, then you can adapt to the feedback you receive. If you already know that a strategy is not working well, you should change and adapt quickly to find one that works better. When you are a startup, you must be faithful to your main vision, but one of your main advantages compared to larger or more established companies is the ability to modify and adapt the execution of this vision, so take advantage of it.
Juetten: And, of course, any IP horror story to share (can they be anonymous)?
Caputo: Be careful with who you collaborated. If you are a startup, you do not actually have any litigation as an option, especially against entrenched interests. Share enough to be excited, but retain some of the things that are really important. Keeping the key aspects on the IP reserved and, if someone tries to follow you, will have to play to recover. While people are generally kind and honest, unfortunately there are people who take advantage of it, and we have heard of cases where they make you chop up a deal, and if you do not accept it, take your property and compete against you.
Juetten: what is the long-term vision for your company?
Caputo: Change the industry for the better. Report ownership to players and control developers in ways that allow the best parts of the industry to thrive, such as student funds. We would like to see developers and innovators have the flexibility to create and create unique digital products as limited editions in which a developer could sell three editions of each game, two are limited and one is platinum. We try to break down the barriers at the game distribution level to be able to choose from more than five gaming clients. Currently we are locked up in digital boxes, mobile games, for example, are completely dominated by the main app stores on each platform. A forward path could be a more open way in which Microsoft, Sony and their consoles interact through an interoperable medium. For us, the future is an open and universal licensing network, where I can buy the game and play it on any console, PC or mobile device. In our model, digital creators can develop content for games, objects such as skins and avatars. These digital creators would be rewarded for the content they produced and could earn a living by selling their digital work to the game ecosystem. At the same time, we want to maximize creativity without taking control from the developer, which we reward to allow others to build on their innovation. In short, we are building an open licensing framework that breaks down fenced gardens and, as with electric cars, people simply do not realize that there is more money to be made using an open model.
My hope is that these stories about the true founders, who do not create Unicorns, can inspire and help other founders. If you have an interesting trip to share, especially with IP considerations, please contact Twitter @maryjuetten. #onwards.
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As I wrote at the beginning of this year, Blockchain and Intellectual Property (IP) are a likely match. The gaming industry has exploded, particularly with regards to digital games. GameStop earns billions each year from resale physical games – representing only 24% of all games sold. The remaining 76% are digital games and the trend is moving further towards digital games. Steam, the main distribution engine for digital games, now possesses all the power of personal computing games. When consumers "buy" a digital PC game, this is tantamount to a lease (but costs the same as purchases) because they can not transfer that game – so consumers are really trading their property rights on Steam in exchange for convenience.
Recently I learned about Equiti Games, a New York company that is creating a new standard for digital games ownership, as "real digital assets" using open and universal licenses. I spoke with Equiti Games chief and CEO Tony Caputo to learn more about what they are doing, what they have learned along the way and what suggestions they have for other startups.
Happy young man at home playing video games
Mary Juetten: where are you based and when did you start?
Tony Caputo: We are Equiti Games based in Katonah, NY – just north of New York. We also have a small team in the Bay Area. The idea started to spread in the first months of 2017 and in October we started to give the company a more complete impulse.
Juetten: What problem are you solving?
Caputo: We are bringing property back to digital games with the ability to give your game to a friend or sell your game after you have finished playing it. We are also facing the loss of revenue of game publishers in gray markets by giving developers a percentage of used game sales. In 2017, GameStop earned over $ 2 billion in pre-owned sales and game developers did nothing.
Juetten Who are your customers and how do you find them?
Caputo: Our end consumers are made up of three main categories: players, game developers and third-party markets. Players are mainly on social media groups, game news sites, streaming platforms and game communities. We keep in touch with a network of game developers and publishers that we already know from experience and are contacting new developers by compiling public lists of catalogs and game developers. We reach directly in addition to gaming conferences and our personal network. Finally, we work with third-party markets through game community sites, which are distributed organically through networks of different social and gaming networks.
Juetten: How have past projects and / or experience helped with this new project?
Caputo: I founded leaptrade.com in 2011 as a reaction to players being robbed by dealers when they traded in their games. For example, you trade in your $ 50 game, get $ 25 from the retailer, and turn it around and store it on the used shelf for $ 55. Leaptrade is a P2P games trading platform for physical games (discs and cartridges), allowing players get real value for their games ($ 50 instead of $ 25 from a retailer), save money and play more games.
Building Leaptrade has given me an invaluable experience on how markets work, manage a virtual economy and what users look for when they buy and sell used games. Managing a virtual resale market using digital currencies has led me to appreciate what makes the secondary markets of the game different from the consumer's point of view, and how much rides the maintenance of loyalty through well balanced incentives.
Juetten: who is there in your team?
Caputo: I have a co-founder, Nicole Allen, who is the director of relations with developers. Nicole has experience in the media and social aspects of the gaming / technology industry and has also edited her personal brand, Nixie Pixel. Also, I have a group of very talented people who complete my team.
Juetten: have you raised money?
Caputo: Yes, we have collected $ 750k so far and recently we have won the Founders' World Championship which includes a $ 1 investment premium and another $ 1 in services – bringing our current total to $ 1.75 million. Details of the competition are available here. We are also conducting a sale of private tokens.
Juetten: Startups are an adventure … what is your favorite boot story?
Caputo: One of my favorite stories is how we started working with our first game publisher, a distributor of indie games called tinyBuild. We wanted to receive information on our platform as soon as possible, but we did not have a website up, our marketing material was not finalized and we had not even moved into our office, but we understood why not give it a try? We were big fans of tinyBuild because they talked about the problems we were trying to solve with sales of gray market games. After only one phone conversation, the technology and concept were so convincing that Luke Burtis immediately joined. With the current set of tools that limit the available platforms, Luke could not manage his business as he wanted and we were the only platform that provided viable alternatives. The result of Luke was to have a direct knowledge of the problems of publishers of indie games, which in turn have allowed us to refine our platform to solve critical points specific to the industry.
Juetten: how do you measure success and what is your favorite success story?
Caputo: For us, success means changing industry. As for my favorite success stories involving entrepreneurs and companies with a vision, I think Tesla is really a good thing. Maybe we do not remember now, but Elon Musk took a big risk building high-end electric cars. It was a niche market, few thought it would be successful and people continue to question the financial perspectives of their companies. Elon builds a lot of things you would not do if you're just trying to earn a lot of money, but he proved that people needed and wanted electric vehicles. In this way, I think that success is measured by making an underlying change: while Tesla's company could bend, electric cars have become very popular. Tesla has created a technology that anyone can use.
Juetten: Any advice to add to the founders of the first phase?
Caputo: Move the needle forward every day. Even if you think it's not perfect, take something out there. You have to break the mistake that a startup must look like a well-established company because you have to move forward, get traction and go to the next step. Things are never perfect and you will never be ready as you wish. People will be enthusiastic about what you are doing and will cut you a little bit of flexibility. People want to believe in what you're doing, so be honest and do something every day. If you are putting yourself out there, then you can adapt to the feedback you receive. If you already know that a strategy is not working well, you should change and adapt quickly to find one that works better. When you are a startup, you must be faithful to your main vision, but one of your main advantages compared to larger or more established companies is the ability to modify and adapt the execution of this vision, so take advantage of it.
Juetten: And, of course, any IP horror story to share (can they be anonymous)?
Caputo: Be careful with who you collaborated. If you are a startup, you do not actually have any litigation as an option, especially against entrenched interests. Share enough to be excited, but retain some of the things that are really important. Keeping the key aspects on the IP reserved and, if someone tries to follow you, will have to play to recover. While people are generally kind and honest, unfortunately there are people who take advantage of it, and we have heard of cases where they make you chop up a deal, and if you do not accept it, take your property and compete against you.
Juetten: what is the long-term vision for your company?
Caputo: Change the industry for the better. Report ownership to players and control developers in ways that allow the best parts of the industry to thrive, such as student funds. We would like to see developers and innovators have the flexibility to create and create unique digital products as limited editions in which a developer could sell three editions of each game, two are limited and one is platinum. We try to break down the barriers at the game distribution level to be able to choose from more than five gaming clients. Currently we are locked up in digital boxes, mobile games, for example, are completely dominated by the main app stores on each platform. A forward path could be a more open way in which Microsoft, Sony and their consoles interact through an interoperable medium. For us, the future is an open and universal licensing network, where I can buy the game and play it on any console, PC or mobile device. In our model, digital creators can develop content for games, objects such as skins and avatars. These digital creators would be rewarded for the content they produced and could earn a living by selling their digital work to the game ecosystem. At the same time, we want to maximize creativity without taking control from the developer, which we reward to allow others to build on their innovation. In short, we are building an open licensing framework that breaks down fenced gardens and, as with electric cars, people simply do not realize that there is more money to be made using an open model.
My hope is that these stories about the true founders, who do not create Unicorns, can inspire and help other founders. If you have an interesting trip to share, especially with IP considerations, please contact Twitter @maryjuetten. #onwards.
