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“What it’s really like to be sued by a patent troll — and how to stop it” plus 13 more VentureBeat

“What it’s really like to be sued by a patent troll — and how to stop it” plus 13 more VentureBeat


What it’s really like to be sued by a patent troll — and how to stop it

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 11:05 AM PST


Patent trolls, more formally known as Patent Assertion Entities (PAEs), are entities that acquire patents for the sole purpose of suing companies in order to monetize them. They also happen to make a habit of piling on a tremendous amount of added work, expense, and stress onto legitimate operating companies.

Preparing for possible litigation has become a standard "cost of doing business" over the years. As the General Counsel of Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise (ALE USA, Inc.), I've spent the last few years engaging in battles with patent trolls, at a cost to my company and colleagues. Meanwhile, the PAEs themselves faced few ramifications.

Recently, my company joined patent protection network LOT and the Open Innovation Network (OIN) to better protect itself from future threats from trolls. And I want to share my experience with the wider community.

If you think your business is too big or too small or too off the radar to fall prey to a patent troll, think again. Your business can be a target — and the damage spreads far beyond the office of your general counsel. If you run a tech company, I’m talking to you.

Gaining the trust of my stakeholders — and nearly losing it

It's my job as lead counsel to help our engineers and developers get their best products out into the market. My job requires them to trust me and to see me as an extension of their development teams. I need to be a trusted business partner and legal advisor. I've been lucky to have forged strong relationships with our very high performing teams, who generally do see me as a part of their functional teams.

Dealing with patent troll lawsuits effectively requires preserving the relationship between the product team, the executives in charge of the product team, the procurement team, the suppliers and the office of the CFO. This is no mean feat.

Imagine this scenario: I'm sitting in a two-hour meeting with three top Product Line Managers (PLMs) talking about product development, and before the meeting adjourns I have to ask them to drop everything and start gathering materials for discovery for possible PAE litigation. What does this do but take them off the job at hand, crush their productivity, and suck their time? Suddenly, I feel a lot less like a part of the team and much more like the reason they can't get home to dinner with their families that night. The cost of the suit isn't limited to the lawyers, it also slows down the PLMs and their teams. It's these folks who are responsible for moving both the business and the litigation forward, complete with a records hold that requires PLMs to track and maintain all documents related to the matter and possibly prepare to be deposed or act as a witness in trial. This additional amount of work impairs the company's ability to do what it was meant to do: innovate and get great products out on the market, on time and on-budget.

The PLMs in charge of the product sets that are implicated in a PAE's bogus claims have to take time out of their days to discuss the details of the suit with me. That takes an emotional toll on these folks, and it can be a stressful and demoralizing distraction. It's infuriating to go to the best and brightest in your company and tell them the very important work they're doing is under fire. This might be the part I hate most: seeing some of the best, legitimate innovators among us forced to defend their incredible work. When I tell them that their product is implicated in a PAE suit, they are floored and always ask me "why?" and "how?" They feel powerless and I'm supposed to be the one that solves this problem for them.

Outside the company, we have suppliers. Litigation that might lead to trial has the potential to alienate suppliers who see money coming out of their pockets in the form of indemnification, which can be damaging to these critical relationships. I dread making the phone call — that will be followed by one of those well-penned formal notice letters — to a supplier's counsel to break the news about a PAE suit and the expected contractual indemnification. No supplier reaches into their pocket gleefully. They might have indemnity obligations, but that next pricing negotiation is going to reflect what they paid us to fight. Who really wins here? It certainly isn't my company or our supplier partners. It's the PAE, and this contract-backed money grab is their life blood. We have to stand up and do something about it.

Picking up the sword and fighting back

I believe in the Constitutional protections afforded to inventors that bring products to market. But, I think it's wrong that PAEs, whose sole business is to make money from suing other businesses, should legally attack everyone from engineers to suppliers by trying to force a "nuisance value" settlement. These "small" settlements can cost a kid's mom or dad their raise, or worse, their job. This PAE problem, in my view, will not be solved by our lawmakers, and I can't continue to accept them as a "cost of doing business.” That is why I have become an evangelist for initiatives that aim to combat PAEs on a more systematic basis.

LOT Network is a great example of one such initiative. LOT is a non-profit with member companies such as Tesla, Alibaba, eBay, Amazon, Uber, RedHat, Netflix, Dropbox, Cisco, and others. As I mentioned above, my organization Alcatel-Lucent also recently joined, as did its family of companies. Started in 2014, it currently has about 190 members. LOT members agree that if (and only if) any member's patent assets fall into the hands of a troll, that member provides all other members of the network with the license to that patent. This inoculates all members against patent troll litigation using those assets. Any operating company can join, and if your company's revenue is $5 million or below, the membership is free, so even the smallest startups can benefit.

Another great organization is the Open Innovation Network, which my company is also a member of. It’s a shared patent pool to protect Linux and developers building on open source software. Founded in 2005, it’s free to join, has the backing of Google, IBM, NEC, Philips, Toyota, Suse, RedHat, and Sony, and has a pool of some 2,000 participants.

Saying no to victimization

There are plenty of things I'd rather do than deal with patent trolls, and I'm guessing it's the same for you. Community-based initiatives like the ones I mention above enable us to stand up and say enough is enough. Together, we can curb the patent troll problem in a collaborative, proactive, and systematic way. Reactive strategies are expensive and fail to get to the root of the problem. Fighting trolls alone on a case-by-case basis serves no business well. We're stronger together, and thankfully there is now a robust arsenal with which we can defend ourselves.

Karina Tiwana is general counsel at Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise.

Let’s talk about the 2017 NPD numbers

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 11:05 AM PST


On this week’s GamesBeat Decides podcast, we spent some time diving into some of the tidbits of news from The NPD Group’s annual report. We run down the list of the best-selling games in the United States and more.

The NPD report revealed that, once again, Call of Duty was the best-selling game of the year. Of course, it’s worth pointing out that the PC version of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is not on this list. Other standouts include NBA 2K18 and a trio of Nintendo games. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Super Mario Odyssey, and Mario Kart 8 all made the top 10, and that’s the most for any one publisher.

You can read the full NPD top 10 for last year in our story here.

And you can listen to the audio version of the podcast here:

Enjoy, kiddos!

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

Overwatch League: An owner’s view of the latest esports sensation

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 10:25 AM PST


Kevin Chou is a freshman among the owners of esports teams. But so far, so good for the CEO of KSV Esports, which owns the Seoul Dynasty team in the Overwatch League. Seoul Dynasty is up 4-0 in its matches so far in Blizzard Entertainment’s brand new esports league, which drew more than 10 million viewers in its debut week.

Chou, former CEO of mobile game company Kabam, acquired a franchise for an official regional Overwatch esports team in Seoul, South Korea, for an estimated $20 million. He believes that the company is poised to take advantage of the dawn of a new sport that could one day be as important as NBA or NFL teams. He scored a sponsorship deal with networking company Netgear ust in time for the league’s debut.

After a week into the league, Chou is optimistic. Market researcher Newzoo estimates that esports will become a $1.5 billion business by 2020. We talked with Chou about his impressions of the first week of the new league.

Here’s an edited transcript of our interview.

Above: Kevin Chou, CEO of KSV Esports International, at the Translink Capital event.

Image Credit: Baris Akyurt

GamesBeat: Have you been to the Overwatch League down in Los Angeles?

Kevin Chou: Yeah, I just got back to San Francisco. I was in Los Angeles last night for our third game of the season.

GamesBeat: How has it been?

Chou: Really good. I'd say right now, Overwatch League is going above every single owner's expectations. We're all super excited. The viewership numbers, the sponsorships that are coming in, there's a lot of interest around it. On the viewership side I think a lot of people were hoping that we'd just get above 50,000, and we're blowing that number away right now.

GamesBeat: What has the in-person experience been like, the crowd sizes there?

Chou: I've only been to two games so far. My understanding is that the Friday and Saturday games are generally sold out. When I was there yesterday there were probably about 400, with 50 to 70 open seats. It's not bad for a Wednesday. It's been pretty good. Overall, the arena size—it's not that big. What they did at Blizzcon, they had a 5,000-person capacity, and that just felt amazing. The Blizzard arena definitely feels a bit more like an arena. But the energy is really good. The matchups, like today—I was watching Dallas versus Houston, and that's a really good matchup. The crowd looks like it's at capacity today.

GamesBeat: Your team's doing pretty well so far.

Chou: Yeah, we won 4-0 last night. That was our third straight win. We're 3-0 in the regular season and we were 3-0 in the preseason. We've gone six games undefeated now.

Above: Netgear is sponsoring Seoul Dynasty, an esports team.

Image Credit: Netgear

GamesBeat: How did the spectating experience feel to you, in-person or on broadcast?

Chou: As an owner, one of my responsibilities right now is getting sponsorship partners to the table. I had a couple of sponsors that I took to the game last night, and I was mostly talking to them. I wasn't able to as intently watch the game. But the owners have access to a skybox for VIPs and so on, and it's a great experience in terms of—I've never had a box at another sporting event, unless you count the Kabam stadium. It has a really premium feel to it. They have a waiter there, food service, wine and drinks. It's a really nice venue to be able to bring partners and talk business. That was my primary goal yesterday.

In the preseason, when I went to those games, I actually like sitting out in the open, because the energy is much better. The skybox is soundproofed, or almost. In the arena you get a real sense of what the energy is like. I've been reading a lot, hanging out on Reddit and other communities, and anybody who visits the Blizzard arena, their reports have all been really good.

GamesBeat: When you guys got Netgear, did that make you more optimistic about the sponsorship side?

Chou: Absolutely. We had hoped to announce something this week, which is why I set up the opportunity to give some interviews. But we're still in the very final stages of dotting the Is and crossing the Ts. We'll hopefully very soon be announcing some other sponsors we're bringing to the table. Also, the league announced Toyota yesterday, and a couple more for the league are about to be announced soon. It's been good.

The ecosystem is growing around Overwatch League very nicely, more so than I've seen for any other esport, because of how everything has been set up as far as what the teams are able to do, what the league is able to do. It's very clearly spelled out, what sponsors the teams can work with and what sponsors the league can work with. That's been fantastic as far as creating clear lanes for the league and the teams to operate in.

GamesBeat: Going forward, do you have expectations for viewership, how that's going to evolve?

Chou: I'm a little bit newer to esports, so I haven't tracked audience numbers across the years. But I'm tracking them this year very closely. We're in week two right now, the very beginning of week two, and we're seeing numbers on Twitch where, just for the English stream, it was hovering around 180,000 fans. Korea generally adds another 50,000, so we're in the low-to-mid 200,000-plus concurrent viewers. That's a really good number.

If you were to ask the owners, opening week is always big, so for opening week most of the owners, including myself, were thinking that 100,000 would be pretty good. That would be a success. For opening week on Twitch alone, if you looked at the English stream, it peaked at about 450,000. Blizzard just announced today that more than 10 million uniques viewed the games and all the other content that went around week one. So 10 million unique viewers and 450,000 peak concurrent.

Week two we're getting 220,000 to 225,000 concurrents, maybe half that original peak. I'm not sure how the China numbers are coming out. But I think that if you were to ask the owners who have more experience, consistent regular season viewership of 50,000 would be incredibly successful. That would put it at the League of Legends level. Right now we're averaging well above that, and it's getting all the owners pretty excited right now.

Above: Overwatch League’s Seoul Dynasty, the South Korean representative in the new major esports venture

GamesBeat: Have you seen a lot of interest from South Korea in your team in particular?

Chou: Yeah, it's fantastic. The really nice thing in season one, being the only South Korean team, we have a lot of fans in South Korea who are tuning in and supporting our team. I feel very lucky that we're doing as well as we're doing, giving all of South Korea a reason to cheer for us. That's been a lot of fun.

GamesBeat: Have you completed your training facility?

Chou: We're still actively working on it. We're targeting late summer to open it up.

GamesBeat: That's going to be pretty elaborate, then?

Chou: I don't know if I would call it elaborate? [laughs] It's certainly going to be world-class, but world-class means—a lot of the best teams in the world will have a really nice team house, and some offices maybe. We're looking to put together maybe a 20,000 square foot training facility and have that be world class in terms of equipment and design and so forth. I'm pumped about it. We haven't seen the designs yet. We're still in the initial stages of finalizing the design. But I'm excited to see what the designs are going to look like. It'll be one of the largest training facilities in the world, I think. I know Team Liquid is building out a 9,000 square foot facility.

GamesBeat: Team Liquid had Alienware deck out a lot of it for them. Do you have something similar, where Netgear might help you with setting up the facility?

Chou: The Netgear sponsorship is a little more specific. We'll definitely have Netgear networking equipment, but networking equipment is just one piece. It's a fun conversation to have with our partners as far as how we build out a world-class facility and bring our partners into that. We're in the midst of those discussions. Hopefully we'll also be able to achieve what Team Liquid achieved. That would be a huge success for us.

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

HyperX’s Cloud Flight wireless headset drops the cord but keeps the quality

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 08:02 AM PST


HyperX is at a point where when it announces a new gaming peripheral, people pay attention. It started with its excellent Cloud headset, and it continues with the company’s long-awaited move into wireless audio with the Cloud Flight. Kingston’s gaming division debuted the Cloud Flight at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas last week, but I’ve already spent a couple of weeks with it. And, as expected, it is another impressive headset.

The HyperX Cloud Flight is shipping now and sells for $160. That puts it up against Razer’s ManO’War and Logitech’s G933. And when it comes to comfort and sound quality, the HyperX headset stands out in its category.

What you’ll like

Beautiful sound

HyperX has some of the best bang-for-the-buck when it comes to audio headsets, and the Cloud Flight definitely benefits from that tradition. Through its 2.4 GHz signal, it delivers a full sound profile that will give you everything that you need for gaming and then some.

It uses the 50mm neodymium drivers that HyperX has had in most of its recent headsets, and that gives the bass a decent kick. But the Cloud Flight also maintains an excellent balance between the various sound channels. You’ll get pulsing highs and robust mid-tones, and you’ll get them with crystal clarity at the same time that the bass is thumping.

What this means is that the Cloud Flight is excellent for those chaotic online multiplayer games. You can hear footsteps, glass breaking, and hear your teammates talking to you all — all at the same time, without one sound smothering another.

HyperX doesn’t include any software, and it doesn’t promise anything like virtual 7.1 surround sound. That’s fine because the clean stereo signal of the Cloud Flight is ideal for the virtual surround sound built into PlayStation 4 games or Windows. The headset thrives with the Dolby Atmos positional-audio algorithm on Windows.

Additionally, the microphone is clear enough for communication. It is approved by Discord and TeamSpeak, and I think it ranks among the better microphones built into a wireless headset. Hear it for yourself:

Comfort and battery life

HyperX didn’t skimp on ensuring the Cloud Flight is something you could wear all day, and with a battery that lasts up to 30 hours, you have the option to do just that.

Getting comfort right is crucial for a gaming headset. All the best audio in the world won’t matter if I don’t want to wear your device. HyperX has nailed this aspect with the Cloud Flight. It is lightweight and it distributes that mass all across the top of your head. You don’t have any one pressure point, and that increased surface also keeps the headset securely in place on your head. You don’t have to worry about it sliding out of place when you look up or down, which is important to me.

As for the battery, you’ll get 30 hours with the red LED light turned off. With the LED on, you’ll get 13 hours. That’s still more than enough for anyone who regularly charges their devices.

What you won’t like

No Bluetooth or Xbox support

I really like the Cloud Flight as a headset dedicated to gaming on PC or PlayStation 4. It looks sharp with deep black plastics and accents of red — including slick exposed cables on each ear. But the cool look, quality audio, and considerable comfort only work wirelessly on PC and PS4. It doesn’t have a Bluetooth radio or Microsoft’s wireless technology. You can, however, plug in a 3.5mm cable to use the headset on any device, but you lose the use of the microphone.

The Cloud Flight also doesn’t have in-line controls for playing or pausing content or answering phone calls. So while I’m glad to have the option to use it with a smartphone or Xbox One, it’s not my first choice for those scenarios.

Conclusion

If you are looking for a wireless headset dedicated to your PC or PlayStation 4, the HyperX Cloud Flight does just about everything right. It is aggressively priced, it sounds amazing, it is comfortable for hours at a time, and its battery will last all night. It even looks cool. It is an easy headset to recommend. If you are looking for something that nearly matches the Cloud Flight but is also great in other situations, then I would still point you to the LucidSound LS40 wireless headset for $150.

HyperX provided GamesBeat with a sample unit for the purpose of this review. The Cloud Flight is $160 and available now.

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

Midwest startup exits surged in 2017

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 07:15 AM PST


A year ago, the Midwest saw one of its largest tech exits to-date: the January 2017 $1.1 billion sale of CoverMyMeds to San Francisco-based McKesson Corp. The CoverMyMeds exit was the biggest in Ohio history, and it signaled an upward growth trajectory in exit activity from 2016.

When it comes to Midwest exits, 2017 was an extremely strong year. Through an analysis conducted with data from Pitchbook, Mattermark, and our own proprietary research, Hyde Park Angels looked at the biggest disclosed exits of 2016 and 2017 in what we consider the Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin.


VentureBeat’s Heartland Tech channel invites you to join us and other senior business leaders at BLUEPRINT in Reno on March 5-7. Learn how to expand jobs to Middle America, lower costs, and boost profits. Click here to request an invite and be a part of the conversation. 


In 2016, 51 companies exited for a collective value of $1.6 billion. In 2017, 37 companies exited for a total value of $5.1 billion. This trend demonstrates a move to more dollars flowing into fewer deals. Interestingly, these exits included a combination of venture capital-backed, private equity-backed, and bootstrapped companies, demonstrating a diversity of capital to fund companies to growth.

Some of the major exits from across the region included Michigan-based Altair Engineering‘s IPO, the aforementioned acquisition of Ohio-based CoverMyMeds, and Ohio-based Macropoint's $107 million exit to Descartes.

While CoverMyMeds was the biggest Midwest exit of 2017, it’s worth noting that the real driver of the increase in exit value from 2016 to 2017 was Illinois, specifically Chicago.

Of the $5.1 billion in exits generated in the Midwest, $2.6 billion came from Chicago exits. This is triple what Chicago exit values were in 2016, which amounted to $859 million. What’s more, so many assumedly large exits were undisclosed in 2017 that the increase is likely considerably greater than the public data reveals.

The majority of the exit value came from acquisitions to strategic acquirers, demonstrating the impact of more corporate investment and acquisition arms entering the market.

In total, 22 companies in Chicago exited in 2017, 14 of which were VC-backed. However, some of the biggest exits included Vivid Seats, Adbasis, VelocityEHS, and CareerBuilder, which were all funded through private equity.

Looking ahead to 2018, we expect to see both Midwest and Chicago companies continue to grow in value, if not in number.

Why?

First, corporations are increasingly becoming strategic acquirers as a means of accessing technology faster and more effectively than allocating resources to in-house solutions.

They have also become more opportunistic in seeking out technology companies as avenues for innovation and as measures against disruption. This trend has grown over time, and we expect to see it continue to grow.

From a capital standpoint, the number of limited partners is also increasing and fundraising levels across PE and VC reached record heights nationally in 2017. With more capital in the market to fuel technology company growth, there will be more opportunities for would-be winners to reach their milestones more quickly with the infusion of capital.

Overall, 2018 may end up being an even stronger year for exits than years prior, creating a halo effect in the Midwest that spurs more startup investment.

Peter Wilkins is a serial entrepreneur and head of one of the top early-stage investment groups in the country, Hyde Park Angels, which focuses on leading the market with a people-first approach. Prior to HPA, Peter successfully founded, built, and turned around companies in multiple industries. Peter is an active advisor to many entrepreneurs, serves on several boards, and frequently speaks about entrepreneurship and venture capital.

Esports advertisers need to be fans first, marketers second

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 06:00 AM PST


Just because New England Patriots star quarterback Tom Brady is good at football doesn't mean he's good at Madden. And just because you're good at marketing doesn't mean you're good at esports marketing. While esports may not yet have the same name recognition as soccer, football, or baseball, the prospect of it soon joining their ranks is not too far-fetched.

As the owner of 10 major esports brands, we at Gamurs Group have seen and reported on the esports industry rapidly gaining steam and grabbing the attention of fans across the world. According to a recent report by IHS Market, in fact, the amount of time spent watching competitive video games totaled more than six billion hours in 2016, up 19 percent from 2015. Moreover, the Olympic Council of Asia recently announced its decision to make esports a medal event in the 2022 Asia Games in Hangzhou, China — hinting at a potential future of esports gaining Olympic status by 2024.

Nevertheless, advertising revenues have yet to match esports' rate of growth. As our esports news site reported, the same IHS Market report estimates that $280 million was spent on esports advertising in 2016, and forecasts the amount to reach $1 billion by 2021. And while many advertisers might be tempted jump right in and plaster their ads on game or competition streams, that strategy has been known to fail.

Based on our experiences working with Acer, Red Bull, and other major brands, here are the four best strategies to reach esports fans with your advertisements:

Know your audience

Esports is new, and as a result the audience is still somewhat of a mystery to advertisers, but it is clear that there is a huge potential in the market. "The esports audience includes some of the hardest-to-reach and most sought-after demographics for marketers and advertisers," said Bobby Kotick, the chief executive of Activision Blizzard, speaking to investors.

As such, it is important to first demystify your target audience before bombarding them with unwelcome advertisements.

We have found that doing this boils down to living and being a part of the esports community. Without being gamers, we would never have been able to keep on top of the quick-moving trends in that community. At the end of the day, who knows what esports fans want more than esports fans themselves? As an advertiser, if you want to succeed in the realm of esports, you must do your homework and understand the community to know exactly what resonates with your audience. Then, you can design advertisements that play directly into your audience's interests.

For example, in this Facebook video advertisement that we designed, you can see that, despite its clearly promotional nature, it is focused on what resonates with the audience. Piggybacking off of content that already interests your audience provides a great opportunity to introduce your advertisement or product. Another example highlights how framing video advertisements as news pieces related to your audience's interests can help extend your advertisement's reach. By linking your advertisement with news that is relevant to your target audience, you can benefit from a much higher level of engagement.

To best reach your audience of esports fans, it is crucial to first understand who they are, what they like, and — perhaps more importantly — what they don't like.

Don't detract from the content

No one likes being interrupted by promotional content — especially gamers. The demographic which includes significant numbers of young males "typically shun[s] brand marketing" — unless it's done right. To get esports fans on board with your advertising attempts, the key is to show them content that speaks to them directly, without interrupting a game or competition stream.

Instead, get fans on board by integrating advertisements seamlessly with content that already resonates with them. We have seen great success by utilizing banners at the beginning of an article or a bumper at the end of a video to expand reach without detracting from the actual content your audience wants to consume. Another method is using title sponsorship for a video. We used these same techniques in a recent campaign we ran for the League of Legends World Championships and found them to be highly effective.

Native advertising has also shown extreme promise in reaching gamers and their fans due to its unobtrusive nature. Rather than smacking fans across the face with blatant advertising attempts, a more subtle approach will yield better results. Creative advertising that supplements — rather than dominates — the content attracting is a much safer bet. Take a page out of Snickers' book and its "You're Not You When You're Hungry" campaign that launched as a sponsor of Eleague last year. The campaign achieved great success for its capability to seamlessly incorporate interesting content into its campaign strategy.

Choose your channels

Knowing who your audience is and what they like and dislike is just one half of the equation; you must also know where to find them. Live streaming video platform Twitch has attracted a large and dedicated esports community where fans flock to watch live streams of their favorite games and gamers.

Just last year Twitch boasted views from 2.2 million unique streamers with 292 billion minutes watched — up more than 50 billion minutes from 2015. For this reason, many successful advertisers have turned to employing the help of gamers and influencers themselves in their promotional strategies. By partnering with someone trusted by the community of users on a platform like Twitch, advertisers look more authentic to viewers. The approach is not new; however, the channel is — and it continues to gain more and more popularity.

We use a similar approach with Facebook and other content pages that are very popular with the community as well. Gamers are generally very spread out, but they also tend to congregate in specific places. Therefore, focusing your advertising efforts on these niche communities are sure to see a higher success rate.

Don't pretend to be a gamer — hire one

Being good at marketing is different than being good at esports marketing. Just as you wouldn't sign up Tom Brady for a Madden tournament, you shouldn't rely on your traditional marketing team to know how to advertise to the esports community.

Instead, hire someone who knows the community well and understands exactly what the target audience wants. Or you can dare to meet the same fate as Bud Light, whose first and awkward venture into esports marketing resembled a dad talking about gaming with his son. In the flopped campaign, the company missed the mark on all of the players they nominated for awards, showing a significant lack of research and preparation, and were ridiculed by the esports community. Ultimately, this serves as the best example of how not to do things.

As gamers and businesspeople, we can tell you: hiring a marketer that is familiar with and actively involved in the esports community is the best way to know which ideas carry the most weight and would best succeed. Knowing the right terminology, a deep understanding of the rules, and up-to-date information about the games and players will give you an edge and avoid the shame of coming across as an ignorant outsider — as well as the wasted advertising dollars that would come along with it.

Esports advertising is no simple task, but with a proper understanding of your audience, it can be. And if exercised properly, you'll be able to get in and reap the early profits that the emerging industry has to offer. As an advertiser, it's more than just talking the talk — you have to walk the walk too. The best way to do it is to become a part of the community and know exactly who your audience is and exactly what it's looking for.

Riad Chikhani is founder and chief executive officer at Gamurs Group, parent company of Dot Esports, the premier destination for news and data on competitive gaming.

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

Sketchfab debuts object store for 3D and virtual reality creators

Posted: 20 Jan 2018 03:34 AM PST


Sketchfab is taking one of its biggest steps yet today and launching features so that users can buy and sell 3D objects.

The startup is supporting the industry standard glTF as its download format, which should make it easy for creators to take the objects purchased from the siteand import them into creativity software.

Google recently launched Poly, which offers similar functionality, but that service is more focused on objects with a limited amount of detail. In addition, Poly launched with only free functionality — so there are no built in tools for creators to use if they want to make money from their creations.

Sketchfab CEO Alban Denoyel said there are 2 million models hosted on Sketchfab and though only around 4,000 are available for purchase on Day One, he's confident the repository is large enough that people should be able to find what they are looking for. Available content ranges from low polygon objects like those found on Google's service up to animated objects and highly detailed 3D scans. The service includes an inspector to check out the details of a file including the materials and textures used.

There are other services as well like Unity's Asset Store that resemble what Sketchfab is doing. Many 3D and VR content creators, however, rely on Sketchfab's cross-device support to ensure people looking at their work can access it no matter what device they're using. The addition of a store to that core functionality could be a big plus for artists struggling to find a way to support themselves by creating cool things in VR.

This story originally appeared on Uploadvr.com. Copyright 2018

Donald Trump signs bill renewing NSA warrantless internet surveillance

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 05:32 PM PST


(Reuters) — U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday said he signed into law a bill renewing the National Security Agency's warrantless internet surveillance program, sealing a defeat for digital privacy advocates.

"Just signed 702 Bill to reauthorize foreign intelligence collection," Trump wrote on Twitter, referring to legislation passed by the U.S. Congress that extends Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

The law renews for six years and with minimal changes the National Security Agency (NSA) program, which gathers information from foreigners overseas but incidentally collects an unknown amount of communications belonging to Americans.

The measure easily passed the U.S. House of Representatives last week despite mixed signals posted on Twitter by Trump and narrowly avoided a filibuster in the Senate earlier this week that split party lines. The measure had drawn opposition from a coalition of privacy-minded Democrats and libertarian Republicans.

In his tweet on Friday, Trump attempted to clarify why he signed the bill despite repeating an unsubstantiated claim that his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama, ordered intelligence agencies to eavesdrop on Trump's 2016 Republican presidential campaign.

"This is NOT the same FISA law that was so wrongly abused during the election," Trump wrote. "I will always do the right thing for our country and put the safety of the American people first!"

Last September, the U.S. Justice Department said in a court filing that it had no evidence to support Trump's claim about improper surveillance during the campaign.

Without Trump's signature, Section 702 had been set to expire on Friday, though intelligence officials had said the surveillance program could continue to operate until April.

Under the law, the NSA is allowed to eavesdrop on vast amounts of digital communications from foreigners living outside the United States via U.S. companies like Facebook Inc, Verizon Communications Inc and Alphabet Inc's Google.

But the program also incidentally scoops up Americans' communications, including when they communicate with a foreign target living overseas, and can search those messages without a warrant.

The White House, U.S. intelligence agencies and congressional Republican leaders have said the program is indispensable to national security, vital to protecting U.S. allies and needs little or no revision.

Privacy advocates say it allows the NSA and other intelligence agencies to grab data belonging to Americans in a way that represents an affront to the U.S. Constitution.

GamesBeat Decides 67: Decision Squad

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 04:36 PM PST


The GamesBeat Decides podcast is back after a week off. Hosts Mike Minotti and Jeffrey Grubb were both sick. Mike was in the hospital, and Jeff had a bit of a cold. But we have returned with games and news.

On this episode, Mike and Jeff discuss why Nintendo is charging a lot of money for cardboard. They also get into a successful Awesome Games Done Quick speedrunning marathon as well as rumors of a new Fable game. Jeff has also spent some time with a Ubisoft shooter with over 25 million players and a Logitech peripheral that he wants to talk about.

Here’s a rundown of the show

  • World of Warcraft
  • Darkest Dungeon
  • Logitech G920 racing wheel
  • Spintires: Mudrunner
  • Rainbow Six: Siege
  • Nintendo Labo
  • AGDQ 2018
  • Fable sequel from Forza Horizon developer Playground?
  • Super Meat Boy’s success on Switch
  • NPD’s 2017 report

Talk to you next time, kiddos.

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

SuperData: Stardew Valley is an indie success with over 3.5 million copies sold

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 04:11 PM PST


Stardew Valley has reaped what it sowed — that is, 3.5 million copies of the Harvest Moon-like farming simulator. It also boasts an impressive 700,000 monthly active players, according to industry analyst SuperData Research. Solo developer Eric Barone, aka ConcernedApe, partnered with publisher Chucklefish to debut the game on PC in February 2016, and has since launched it on the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, and most recently, Nintendo Switch.

A huge part of Stardew Valley’s appeal is how it evokes the nostalgia of Natsume’s Harvest Moon. It borrows a lot of the mechanics and some story elements as well: the player inherits a farm, plants and harvests crops, and wins the love and affection of townspeople. Like in Harvest Moon, magical spirits of the land can grant you boons and you can romance the non-playable character of your choice by earning what are essentially friendship points. However, Stardew Valley does depart from the script a bit by including some modern-day commentary with Joja Corporation, a global company that’s threatening local business with its cheap, mass-produced products.

In the first month on PC, Stardew Valley sold 800,000 copies, which makes it a standout hit in a crowded indie-gaming space. However, other developers can still learn lessons from its success. SuperData’s senior analyst Elena Fedina examines what contributed to the game’s high sales, suggesting that the enthusiastic fanbase is a major factor. On the Nexus Mods website, the community has created and uploaded 1,513 mods. Some grant minor additions, like tooltips to help players keep track of quest items. Others overhaul the game’s art style, replacing its small-town aesthetic with Victorian mansions or changing its character portraits to anime-style illustrations.

“ConcernedApe was extremely passionate about the game concept and worked hard on bringing his vision to life,” writes Fedina in a post. “He built a trusting relationship with his players, who later in development helped to test the game, and brought in an even larger audience after release.”

And that close relationship bore fruit in the form of a Reddit thread where fans bought copies of the game for folks who said they couldn’t afford it. The community has also been patiently waiting for the multiplayer mode, which is slated for release later this year.

SuperData warns that Stardew Valley’s outsize success may be more of the exception than the rule. ConcernedApe worked 10 hours every day for four years to develop the title, a work schedule that simply may not be possible for everyone. Similarly, not everyone has access to a publisher who will help get the word out in the crowded games market. And indies who are seeking funding so they can market their projects as well as devote more time to development have a tough road ahead of them.

“For example, as of January 3, there were 11,000 projects in Kickstarter's video games category, 80 percent of which met less than 75 percent of their funding goal,” said Fedina. “Optimistically, only 30 percent of all projects will run a successful campaign, leaving the others to find different ways to pay for development.”

But it’s not all grim. Stardew Valley shows what rallying a tight-knit community around a game can do. And though it would be nice to sell millions of copies, that’s not necessarily the only way to define success for an indie game. Plus, many developers are finding ways to work around their financial constraints — balancing a day job, or cutting down on overhead costs. In an interview with GamesBeat, Mike Bithell (Thomas Was Alone, Subsurface Circular) noted some of the solutions that he’s seen developers come up with that work with their situations.

“The financial situation in the U.K. in particular is pretty unpleasant right now because of all the Brexit stuff, but you're seeing more and more remote working situations,” said Bithell. “People not doing the office thing. I'm interested to see how that affects the stuff that's coming out. We're going to see some games made by international indie teams, or weird mishmashes of people collaborating. You're already seeing a number of people in the indie space who are working on several projects with different teams.”

The games market is noisy, and that makes it difficult for developers to get their titles in front of people. But a ton of creative work is coming out of the indie scene — such as the games that have been recently recognized by the Independent Games Festival. And since the launch of the Switch, Nintendo has been welcoming of indie titles to its platform. The opportunity of a new platform along with more discovery options, like the curated game subscription service Jump, will hopefully yield even more indie success stories in the future.

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

Location data is transforming every industry (VB Live)

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 03:51 PM PST


Prince Nasr Harfouche, a principal at Deloitte Consulting LLP, joins this upcoming VB Live event to share how every industry can leverage location intelligence to transform their digital marketing strategy. Learn how location intelligence, incorporated into digital strategies, helps engage consumers in real time, increases brand loyalty, and provides actionable data. 

Register here for free.


The amount of user intelligence and precision location technology capabilities available today is skyrocketing. Pair that with an audience that’s growing increasingly receptive to relevant messaging — the kind that happens where and when they’re most interested and delivers exactly what they need? You’ve got a revolution in targeting that’s touching every industry, says Prince Nasr Harfouche, a principal at Deloitte Consulting LLP.

“We see location data being used in insurance, corporate communications, banking, telecommunications, and more,” says Harfouche, and each use case demonstrates a new way for companies to unlock the potential of location-based intelligence.

With location data added as a new dimension of customer data, insurance agents gain an understanding of each customer’s pattern of movement and travel, delivering deeper insight into potential risks when they’re underwriting an insurance claim.

In banking, geo-location data is helping retail banks plan branch expansions and ATM placements. For example, in New York City there are so many ATM machines and so many different branches of the same bank.

“So you’re trying to look for the optimum distribution,” Harfouche says. “With geo-location data for their customers, they know the intensity, the frequency, and the pattern of movement of their clients in the city, which informs their distribution strategy — and that lowers costs.”

The telecommunications industry is able to harness geolocation data in a similar way, when they’re planning the distribution of their towers. In order to plan the widest coverage possible, telecommunications companies track and simulate geo-locations of users.

And real-time, streaming geoloaction is being tapped to combat money laundering and fraud protection, as well.

“If we see a credit card charge in Mexico and we know you are based in the U.S., we can instantly pinpoint your actual location and immediately flag it as a fraud if you haven’t left the country,” Harfouche says. “This use case can potentially help in money laundering, identity theft, and other types of fraud as well.”

Of course, there are privacy cautions in the use of any customer data, and it’s no different with location data. Companies need to take care not to violate country borders or the jurisdiction they are allowed to operate within. But Harfouche notes that if customers want to share their location, they actually have to make that choice. And even then, use of that data has to actually be serving a particular business case, especially if you have more sensitive data available, including a pinpointed location and a name. But when you’re looking at patterns and crowd movement, privacy issues should not pose a problem, he adds.

Customers are actually getting more comfortable, and even more enthusiastic, about sharing their location data, as use cases expand and the technology  results in larger consumer benefits. For instance, real-time location data has been enhancing direction apps for years, and automated cars are on the way.

“Dubai is claiming that in 2020, they’ll have the first automated taxis,” Harfouche says. “That means live geolocation data connected in a solid network and perfected. To make that self-imposed deadline, both the technology and the government have to move fast.”

And as the technology evolves for every industry, it’s time for marketers to get on board the location data express. To learn more about how every industry can benefit from the power of location data, where to start, and how to win, don’t miss this VB Live event.


Don’t miss out!

Register here for free.


During this VB Live event, you'll learn how to:

  • Boost engagement with real-time, location-based consumer engagement and experiences
  • Gain insight into the behavioral patterns of customers and prospects
  • Understand the future of location data for your business

Speakers:

  • David Bairstow, VP Products, Skyhook
  • Prince Nasr Harfouche, Principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP
  • Stewart Rogers, Analyst at Large, VentureBeat (Moderator)

Sponsored by Skyhook

Digi-Capital: Game software/hardware could hit $170 billion in 2018, $230 billion by 2022

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 03:30 PM PST


Video game software and hardware together could be a $165-$170 billion range in 2018 (if mobile outperforms again), and it could reach between $230 and $235 billion by 2022 if strong performance continues. That might make games software/hardware bigger in five years than 150 countries' individual GDPs today (somewhere between Vietnam and Finland). Games software alone could drive around three-quarters of total market revenue in 5 years, with hardware taking the rest.

Games are great fun, but they're also serious business.

Three giant sectors to dominate market revenue

Above: Digi-Capital games software/hardware sector revenue (click to expand)

Digi-Capital's new Games Report Q1 2018 details how the three big sectors of mobile games software, PC games hardware (which includes gaming computers, upgrades and peripherals), and online PC games (including DLC, IAP and subscriptions) could take just under three-quarters of total games market revenue by 2022. If mobile games software continues to outperform forecasts, it could deliver in the $55 billion-$60 billion range this year, and grow to $90 billion-95 billion by 2022. PC games hardware sales could hit $30 billion-$35 billion in 2018, growing steadily to between $40 billion-45 billion in the same timeframe. Lastly PC online games could drive $20 billion-25 billion this year, also growing steadily to $25 billion-$30 billion by 2022.

15 sectors driving market growth … and decline

Above: Digi-Capital: Games sector revenue growth, 2017-2022 (click to expand)

Console games (physical sales) could still produce significant revenue by 2022, despite long-term decline. All the other sectors might be in the high- to low-single digit billions in five years, including steady-growth console games (digital sales), high-growth AR games (from a low base), long-term ex-growth console games hardware (even with Nintendo Switch's recent outperformance), high-growth VR games (from a low base), solid-growth console games (online), steady-growth games advertising, low-growth PC games (digital sales), steady-growth VR hardware (from a low base), declining web games, strong-growth (but small) esports, and declining PC games (physical sales).

At a platform level, mobile games (software only) could approach two-fifths of all game revenue, and PC games (software/hardware) one-third, by 2022. Console games (software/hardware) remain huge fun, but could see less than one-sixth of all market revenue in five years. VR games (software/hardware) and AR games (software only) are both going to be big, but they're not the same scale as the three major platforms. Web games are not growing, and exciting esports might still produce less than 1 percent of total industry revenue long-term, even as they do wonders as a marketing tool for games on the major platforms.

USA, China, Japan, and South Korea dominant

Above: Digi-Capital games software-hardware country revenue (click to expand)

The US, China, Japan and South Korea together could take nearly two-thirds of global games market revenue in 5 years. But when grouped into regions with the 50 other games countries Digi-Capital covers, Asia should continue to be bigger than North America and Western Europe combined.

There are huge differences in games industry growth rates across countries, but at a regional level, Asia's combined scale and growth are driving the industry forward. Some of the highest revenue growth rates are also coming from countries which won't hit the top 10 in five years, with several Eastern European, Latin American and Middle Eastern/African countries seeing significant revenue growth from a small base.

Above: Digi-Capital: Revenue share versus growth, by country (click to expand)

Record games investment in 2017

Above: Digi-Capital games sector investment deal value and volume (click to expand)

All of this scale and growth has led to two consecutive years of games investment growth, with VCs from Sand Hill Road to China pouring a record well over $2 billion into games startups in 2017. The biggest investments were in games core tech, mobile games and AR/VR games sectors. Esports also generated a huge amount of interest, but not the same level of investment.

In contrast, games M&A dropped back below $5 billion to its most recent low point of 2015 due to a lack of giant games acquisitions in 2017 (unlike 2016's record over $28 billion). To balance this decline, the games IPO market rebounded to a record high last year led by NetmarbleSEA (Garena) and Rovio. The next 12 months could determine whether the last decade's three-year games IPO cycles hold true, with one big year followed by two quiet ones. Altogether 2017's total games market exits (M&A/IPO combined) delivered lower dollar value, but higher deal volume than the year before.

Above: Digi-Capital: Total games mergers and acquisitions and IPO deal value and volume

Games has become a largely consolidated market where giants rule, but indie developer hope springs eternal. The next few years could see a new wave of giants emerge from early-stage sectors that promise to become the future of the industry.

(You can read more in Digi-Capital's new 206 page Games Report and Database Q1 2018,including games market analysis and forecasts from 2017 to 2022 for all games sectors

Tim Merel is managing director of AR/VR and games adviser Digi-Capital.

The PC Gaming channel is presented by Intel®'s Game Dev program.

Apple CEO Tim Cook blames social media and technology ‘overuse’ after iPhone addiction criticisms

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 02:15 PM PST


Speaking in the U.K. today about Apple's Everyone Can Code curriculum, CEO Tim Cook briefly addressed the topic of iPhone addiction, seeming to cast blame on social media and the “overuse” of technology.

"I don't have a kid,” said the 57-year-old Cook, “but I have a nephew that I put some boundaries on. There are some things that I won't allow; I don't want them on a social network."

A debate has raged over whether smartphones, social media, or a combination of factors is leading children — and many adults — to stay glued to their devices, awaiting text and other communications. Earlier this month, shareholders called for Apple to address what they deemed childrens’ iPhone addiction and, in response, Apple rapidly pledged to enhance parental controls on iOS.

According to The Guardian, Cook said he does not “believe in overuse” of technology, noting that “I'm not a person that says we've achieved success if you're using it all the time … I don't subscribe to that at all."

He also explained that he believes technology should not play a major role in every academic subject. "In a course on literature, do I think you should use technology a lot? Probably not."

The comments come ahead of the company’s Q1 2018 earnings on February 1, when Apple is expected to report record-breaking device sales. Apple recently announced plans to inject billions of dollars into the U.S. economy, in part through product support and manufacturing efforts over the next five years.

Facebook’s News Feed will soon prioritize stories that are trustworthy, informative, or local

Posted: 19 Jan 2018 02:09 PM PST


Facebook today announced that its News Feed will soon give priority to trustworthy news outlets. The gauge for what Facebook considers high-quality news will come in part from a survey of Facebook users to determine which news outlets they find most trustworthy. Local news and news outlets that Facebook users deem informative will also be given priority.

Tests of a Trusted Sources program used to determine which the news outlets users deem most trustworthy will begin next week, first in the U.S. and then in other nations around the world. More details on initiatives to identify informative news outlets may be shared later this year, according to a Facebook blog post.

“There’s too much sensationalism, misinformation and polarization in the world today. Social media enables people to spread information faster than ever before, and if we don’t specifically tackle these problems, then we end up amplifying them. That’s why it’s important that News Feed promotes high quality news that helps build a sense of common ground,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a Facebook post about an hour ago.

Today’s news about the news media follows a News Feed update announced last week to surface more engaging content from friends and less public content like links to news stories in user’s News Feeds.

“After this change, we expect news to make up roughly 4 percent of News Feed — down from roughly 5 percent today,” Zuckerberg said.

Last week, Zuckerberg warned that the change set to take place later this year will result in more quality time and conversation with friends on Facebook but less engagement.

Facebook has faced criticism from lawmakers in Washington D.C. and other governments for its failure to address fake news circulated on its platform during national elections.

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