Posted by Sulaiman Alhasawi on Sep 15, 2010 in
Entrepreneur What are the differences between an entrepreneur and a hacker? Are they both trying to solve problems or create one ? Do they share the habit of looking for new ideas and innovation ?
As Pablos Holman puts in his presentation: A hacker looks at things differently and always find new ways to use them. According to Pablos: the hacker has the “discovery” mindset. He emphasises that the entrepreneur can learn a lot from the hacker and how he thinks. His passion of learning new things and opening new windows can/will create many opportunities. He also demonstrates the concept of consequences; by analyzing how a particular technology or a problem can lead to another new idea or concept; its side effects can lead the curious mind to new discoveries. What I have noticed from his speech is: he always looked at things from his own perspective that is “from a security point of view per say. So he, for example viewed TV, mobile phones & portable computers while wearing his “Black Hat” glasses. He wanted to know if these devices can be used or improved in order to make or manipulate them for security reasons. The gist of that is every person or entrepreneur can look at things wearing his/her own personal glasses. You don’t have to view things like Pablos or some one else, every body is unique. So find your strength and your glasses and stick to it.
Pablos is a well known hacker in the technology and computers industry. He has worked on many projects. He gave this speech at the “World Entrepreneurship Day” event. If you remember I talked about that event in a previous post: Entrepreneurship Day. We can always learn new angles and dimensions from other crafts such as hacking. The human mind is so perfect that is capable of doing wonderful things. The sky is the limit or maybe more, who knows. Enjoy the video: Hacking and invention by Pablos Holman
Tags: creativity, Entrepreneur, entrepreneur vs hacker, hacker mind set, innovation
Making money from virtual money is becoming increasingly a common phenomena. I’m talking about the business of selling and buying GAMES’ currencies (gold) such as World of Warcraft , EverQuest or Ultima Online ..etc. People are willing to pay real money in exchange for virtual money for the sake of having fun and pleasure. I even saw my friend who paid real money to get virtual money to play a game in FaceBook.The number of virtual currencies providers (stores)are increasing exponentially. These stores are spread everywhere in the world. From East-such as China (which has the biggest ratio) to the west. The economy of such games is enormously huge, it was estimated that GOLD money industry is valued in billions of Dollars. However some game providers ban trading gold, because it harms the game’s economy.
The game industry has attracted many of academics’ attention. They came up with many theories from a variety of scientific backgrounds (psychology , economy, sociology, etc.) doing their best to explain what’s happening inside and outside games, as games becoming the information age’s big event. One of the interesting analysis that I came across on Youtube was done by a game researcher and virtual money trader Julian Dibbell. He even wrote a book about making money from games.
I’m wondering, how many other models are similar to the above which are based on making businesses from virtual services or currencies. Some game companies organize tournaments, in which they reward skilled players when they win. This could be a good income source for gamers who are good at playing and are passionate about it. Its like snooker, you get paid for being professional. If you have good experience at testing and developing games, companies might hire/pay you to test their games. You can also sell your service in the form of consultations, by writing for example guides or eBooks. There is the business of “Power Levelling” : this service is provided by some stores to help you achieve the status/rank/gear that you wish to obtain. They charge you real money for it, and it varies depending on the difficulty or other factors.
If you claimed- in the past (correct me if I’m wrong) that you can make money from playing games,nobody would listen to you and they probably would be right. Nowadays its possible to play for fun and make money out of it, thanks to the technology and the internet.
Tags: buy sell gold, Everquest, games theory, make money online, online games, Ultima online, virtaul money, Webpreneur, world of warcraft, wow kuwait
