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This blog will hopefully track my progress as I try to create what I hope will be the definitive UK E-Sports scene.
Location: Middlesbrough, England.
As unlikely as this seems, it's actually quite ideal for what I'm trying to create, living space here is cheap, it's very accessible, and there's also the University of Teesside here which I am currently a business student.
I've pitched the idea to Digital City an EU initiative which offers £4000 fellowships for six months while the business is in the incubation stages. From there on I will be able to get around 200,000 Euro's of government Business grants over a three year period. Which along with start up capital and loans will be enough to set up a venue and the infrastructure needed to broadcast games and of course, run a pro scene.
Current progress: I have nearly finished a business plan detailing what I need, I have two versions of the plan, one which I need finished by the 17th of March and one which I will take a bit more time with but hope to have finished before the evaluation period for the digital city fellowship.
I am meeting with Digital City again on Tuesday the 9th of March to talk about logistics, as they seem to be very interested in the concept.
Ideally I want to form a close relationship with Blizzard, as opposed to the KESPA model of simply screwing them over.
My general plan is to create a more commercial model on site. With paid entry, food and drinks available, and most importantly, comfortable seating.
The biggest challenge I foresee is getting companies interested in both running pro-teams as well as sponsoring the leagues and events.
Either way I will be using the blog to keep anyone interested updated. Expect the next post on Tuesday.
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Good luck! I know there are atleast a few english tlers.
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Good luck, I hope you do well. :D
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this sounds awesome. i'm super interested.
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Melbourne5338 Posts
didn't uk have that really cool looking lan center in london by the ESReality guys
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As someone who is extremely pessimistic and knows nothing about the broadcasting industry (and even less about the UK industry): I think you will have to broadcast more than just starcraft to english clients.
That being said, if it works, well, let me know where to send my resume 
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I'm not all that clued up about ESReality, but I will check them out once their site is back up.
On March 04 2010 16:39 VorcePA wrote:As someone who is extremely pessimistic and knows nothing about the broadcasting industry (and even less about the UK industry): I think you will have to broadcast more than just starcraft to english clients. That being said, if it works, well, let me know where to send my resume
Starcraft will only be a small part of a larger scheme. Of course my love will always lie with starcraft, but like in Korea, they're willing to give any game a chance to see if it's profitable. And I'm definitely going to make sure that console games especially will be considered given the current UK gaming climate. Ideally I'd want as many games as possible. However the question is how many games ARE possible? It will all be about getting that critical number for optimized broad cast.
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I spent the last hour off and on writing a nice long post for this blog, but I'm suddenly very skeptical. The fact that you haven't put any thought into how many games are feasible (i came up with a number in about 2 minutes of thought) means both that you may be unfamiliar with the dynamics within and between gaming communities of actually good competitive games with potential to turn long-term profits, and that you seem to be in this just for the money since you're not taking into account the sometimes fanatical, close-knit networks of players you will be working with nor the fact that you have basically no infrastructure to readily work off of. Maybe I'm wrong and being too harsh, but I'd just have an entirely different approach to this if I were in your shoes.
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The problem with estimating the amount of games feasible is on a practical level, and not a theoretical one. It will all depend on the premises and the interest. It's a very valid criticism, I've been tackling the question for a few months and have come up with around 5 different scenarios which have slightly different numbers. I'm not comfortable discussing them fully before I do some more market research beyond just asking people on the street. There's also the question of broadcast time, because if you hit a critical number and are unable to broadcast more games without relegating them only to a stream and VOD service I will then have to make a descision about whether it would be profitable to launch a second Television channel.
Infrastructure, as I said is the main problem at the moment, which can easily be rectified with council backing, which of coruse will be step one since I will be getting government and university funding and support.
The fact you immediately assumed I hadn't put thought into the number of games is a bit insulting, but of course I didn't specifically mention that in the OP, although I never mentioned starcraft specifically, it's all about setting up an E-Sports system. I'd love a prolongued theoretical discussion about how many games/what type and the intended target audience if anyone is interested. But it will still be limited based on the venue, especially in the infancy stages. I'm also very vary of over-extending myself before I have established any kind of cash flow, you can only support running a loss for a few years until banks and investors start to lose confidence.
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My apologies, I'm glad you've put a lot more thought into this than I gave you credit for, and I'm really sorry for sounding like a total asshole. I just know that there have been so many people trying to just take advantage of the gaming scene to turn a quick profit. I've seen so much of this kind of thing not just in gaming that it has made me pretty jaded and wary.
Though I love these kinds of things (brainstorming about creating something from scratch), I can't give you much advice since I realize I know next to nothing about the UK gaming scene. I hope things go well on Tuesday!
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I completely understand your scepticism I would be thinking the same thing. My actual motivation is two-fold first I have a passion for gaming being considered on a professional competitive level and to have this recognized as someting more than a "passing fad". I also want to support the development of Middlesbrough which has a seemingly never-ending cycle of economic mediocrity. Continually suffering setbacks when things start developing. The monetary aspect is important only in that if this does succeed, I would have to be able to live off the proceeds, and of course given the monumental task ahead it's definitely not a quick buck.
One of my main aspirations however is to get international interest. And I have been working my e-marketing and e-distribution models from that.
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This sounds cool. Good luck and let us know how it goes will you?
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Yeah, expect the next blog post on Tuesday. My meeting is 11AM UK time.
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EPT
