12 Year Old Gets $6.5M for Gaming Company

Bayscribe writes "A Silicon Valley company co-founded by a 12-year-old has just raised $6.5 million in venture capital. PlaySpan, based in Santa Clara, Calif. says it offers game publishers a technology that lets users make payments and shop for other items. It calls itself the first "publisher-sponsored in-game commerce network." Arjun Mehta, a 6th grader, says on his Web site that he is passionate about software that can make the game experience more "rewarding," and that he started the company last year in his garage. He paid for it from earnings made from selling online game items he won."

Comments

bubble 2.0

[wwmedia]

i smell another dot com bubble bursting

Re:bubble 2.0

[Otter]

Nonsense! The OLPC people have explained very clearly how software they don't have time to implement themselves will be written for them by kids who have never seen a light bulb before.

His future plans

[CRCulver]

From the article:

Mehta said that he now intended to drop out of the sixth grade. "School is great, but now that I've got a multi-million dollar company, I need to concentrate on that. After all, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs did it. Sixth grade will still be there waiting for me in a few years. Now excuse me while I ask my mom to drive me in my new Ferrari to the mall."

Re:His future plans

[FinchWorld]

Now excuse me while I ask my mom to drive me in my new Ferrari to the mall.

Finally! A Slashdot story we can all relate to!

Re:His future plans

[value_added]

Finally! A Slashdot story we can all relate to!

Even better ...

he started the company last year in his garage. He paid for it from earnings made from selling online game items he won."

Dunno about you, but I've always dreamed of moving out of the basement and buying my own garage.

Aren't dangling participles fun? ;-)

Re:His future plans

[CRCulver]

*whoosh*

riight.

[apodyopsis]

dupe or not - that kid has just got to be an insufferable, annoying little snot.

a bit like "doogie howser MD" only real, remember that?

Re:dupe

[Opportunist]

Not only is this story almost certainly a dupe, it's also over 4 months old.

In other words, could someone check whether that company still exists?

Kids today grow up so fast

[Nymz]

This one turned 13 before I got to the article.

I wonder...

[farkus888]

I wonder if this is what my mom thought I could have been doing with my time when she kept yelling at me for wasting all my time touching myself when I was 12?

I'll have to ask her sometime.

Re:Incorrect linkage

[ThirdPrize]

If the editors don't even RTFAs before posting them, why shoud we? ;)

Hmm. Isn't this already patented?

[someone1234]

The chinese gold farmers do this since years, isn't there already a patent for this business method?

Re:dupe

[Puff of Logic]

Fields? Huh. I remember when this was all molten rock and hadn't even finished cooling yet! Now you kids get off of my lawn!
Molten rock? Luxury! We used to have to bring our own interstellar dust in a bucket and hope that we could pile up enough to have it hold together under its own gravity!