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Colleges Are Starting Varsity Programs For Video Games (theoutline.com)
An anonymous reader shares an article: Professional esports -- competitive video game playing as a spectator sport -- is surging in the U.S., with revenues in the hundreds of millions and growing fast. So it's little surprise that collegiate esports -- in which universities field their own teams just as they would for baseball or basketball -- has been been growing as well, to the point where players are now sometimes earning scholarships that pay their entire tuition. Stephen's College, an all-women's college in Columbia, Missouri, announced a varsity esports program two weeks ago. The University of Utah did the same in early April. The growth of varsity esports teams is phenomenal, said Michael Brooks, executive director at the National Association of Collegiate eSports (NACE), a non-profit organization that is working to set standards and build infrastructure for the scene. NACE launched in September to advocate for college esports, initiate communication between schools, and provide information to program directors interested in varsity esports programs. At the time, there were only seven varsity esports programs in North America. Now there are 34 varsity programs in total, and 31 are members of NACE. Brooks expects the number of varsity programs to double by August.
As much as people like to complain about video card costs; it should be fairly difficult for this nonsense to be nearly as expensive as the more traditional flavors of college sportsball.
Rocket League fits the bill, its just football with cars after all.
speak for yourself. I play video games, and the idea of dating a socially awkward mumbling chick with interests limited to cat videos and minecraft sounds painful.
The NFL *was* non-profit. That hasn't been the case for a few years:
NFL no longer non-profit after giving up tax exempt status
As a parent of 2 young kids its a constant struggle to get them to play outdoor sports instead of video games. One argument I have been using is it may help you get a college scholarship if you are good at a sport. Now that argument is going away I wonder what excuse to get them out in the fresh air.
**Life is too short to be serious**
That whole competitive video gaming thing seems like one enormous scam targeted at gullible children. Seriously who the fuck are the mindless drones that basically play one gamer over and over and over and over and over, to bloody infinity. The most mind blowing stupendously boring and pointless activity. I like gaming, I like learning new games, I like games with replayability but fuck being forced to play the same game over and over and over again driven by greed and empty bullshit marketing targeted at children, fuck, I would rather lay bricks out in the sun.
What kind of marketing shit will sick adults target at children next. http://www.skynews.com.au/news... there are some seriously sick super greedy adults out there.
Like playing computer games, then play them, do not watch them, seriously play them. Look it is all so stupid, do the same thing over and over and over again and you will be better at it than other people who do not and instead do a lot of interesting and varied stuff. The only thing keeping that bullshit going is marketing targeted at children to manipulate them, make them feel inferior because they can not play that well, so they can try to make themselves feel better by buying worthless shit.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
it should be fairly difficult for this nonsense to be nearly as expensive as the more traditional flavors of college sportsball.
E-sports has one expense that ball sports lack, namely a royalty payable to each game's publisher. The owner of copyright in a proprietary video game has the exclusive right to authorize public performance of its audiovisual work, and a game's publisher can sue any school that streams its matches or makes captures available for later viewing without a license.
I had to beat off the throngs of adoring coeds with my slide rule.
You know, it is possible to take this social justice thing too far.
You mean the life they're not really allowed to enjoy anymore because legions of governments, insurance companies, employers, and schools think fun is too dangerous, costly, or just bad for the bottom line?
Not like golf, equestrian and other activities which are clearly not sports are already put under the umbrella.
They smell money and want a piece. 'Student' gamers who don't get paid next?
It is a bizarre fact, that anything that is even vaguely competitive and can be commericalised as a form of entertainment, counts as 'sport' in the US. I think the most eye-watering example of this, so far, is the eating competitions; the sight of blubbery blokes engulfing vast amounts of fast food in the shortest time possible - and being called 'athletes' - sent me straight to the salad bowl for a week. Sport indeed.
In Japan, they do tank battles as a sport.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
It is a bizarre fact, that anything that is even vaguely competitive and can be commericalised as a form of entertainment, counts as 'sport' in the US. I think the most eye-watering example of this, so far, is the eating competitions; the sight of blubbery blokes engulfing vast amounts of fast food in the shortest time possible - and being called 'athletes' - sent me straight to the salad bowl for a week. Sport indeed.
The best competitve eaters aren't "blubbery blokes". The fat actually gets in the way of their stomach expanding so they can't eat as much as others.
The best competitve eaters aren't "blubbery blokes".
That was by way of poetic license - "it ain't wrong, if it sounds good" ;-) Why let mere facts stand in the way of a good rant?
They'll be sports when you carry the horse through the course or change golf so its like the biathlon. Until then they are no more sports than pool, snooker, darts, bowling or racing cars.
varsity leagues for regular athletic sports have the same restrictions and often charge their members fees for participation as well.
A set of schools that play a ball sport is free to start a new league without having to pay the owner of exclusive rights in the sport. This isn't true of an e-sport.
And yes, there can often be restrictions on who can broadcast what as well, which happens just as often in the professional leagues as well (NFL is a well know abuser to take down "illegal" rebroadcasts. Olympics are another).
The difference is that with ball sports, these rights are controlled only by the league, not by the owner of a whole sport. NFL is one gridiron football league; others exist, and no law prevents a few hundred athletes from starting their own, such as USFL and XFL. Olympics is a league; there are other leagues for every sport contested at IOC events. A game publisher has legal exclusive right over all leagues playing that sport; each league has to either kiss the publisher's behind or stop playing an entire sport.
...but... Colleges should not be allowed to give scholarships for anything other than academics or financial need and still keep their tax-exempt status. The reason for hiring the best athletes (the reason for sports scholarships) is to make money. Since it's a for-profit enterprise, it should be taxed.
If you can be 200 lbs overweight and play it with competitive success, it's a game, not a sport.
We ave an established term for these: "video games". There's nothing wrong with them. But they are not "sports".
They are e-sports not sports that "e-" is critical, but pedantics aside.... There is a low bar for what people call "sport" that I think video gaming can clear. ESPN thinks professional poker, eating competitions, billiards, and trick-shot pool are sport enough to air on TV...many of those people don't look too healthy. One can win an Olympic medal in eight different categories of target shooting. Although it is more active than video games, the Olympic event of "race walking" [20KM and 50KM] seems incredibly silly when one could run. Last but certainly not least, the multi-billion dollar infinite left-turn sport of NASCAR, where competitors sit for long periods of times making slight movements to control a piece of technology while talking to their team on a microphone... sound familiar? I think pro video gamers can fit right in "sports."