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New site wants to merge YouTube and gaming

Dela @ Mar 22, 2007 16:55 | 1 comment

A new site, Kongregate.com, aims to bring independent game developers to a YouTube-like system that offers revenue sharing. Video game maker Jim Greer came up with the idea, and after pitching it to some Silicon Valley investors, he received $1 million for the start-up. The site was opened shortly after Christmas and is open to all developers.

Currently it only hosts about 300 games. "Not all of them are gems, but the top 100 are," said Greer. The 36 year old founded the company with his younger sister Emily, 32. Reid Hoffman, founder of business networking site LinkedIn, said that the timing was the reason for his decision to invest in the company.

"If you get thousands of people creating content, really interesting things emerge," said Hoffman, who describes himself as an occasional gamer. Greer is not new to the video game business at all, having made his first computer games on an Apple II at the age of 12 and proceeding to work with Origin Systems. He also served as technical director Electronic Arts Inc.'s Pogo.com Web site, which attracts about 14 million gamers (mostly middle aged female).

Source:

Reuters

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