So far, 200 gamers have gone on from Nerd Street programming to professional careers and college scholarships. Toward that end, Fazio, a software engineer, built Nerd Street Gamers, a national network of facilities that provides affordable access to high-quality equipment, and hosts tournaments and training camps. "I realized that if competitive video games were going to be the same type of opportunity equalizer as traditional sports, we had to fix the access gap in technology," Fazio says. One big impediment for aspiring gamers: the expensive equipment required to practice. Now Fazio is aiming to do the same thing for the burgeoning esports industry, where competitive video gamers vie for recognition and prize money, some superstar players earn as much as top pro athletes and viewership rivals that of traditional sports. "What was most profound about soccer to me, though, was how it equalized opportunities for everyone, no matter their background." Growing up, Fazio was a varsity-level soccer player, which he says helped him get into college and see the world. JOHN FAZIO - FOUNDER AND CEO, NERD STREET GAMERS Next up: Akili is exploring digital therapeutic treatments for other conditions like multiple sclerosis, depression and COVID "brain fog." - Meghan Gunn After seven years of trials and a handful of peer-reviewed studies-in one, two-thirds of parents reported improvement in attention after two months of treatment-the FDA approved the game last year and it became widely available in 2021, via a doctor's prescription, for use on iPhones, iPads and Android devices. ![]() As company spokesperson Julie DiCarlo puts it, "For the first time, technology is not just delivering medicine, but is the medicine."Ĭreated with neuroscientist Gazzaley's research and art director Omernick's game design, EndeavorRX is a racing game that uses sensory stimuli and motor challenges to target the part of the brain that plays a key role in attention function as children play over time, algorithms adapt to their progress and personalize the treatment. "Together," he tells fans, "we are the architects of play." - Ned PotterĮDDIE MARTUCCI, ADAM GAZZALEY, MATT OMERNICK - FOUNDERS, AKILI INTERACTIVEĪkili's EndeavorRX, is the first-and so far, only-video game approved by the Food and Drug Administration as a medical treatment, in this case for Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children ages 8 to 12. Baszucki apologized and said his young users quickly returned. Over Halloween weekend, Roblox had a massive outage, and social media sites filled with jokes about the horror of children having to go outside and see each other. Reviewers generally say the Roblox metaverse is safe and welcoming but there have been cases of hate groups or sex clubs on the site the company says it has a safety team of more than 1,600 working to shut them down.Ī broader concern is that as the metaverse becomes more and more enticing, the real world-with annoyances like work, exercise and human contact-will seem dreary. Many beginners' avatars are simple, like Lego figures, but Roblox provides tools to make them more elaborate. If you log on, through a computer, gaming console or VR headset, you'll find yourself in what resembles a vast, brightly colored video game. ![]() By one estimate, two out of three children between the ages of 6 and 16 now have accounts. When COVID hit, Roblox's popularity exploded. He and a small team began work in 2004 on what is now Roblox. "We saw that in addition to doing their physics homework, they were building stuff and creating stuff and watching what would happen when a car ran into a building," says Baszucki. The developers design games, stores, imaginary planets and such, and get paid if kids buy subscriptions and spend digital currency ("Robux") on admission fees or digital merchandise.īaszucki, 58, schooled at Stanford, started an educational software company in 1989 with his brother, teaching kids basic science. ![]() There may be more than 30 million different games on Roblox, according to RTrack, a site that compiles Roblox statistics. But Roblox leaves most of the "building" to the developers and the youngsters who use the site, much as social media sites let you post your own stuff. And it's built on civility and safety."Īt a conference for software developers in October, Baszucki was introduced, and loudly applauded, as "the one and only Builderman." Builderman was his avatar-the computer-generated character he created to represent himself online in the early days of Roblox. "Users provide the variety-millions and millions and millions of experiences. "We're creating a platform where people don't just play, but they're starting to learn together, work together, experience entertainment together," says Baszucki via email.
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