Venkat Koduru’s Blog

My recollection of elementary school art class is plagued by two overarching memories – Mrs. Martin and my lectures on “eliminating sports”.  In between molding clay and coloring in circles, I would share my grand scheme with the rest of the table.  At first, “sports” in general was to be sentenced to death row; then I narrowed down the list to specific sports (hockey was to remain). Finally I came up with an alternative to sports – “virtual sports”.  So instead of actually hitting a ball with a bat in a baseball stadium, you’d put on your goggles, and hand sensors, and play in the comfort of your own backyard.  No bat would be needed; neither would the ball.  You’d simply swing your hand, and the goggles would take care of the rest. (Of course, I overlooked the fact that humans posses five senses, and that hitting a ball, at the very least, employs “sight”, “hearing”, and “touch”.  Ear buds, and touch-simulating gloves, then, would have been required.)

At the same time, I had another fantastical dream – “GX Great”.  This was an imaginative company that was formulated as the result of hours spent sitting at my desk, daydreaming. One day, I decided that GX Great would eliminate death.  Exactly how that would happen was not including in my concoction. Bare in mind, though, that it was not to be done placing the Grim Repear under house arrest and serving him dinner (Family Guy). Another day, after running out of space on my own computer (I was a software junkie and would download anything and everything I found online), I decided that GX Great would solve the computer storage problem. Every GX Great computer would be equipped with unlimited storage… “unlimited” in it’s most innocent sense – as much as you’d like, to your heart’s desire, no strings attached.  GX Great would also solve world hunger, and bring peace, prosperity, and high wages to all.

It was this imagination that kept me afloat; I never slept with a teddy bear nor ever had any desire to.  And as I grew older, I left my sports elimination and GX Great plans behind. I substituted impractical dreams with ambitions more realistic, plausible, and in line with my growing sense of maturity.  I made a website, GamerzParadise.biz, and with it formed a new aspiration.  I would be an entrepreneur.  Now please understand that I’m omitting numerous intermediate steps – from GX Great and “eliminating sports”, grew a Pokemon, and later Computer club, then a goal to raise $100 for the Computer Club, along with a few other small projects along the way.  Only after all these ventures were abandon, did the website begin.

GamerzParadise.biz was started as a tutorial site for Runescape, a multiplayer online computer game.  It soon branched out to Roller Coaster Tycoon, Neopets, and other popular games of the time.  I envisioned GamerzParadise being the number one destination for Runescape, but sadly at it’s the height it was probably the 53rd.

After GamerzParadise.biz, TrackMyProfile.com was launched. It was a success – number two in it’s category.  Soon after launch, I went off to an educational camp against my will; it was a place called CTY and I was in their Saratoga Springs location.  Every night the counselors would take our cell phones, and every morning we would get them back.  This was testament to the cruelty campers had to endure.  We were also forbidden from bringing laptops, and computer time was not provided.  In addition, we had to have our lights out by 10:30. No matter how tired, no matter how much I wanted to do something else in the short gap of time between the end of class and “lights out”, I never failed to call my dad.  Ever night I’d ask him to check how many new users had joined TrackMyProfile.  I had typed up a detailed set of instructions and made sure he was thoroughly acquainted with the process before leaving home.  The number usually swelled around 7 or 8, or on occasion 9.  After returning home from camp, I continued work on my new venture.  After only 5 months in existence TrackMyProfile was racking in $300 a month.  Then two months later, the figure grew to $500. Finally, at its peak TrackMyProfile signed on 100 to 200 new users a day was earning $800 monthly.  Given that I was in middle school, this was a hefty sum.  I’d work on TrackMyProfile at every opportunity – while watching TV, at school, and when I should have been doing homework. Naturally, I was optimistic.

My dad was quite the opposite though, and when I asked my mom why he never seemed too excited about any of my success, she kindly replied “everyone’s optimistic as a child”.  She continued, “as you get older, you’ll become more like dad”.

I’m 16 now, a junior in high school. Sadly, I think my mom was right.