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Speaker 1: Technology with tech Stuff from dot com. Hey there, and

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Speaker 1: welcome to tech Stuff. I am your host, Jonathan Strickland.

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Speaker 1: I'm a podcaster y'all over at how stuff Works dot com.

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Speaker 1: And if you've been listening to the show, you know

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Speaker 1: I absolutely adore technology. I can't shut up about it,

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Speaker 1: which is great because that's what they pay me before.

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Speaker 1: Am I Right? So today I wanted to kind of

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Speaker 1: conclude sort of the episodes that have been leading up

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Speaker 1: to this point. I did a three part series about

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Speaker 1: the history of Valve, a very influential company in the

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Speaker 1: realm of PC gaining. I did an episode about eye

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Speaker 1: tracking technology, which is a it's a technology. It's used

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Speaker 1: for lots of different stuff, but one of the things

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Speaker 1: that's being used for is analysis and another is for

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Speaker 1: a user interface, and we talked a little bit about

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Speaker 1: its application toward gaming in that last episode. But today

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Speaker 1: we're gonna talk specifically about the realm of professional gaming

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Speaker 1: and professional gaming leagues, as well as how eye tracking

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Speaker 1: technology is integrated into that world these days. So think

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Speaker 1: of this as the conclusion of that that loosely serialized

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Speaker 1: series of episodes, and then after this one, our next

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Speaker 1: episode will probably be about something completely unrelated. So if

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Speaker 1: you are uh satisfied, satiated, let us say with video

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Speaker 1: game content, fear not. We will cover something different in

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Speaker 1: our next episode. If you love video game content, fear not.

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Speaker 1: Eventually I'll get back to it. It'll happen because it

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Speaker 1: plays a big role in tech. Now let's talk about

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Speaker 1: E sports. I've covered related topics, including some way back

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Speaker 1: in the old days of tech stuff, when Chris Poulette

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Speaker 1: and I used to shout our podcast from the top

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Speaker 1: of a building in Buckhead in Atlanta, and the only

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Speaker 1: way you could hear it was if you were in

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Speaker 1: the general neighborhood. There is a classic episode titled Can

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Speaker 1: You Make a Living Playing Games? And that original episode

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Speaker 1: came out on July two thousand eleven. Holy cow, guys,

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Speaker 1: I've been doing this show a long time. The answer,

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Speaker 1: by the way, is yes, you can make money playing

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Speaker 1: video games if you're good enough. We're gonna talk a

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Speaker 1: bit today about the industry around competitive professional video game players,

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Speaker 1: better known as e sports. I'll have a chance to

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Speaker 1: chat with Robert o'kelleeny, VP of E sports products over

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Speaker 1: at Turner Sports, and later on I'll also chat with

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Speaker 1: Brian Desaias and David Chen of alien Ware to talk

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Speaker 1: about the use of eye tracking tech and e sports

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Speaker 1: and how it can enhance the experience. We've got a

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Speaker 1: lot of wonderful folks who gave over their time, him

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Speaker 1: and their expertise to help make this episode happen. So

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Speaker 1: big thanks to all of them, and I can't wait

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Speaker 1: for you guys to hear what they have to say,

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Speaker 1: because they're really fascinating people. But before we dive into that,

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Speaker 1: it's always fun, at least for me anyway, to talk

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Speaker 1: about the history of whatever the subject is at hand.

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Speaker 1: So how old do you think e sports to be.

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Speaker 1: Do you think it rose up in the nineties, like

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Speaker 1: maybe the late nineties over in South Korea, or maybe

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Speaker 1: you would go back to like the nineteen eighties when

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Speaker 1: people like Billy Mitchell established world record high scores and

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Speaker 1: arcade games like pac Man. Well, depending upon your definition

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Speaker 1: of e sports, the real birth of the industry dates

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Speaker 1: back to nineteen seventy two. That's when students at Stanford

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Speaker 1: University pitted their lead gaming skills and tournament of Space

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Speaker 1: war Now. Steve Russell had led a small group of

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Speaker 1: designers way back in nineteen sixty two to create Space

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Speaker 1: War with it was one of the first examples of

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Speaker 1: a computer game to use a dynamic display. Now Ever,

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Speaker 1: since we've had computers, people have been trying to figure

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Speaker 1: out ways to make those computers do stuff that they

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Speaker 1: weren't intended to do, like play games. The original computers

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Speaker 1: weren't meant to do that. But you get enough people

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Speaker 1: who are mathematically gifted together and they start thinking about

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Speaker 1: the potential for math to do practically anything. Eventually they're

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Speaker 1: going to start creating programs that play games, including things

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Speaker 1: like Tic Tac toe. But it wasn't until the nineteen

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Speaker 1: sixties that people were looking at the potential of creating

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Speaker 1: displays for computers. Otherwise, you were getting readouts that were

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Speaker 1: either on paper or sometimes just a bank of lights

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Speaker 1: would light up a specific way, and that's how you

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Speaker 1: knew what the output was of whatever your input was.

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Speaker 1: So Space War was one of these early, early, early

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Speaker 1: examples of a game that uses such a dynamic display.

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Speaker 1: Players would control one of two spaceships. There was one

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Speaker 1: called the knee and one called the wedge, and they

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Speaker 1: were called that because obviously of their their shapes, and

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Speaker 1: these spaceships could fly around in a two dimensional plane,

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Speaker 1: so you can fly along that x y axis, but

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Speaker 1: not the Z There was no third dimension to this,

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Speaker 1: and it looked like a little space field and you

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Speaker 1: were technically you were flying around the gravity well of

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Speaker 1: a star so there was this gravitational effect that came

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Speaker 1: into play with the game, and your whole goal was

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Speaker 1: to destroy the other starship. So it was a player

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Speaker 1: versus player game that came out in nineteen sixty two,

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Speaker 1: and by came out, I mean it was developed for

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Speaker 1: a what at that time amounted to a supercomputer, and

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Speaker 1: if you also happen to have a supercomputer and you

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Speaker 1: could get a copy of the code, you could install

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Speaker 1: and play that game yourself, not even installed, run the game.

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Speaker 1: It's not really even installation because we're not talking about

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Speaker 1: a hard disk at this point. By nineteen seventy two,

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Speaker 1: several engineering and computer science schools had a version of

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Speaker 1: this game, and then the tournament was born. The grand

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Speaker 1: prize for this tournament back in nineteen seventy two was

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Speaker 1: a whole year's subscription to Rolling Stone magazine. The tournament

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Speaker 1: itself took place in the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Lab, so

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Speaker 1: one of the most important events to ever take place

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Speaker 1: in that ai lab in the history of mankind as

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Speaker 1: far as I'm concerned. Stewart Brand, who at the time

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Speaker 1: was a writer and editor for Rolling Stone, was the

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Speaker 1: organizer for this event. His piece in Rolling Stone equated

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Speaker 1: the players with athletes in traditional sports, so from the

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Speaker 1: very beginning there were parallels. Though at the time the

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Speaker 1: treatment might have been a touch tongue in cheek, maybe

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Speaker 1: a little playful satirical, But the version that the students

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Speaker 1: were playing of Space War was slightly altered from the

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Speaker 1: one that debuted back in nineteen sixty two. There was

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Speaker 1: a programmer named Ralph Goren who added in a couple

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Speaker 1: of elements to the game to make it more competitive

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Speaker 1: and interesting. He added in the capacity for ships to

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Speaker 1: suffer partial damage before being destroyed, so you could take

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Speaker 1: more than one hit. And he also threw in some

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Speaker 1: space minds, so some obstacles that you could deploy within

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Speaker 1: the game field and uh maybe your opponent would fly

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Speaker 1: into them and destroy himself and that would just make

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Speaker 1: the game more interesting to play and watch. By the way,

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Speaker 1: Ralph Gordon would later go on to create the world's

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Speaker 1: first spell checker. So when you hear about some of

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Speaker 1: these people who were involved in this tournament, a lot

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Speaker 1: of them went on to do some very important things

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Speaker 1: in the realm of technology and computer science. Now. The

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Speaker 1: winner of that first tournament was a guy named Bruce

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Speaker 1: baum Guard, and baum Guard would go on to work

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Speaker 1: at the Internet Archive, and later on he would become

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Speaker 1: the head of operations at Cool. Ce U I L.

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Speaker 1: And you may owe my drugs not remember what Cool is?

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Speaker 1: Things changing so scory nowadays and people quick to forget it.

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Speaker 1: Cool was one of those companies that when it launched,

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Speaker 1: got a lot out of people poking fun at it

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Speaker 1: for its name, that c U I L being spelled cool.

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Speaker 1: It was a short lived search engine. It did not

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Speaker 1: last very long. It had really long entries, so when

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Speaker 1: you did a search, you would get the results with

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Speaker 1: very long descriptors of what those search results were, plus

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Speaker 1: a thumbnail that would appear next to every search result.

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Speaker 1: But it just didn't catch on. It ended up shutting

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Speaker 1: down in September. But while Cool would come and go,

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Speaker 1: video game tournaments were really here to stay, and whether

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Speaker 1: they were informal or they were big twodues, they continued

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Speaker 1: largely beneath the notice of the general public. The introduction

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Speaker 1: of the personal computer and various gaming systems in the

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighties helped a little bits, as as did the

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Speaker 1: rise of the arcade, but by and large, video game

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Speaker 1: competitions remain confined to a niche audience. In the late

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Speaker 1: ninet nineties, gaming had reached a new level, largely because

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Speaker 1: personal computers were much more common, and this would be

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Speaker 1: the early days of the high powered graphics processing units

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Speaker 1: or gp us, those dedicated graphics cards, which were the

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Speaker 1: devices that were actually giving computers the horsepower needed to

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Speaker 1: run games that had three dimensional graphics, so stuff like Quake,

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Speaker 1: and in fact, one of the earliest tournaments of this

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Speaker 1: time was a Quake competition. It was held in nine

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Speaker 1: and the organization holding it was read Annihilation. It drew

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Speaker 1: two thousand participants and the prize was a doozy. If

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Speaker 1: you won, you got to go home with a Ferrari

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Speaker 1: that once belonged to John Carmack. He was one of

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Speaker 1: the lead developers of Quake. On June seven, Angel Manuals

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Speaker 1: founded the cyber Athlete Professional League or the CPL. This

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Speaker 1: was a group that organized various tournaments and pioneered the

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Speaker 1: field of e sports. Professional tournaments. It operated out of

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Speaker 1: the United States until two thousand eight, when the company

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Speaker 1: nearly dissolved due to an overcrowded scene, got acquired and

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Speaker 1: then sort of relaunched in China. But in just a

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Speaker 1: decade we saw that the environment had changed from a

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Speaker 1: curiosity into a pretty big industry. This cyber Athlete Professional

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Speaker 1: League went from being the only game in town pun

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Speaker 1: intended to being a a fish in a very large

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Speaker 1: pond that was growing completely beyond what it originally was. Now.

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Speaker 1: Early on, the emphasis in these tournaments was on first

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Speaker 1: person shooter games games like Quake. Then sports titles also

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Speaker 1: became popular in tournament play. Then you might get things

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Speaker 1: like fighting games. They popped up a little bit later,

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Speaker 1: and then real time strategy genre games joined the ranks,

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Speaker 1: and that's when the game StarCraft brood War rose to

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Speaker 1: prominence in the tournament scene. While tournaments were still largely

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Speaker 1: a niche interest in the United States and other parts

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Speaker 1: of the world, they had become incredibly popular, and one

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Speaker 1: of those regions was South Korea. South Korea has two

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Speaker 1: big game channels, on game Net and NBC Game, both

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Speaker 1: of which created leagues of professional StarCraft players who would

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Speaker 1: compete against each other for prizes. The country takes professional

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Speaker 1: gaming extremely seriously. In fact, when a scandal broke out

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Speaker 1: in that some StarCraft players were purposefully throwing games as

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Speaker 1: part of a gambling scheme, the government levied harsh punishments

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Speaker 1: against the accused players, all of whom were banned for

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Speaker 1: life from professional StarCraft competition. In two thousand, the World

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Speaker 1: Cyber Games and Electronics Sports World Cup both launched, and

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Speaker 1: they gave professional gaming a bigger spotlight. Two years later,

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Speaker 1: the Major League Gaming Professional Game League launched, and since

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Speaker 1: then professional video game leagues have been picking up speed.

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Speaker 1: We've also seen other types of games into this realm,

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Speaker 1: including MOBA's things like Dota Too and Smite and League

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Speaker 1: of Legends. Those have become enormously popular in the professional

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Speaker 1: gaming league scene. In recent years, we've also seen a

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Speaker 1: big push coming from major broadcasters to elevate professional video

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Speaker 1: game tournaments. I had a chance to speak with Robert Ocellini,

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Speaker 1: who overseas eleague at Turner to talk about it now. Robert,

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Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us on text stuff.

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Speaker 1: I want to kind of get an idea about how

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Speaker 1: eligue came about, and uh and and sort of get

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Speaker 1: an idea of how it's evolved and and what you

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Speaker 1: have seen so far in that space. Because while e sports,

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Speaker 1: I think, uh, it's something that more and more people

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Speaker 1: are are aware of, it's still sort of an emerging

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Speaker 1: kind of form of entertainment for a large part of

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Speaker 1: the mainstream audience. I think that's changing, especially among younger demographics.

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Speaker 1: I think they're far more aware, especially now that we're

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Speaker 1: seeing video games being used as a form just the

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Speaker 1: playing of video games being used as a form of

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Speaker 1: entertainment throughout lots of different platforms. But tell me specifically

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Speaker 1: about E League, sure, So, Uh, Eleague was first announced

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Speaker 1: about two years ago. Um, it actually wasn't called Elague

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Speaker 1: at the time. We didn't have a name yet. Um,

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Speaker 1: but we were working on it, I would say, for

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Speaker 1: probably six months or so before that, uh September two

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Speaker 1: thousand fifteen announcement. Um. And really it came from the

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Speaker 1: sort of interest came from the very senior levels of

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Speaker 1: Turner so h Kevin Riley, who is the head of

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Speaker 1: TBS and T and T came to the company with

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Speaker 1: a lot of contacts and gaming Um, and you know

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Speaker 1: he's in l A and E sports has really taken

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Speaker 1: off in Los Angeles, and so he came in with

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Speaker 1: a lot of interest and he's sports. And then from

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Speaker 1: the Turner Sports side, you know, Lenny Daniels and David

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Speaker 1: Levy UM had had a lot of interest in the space.

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Speaker 1: They saw, you know, they kept hearing that this space

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Speaker 1: was developing. They kind of saw what was happening. And

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Speaker 1: and actually at first, UM at the time, I was

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Speaker 1: working on the NBA's digital products here. I did seven

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Speaker 1: seasons working on the NBA mobile apps and over the

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Speaker 1: top apps and NBA League Pass UM and for a

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Speaker 1: little while as a part time job, I was actually

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Speaker 1: going to meetings and working on this, and you know,

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Speaker 1: sort of my background is more in digital product but

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Speaker 1: I'm a lifelong gamer and very interested in competitive gaming

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Speaker 1: and was actually the GM of competitive World of Warcraft

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Speaker 1: Guild UM. So I kind of had my own long

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Speaker 1: history with with gaming and and E sports UM on

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Speaker 1: the fan side and on the playing side. UM. So

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Speaker 1: I kind of was able to bring that to the

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Speaker 1: table UM as we looked into this, and then I

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Speaker 1: think probably around uh the beginning of July July, we

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Speaker 1: sort of decided what direction we were going to go

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Speaker 1: in and at that time they decided that if I

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Speaker 1: wanted to work on this full time, they give me

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Speaker 1: that opportunity, and I really haven't looked back, UM, nor

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Speaker 1: have nor has the company. UM uh. So, you know,

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Speaker 1: we we did this deal with I M g U

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Speaker 1: Eligue as a joint venture with w M E I MG,

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Speaker 1: and we started meeting with teams. We actually had a

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Speaker 1: big team summit in September because we were really the

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Speaker 1: first big media brand to enter into this e sports

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Speaker 1: space and we wanted to make sure that we were

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Speaker 1: entering it with reverence, UM, with you know, an eye

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Speaker 1: towards authenticity. And then of course, you know, we'd already

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Speaker 1: decided at that point that we're gonna work with counter

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Speaker 1: Strike UM that we were talking to and getting feedback

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Speaker 1: from the counter strike community. UM. About two months later

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Speaker 1: we came up with a name and logo and all

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Speaker 1: of that stuff and launched our website, and then in

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Speaker 1: January of two thousand sixteen, we did our very first

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Speaker 1: tournament UM the Road to Vegas, and that was essentially

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Speaker 1: sort of an open qualifier for one of the scots

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Speaker 1: in our inaugural season. Later in UM we really started

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Speaker 1: the league and league play in earnest in May of

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Speaker 1: UM with our first counter Strike season. We followed that

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Speaker 1: up later in Steen we had the opportunity to do

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Speaker 1: the Overwatch Open. We were like the first big Overwatch tournament, UM,

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Speaker 1: and then we did a second season of counter Strike.

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Speaker 1: Around that time frame, we were also awarded the first

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Speaker 1: Counterstrike Major of sen UM and we did that in January,

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Speaker 1: and then in in we've we've branched out a little

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Speaker 1: bit and have done some stuff with Street Fighter. We

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Speaker 1: did a series a docuseries around uh the International, which

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Speaker 1: is the big DODA World Championship. And then finally right

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Speaker 1: now we're running our what is essentially our third counter

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Speaker 1: Strike season, the Premier UM and you know that's where

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Speaker 1: Group D starts tonight, uh and then the finals the

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Speaker 1: week of October ten. So you know, it's been, uh,

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Speaker 1: it's been kind of a wild ride. We went from

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Speaker 1: from you know, nothing and no organization to a thriving

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Speaker 1: business with a lot of employees and uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: have done a lot of tournaments at this point. UM.

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Speaker 1: I think you know, the only other thing I'll add

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Speaker 1: that I shouldn't have gloss over is the amazing studio

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Speaker 1: that we built downstairs that's built for e sports, whether

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Speaker 1: that game is one v one or six v six.

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Speaker 1: We have built the studio in a way that um

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Speaker 1: it can it can easily support any game that we

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Speaker 1: want to do. And then of course we've got all

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Speaker 1: of the you know other stuff you would want, practice

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Speaker 1: space for the players, a player lounge, first class green

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Speaker 1: room for our talent um, and then all the tech

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Speaker 1: that you would need to to support doing something like

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Speaker 1: a counter Strike tournament, which is a pretty big undertaking

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Speaker 1: right where every tiny little technical detail can end up

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Speaker 1: UH having an influence on actual game play. It is

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Speaker 1: really important as well pointing out to my listeners here

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Speaker 1: that by going this route, by having the tournament where

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Speaker 1: you've got the system set up where you know you're

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Speaker 1: going to have a really good approach to running these games,

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Speaker 1: it also means everyone's on equal footing. It doesn't mean

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Speaker 1: that you know, you're not worried about someone who's souped

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Speaker 1: up their game engine so or their game system so

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Speaker 1: much that they're going to have an unfair advantage over

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Speaker 1: anyone else. It really does bring it down to skill

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Speaker 1: and in the case of games like Counterstrike, really good

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Speaker 1: team communication and team UH cooperation I'm really fascinated by this,

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Speaker 1: and since you've had experience working in a realm that

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Speaker 1: was uh that was focused on traditional sports, something that

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Speaker 1: I think a lot of people can can kind of

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Speaker 1: get their mind around. For For people who haven't made

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Speaker 1: that that step from the idea of well, a professional

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Speaker 1: sport where you're playing physically in a on a cord

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Speaker 1: or on a field or whatever it may be, that's

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Speaker 1: one thing. But professional video game playing, how is that

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Speaker 1: something that you How can you consider that person an athlete? Well,

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Speaker 1: you've seen both worlds. What's your kind of response to

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Speaker 1: that sort of uh, like, if everyone's asking questions or

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Speaker 1: if they're just expressing skepticism that someone could be an

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Speaker 1: athlete playing video games. By the way, I'm totally on

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Speaker 1: the board of professional video games players are on a

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Speaker 1: level that is far, far, far beyond the capabilities of

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Speaker 1: the average person. I mean, listen, I think that that

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Speaker 1: skepticism is a natural, a natural thing, right, Like I

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Speaker 1: think with with physical sports, it's very easy to tell

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Speaker 1: that I cannot jump as high off the ground as

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Speaker 1: Lebron James, right. Um, but me sitting in front of

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Speaker 1: a computer, it doesn't look optically any different. Than Olive

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Speaker 1: Meister or Faker or any of these sort of top

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Speaker 1: tier e sports players. But I will tell you that, UM,

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Speaker 1: from a talent perspective, from a commitment perspective, these gentlemen

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Speaker 1: are no and women are no different than professional athletes

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Speaker 1: and traditional stick and ball sports. They are a cut

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Speaker 1: above and you know, you if you were to put

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Speaker 1: an average or even above average sort of casual video

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Speaker 1: game athlete up against these guys, they would just get

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Speaker 1: completely and utterly wrecked. You know. I think that one

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Speaker 1: of the interesting things that we've done here at Turner

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Speaker 1: this year is we had an employee tournament for street fighters.

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Speaker 1: So we did we did this uh six week street

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Speaker 1: fighter season where we had the best street fighter players

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Speaker 1: in the world come to our camp us and play.

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Speaker 1: And then, UM, a couple of weeks after that tournament

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Speaker 1: was over, we had an internal tournament that culminated with

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Speaker 1: the finals that was played in the very same studio

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Speaker 1: where our street Fighter tournament was hosted. UM. And you know,

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Speaker 1: sure enough, Turners a pretty big company. There's some really

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Speaker 1: good street fighter players here. But talking to the sort

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Speaker 1: of experts that we have on staff, the guy who

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Speaker 1: won the tournament would be like the tenth best player

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Speaker 1: at a local Atlanta semi professional tournament, and the guy

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Speaker 1: who would win that tournament wouldn't even be in the

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Speaker 1: top hundred in the world. You know, there's there's a

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Speaker 1: there's a big difference between the two hundred and fifty

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Speaker 1: guys who play counter strike sort of at the top

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Speaker 1: level professionally and the seven or eight mill in people

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Speaker 1: who play it on a daily basis. UM. So you

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Speaker 1: know I'm in definitely you can tell I'm in the

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Speaker 1: camp of this is no different than the other sports.

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Speaker 1: There's a scarcity of of talent and then the ability

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Speaker 1: to sort of focus that. The commitment that it requires

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Speaker 1: to play these games at the top level UM is ridiculous.

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Speaker 1: I guess the last point I'd make on that is, UM,

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Speaker 1: it's also really hard to stay on top. And you

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Speaker 1: know there's one team currently that you know, last year

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Speaker 1: one I think five tournaments UH during the regular tournament season,

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Speaker 1: and this year made it to the finals of the Major.

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Speaker 1: But we've seen them slowly declined. The name of the

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Speaker 1: team is Burtis Pro and we love them. They won

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Speaker 1: our first season, UM, but we've seen them slowly decline

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Speaker 1: and they actually didn't make it to the playoffs of

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Speaker 1: our current tournament. And I think that that shows like

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Speaker 1: just how tight it is at the very top, right,

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Speaker 1: Like even just kind of in six months, a team

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Speaker 1: can go from being virtually unbeatable over a three or

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Speaker 1: four months time period to not even making it to

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Speaker 1: the late stages of any tournaments. There's that very top level.

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Speaker 1: Is it is the top of the pyramid in every way,

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Speaker 1: shape or form. Now in your experience of overseeing these

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Speaker 1: things being part of the the E League, Uh, does

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Speaker 1: it feel like when there's a tournament going, when you

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Speaker 1: have these people at this these very elite levels of

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Speaker 1: performance competing against each other. Isn't a similar kind of

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Speaker 1: of atmosphere of excitement to watch people at that level play,

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Speaker 1: similar to what you might see in a traditional sporting arena.

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Speaker 1: I think, you know, I think for so it's there

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Speaker 1: are differences there that I would call out right so um,

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Speaker 1: for some tournaments, and and I'm not alluding to ours,

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Speaker 1: almost all of the competition except for the finals is

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Speaker 1: played over the internet, right, and so you know the

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Speaker 1: spectator experience there is on twitch and on YouTube, and

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Speaker 1: you know that the chat experience is like a proxy

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Speaker 1: for the arena, if that makes sense, It most like

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Speaker 1: a virtual proxy. I would say, though, at the very

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Speaker 1: top level, if you were to were to attend like

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Speaker 1: our finals at the Fox Theater in Atlanta for the Major,

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Speaker 1: or an e s L one in New York, or

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Speaker 1: the finals of a dream Hack, they have all of

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Speaker 1: the same trappings and crowd engagement that you know a

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Speaker 1: professional Atlanta sports team has. And you know, I go,

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Speaker 1: I'm a season ticket holder for our our new MLS team,

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Speaker 1: which probably has about as good fan engagement as you

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Speaker 1: could possibly have, and it feels the same to me

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Speaker 1: as the really rabid fans for the finals of our

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Speaker 1: Major or the finals of the Dota to International. I

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Speaker 1: went to that this summer too, at Key Arena, which

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Speaker 1: is where the Sonics used to play in Seattle. So

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Speaker 1: even the same buildings in some case, although I will

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Speaker 1: also say those buildings can sometimes not be the best

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Speaker 1: venues for watching the sports because you're trying to watch

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Speaker 1: on the screen and watch kind of what's going on stage.

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Speaker 1: But what's going on on stage a lot of the

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Speaker 1: time is some guys in headsets yelling to each other, right, Like,

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Speaker 1: the more interesting thing is the combination of what they're

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Speaker 1: doing with what's happening on the screen right. Similar to

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Speaker 1: what we've seen with various patforms where people are setting

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Speaker 1: up webcams to capture their their footage of how they

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Speaker 1: react while they're playing games. I imagine something similar is

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Speaker 1: useful in this kind of realm. When we come back,

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Speaker 1: we'll talk more about the advances and technology that are

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Speaker 1: making it easier and more enjoyable to watch gaming as

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00:27:17,240 --> 00:27:20,439
Speaker 1: a professional sport. But first let's take a quick break

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Speaker 1: to thank our sponsor. In a previous episode, I spoke

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Speaker 1: with Oscar Warner over at Toby Tech about eye tracking

434
00:27:33,240 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 1: technology and we talked a bit about how it could

435
00:27:35,280 --> 00:27:37,600
Speaker 1: be used in professional gaming, but to get a more

436
00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:40,160
Speaker 1: thorough perspective on it, I had a conversation with Brian

437
00:27:40,240 --> 00:27:43,840
Speaker 1: Dazaias and David Chen of alien Ware about how it's

438
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:48,360
Speaker 1: transforming e sports. Yeah. So, um, one of the things

439
00:27:48,359 --> 00:27:50,880
Speaker 1: that is always doing right. We're always trying to look

440
00:27:50,920 --> 00:27:53,919
Speaker 1: for the the next innovative thing, what's going to help

441
00:27:55,240 --> 00:27:58,520
Speaker 1: whether they're professional or just you know, folks just want

442
00:27:58,520 --> 00:28:01,120
Speaker 1: to have fun playing games. How can they have more

443
00:28:01,160 --> 00:28:03,040
Speaker 1: fun and how can they get better at their games?

444
00:28:03,520 --> 00:28:05,280
Speaker 1: I'm in front, I just make it as the most

445
00:28:05,280 --> 00:28:08,360
Speaker 1: of it as possible. UM. So you know, as as

446
00:28:08,400 --> 00:28:12,600
Speaker 1: we launch and look at new technologies, UM. One of

447
00:28:12,600 --> 00:28:14,800
Speaker 1: the things that was coming down the pike several years ago,

448
00:28:15,560 --> 00:28:19,280
Speaker 1: UM is eye tracking. Now, historically you've thought of eye

449
00:28:19,280 --> 00:28:23,359
Speaker 1: tracking or you know, eye tracking mainly for some cool

450
00:28:23,400 --> 00:28:27,000
Speaker 1: stuff like trying to maybe log into a computer or

451
00:28:27,040 --> 00:28:30,199
Speaker 1: something like that, kind of like facial recognition. UM. But

452
00:28:30,560 --> 00:28:34,240
Speaker 1: as the technologies evolved, as it's gotten smaller, been able

453
00:28:34,280 --> 00:28:38,640
Speaker 1: to put into laptops and things like that. UM. It

454
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:43,640
Speaker 1: really there's a lot of innovative ways to the things

455
00:28:43,680 --> 00:28:46,800
Speaker 1: we could do as you're just tracking with the eyes looking.

456
00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:51,240
Speaker 1: And so what we started working with Toby on is

457
00:28:51,240 --> 00:28:54,360
Speaker 1: how can we adopt that and tie that into something

458
00:28:54,440 --> 00:28:58,680
Speaker 1: meaningful for gamers. And at the same time, you know,

459
00:28:58,760 --> 00:29:04,080
Speaker 1: we've we've seen an known that gamers are always looking

460
00:29:04,160 --> 00:29:06,800
Speaker 1: for an advantage. So I'll give you an example. You know,

461
00:29:06,880 --> 00:29:10,160
Speaker 1: when most most gamers will at some point, if they're

462
00:29:10,160 --> 00:29:12,240
Speaker 1: really into a game, right, they're gonna go to YouTube

463
00:29:12,320 --> 00:29:15,560
Speaker 1: or they're gonna go onto Twitch, and they're gonna try

464
00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:17,200
Speaker 1: and get better at their game. They're gonna look at

465
00:29:17,240 --> 00:29:20,160
Speaker 1: tips and tricks and you know, I'm maybe doing it today.

466
00:29:20,560 --> 00:29:24,800
Speaker 1: I'm I'm heavily invested in pub G and um it

467
00:29:24,840 --> 00:29:27,400
Speaker 1: seems like every other day, every day, I'm trying to see,

468
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:29,240
Speaker 1: you know, we're going to get some tips and tricks

469
00:29:29,240 --> 00:29:32,320
Speaker 1: and get better at it because I'm not very good, Jonathan,

470
00:29:32,360 --> 00:29:35,560
Speaker 1: but you know, I dive in there anyway. I completely

471
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:40,920
Speaker 1: completely sympathize. But it's too much fun to avoid. So

472
00:29:42,000 --> 00:29:44,320
Speaker 1: but but kind of that that nature and just wanting

473
00:29:44,360 --> 00:29:48,680
Speaker 1: to get better. UM and I tracking prove as we're

474
00:29:48,800 --> 00:29:54,400
Speaker 1: thinking about how leverage, this provided a real, a real

475
00:29:54,480 --> 00:29:58,080
Speaker 1: way to track how the best players in the world

476
00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:01,440
Speaker 1: as a specific game or any game that they're playing.

477
00:30:02,120 --> 00:30:04,400
Speaker 1: Where are they looking? You know, gaming is so much

478
00:30:04,440 --> 00:30:07,120
Speaker 1: about where you're looking, where you're paying attention, where your

479
00:30:07,120 --> 00:30:13,600
Speaker 1: focus is. And eye tracking really enabled really the world.

480
00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:17,200
Speaker 1: And we'll talk to some definitely about this, but enabled

481
00:30:17,280 --> 00:30:20,080
Speaker 1: gamers to see where the best players in the world

482
00:30:20,160 --> 00:30:23,280
Speaker 1: are looking at any point in time. So are they

483
00:30:23,320 --> 00:30:26,560
Speaker 1: looking at the mini map, are they looking down the corridor,

484
00:30:26,560 --> 00:30:29,880
Speaker 1: They're looking down the hallway. Um, right before you know,

485
00:30:29,960 --> 00:30:32,640
Speaker 1: they fragged somebody or they get tragged or whatever it

486
00:30:32,680 --> 00:30:36,880
Speaker 1: might be happening in the match. So we saw this

487
00:30:37,040 --> 00:30:41,640
Speaker 1: real opportunity, this real thing that gamers are looking to do,

488
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:46,280
Speaker 1: and that's get better and this technology that really allows

489
00:30:46,320 --> 00:30:50,280
Speaker 1: a new level of data capture and then you turn

490
00:30:50,360 --> 00:30:54,160
Speaker 1: that into some analytics and you can actually put out, um,

491
00:30:55,600 --> 00:30:58,640
Speaker 1: some pretty interesting information. So that's kind of at the

492
00:30:58,760 --> 00:31:01,480
Speaker 1: very beginning conceptually, and we're just you know, sitting around

493
00:31:01,560 --> 00:31:04,720
Speaker 1: with you know, our internal product group teams, are internal

494
00:31:05,120 --> 00:31:10,000
Speaker 1: marketing teams talking to the sports organizations, um, and you know,

495
00:31:10,080 --> 00:31:13,960
Speaker 1: our third party partners like Toby talking about whether the

496
00:31:14,000 --> 00:31:16,200
Speaker 1: priorities that we have coming up. You know, this isn't

497
00:31:16,240 --> 00:31:19,640
Speaker 1: just a something we spoke about six months ago. This

498
00:31:19,800 --> 00:31:23,280
Speaker 1: is years in the making of understanding what gamers are

499
00:31:23,320 --> 00:31:27,080
Speaker 1: looking for and working with these technology partners. So that's

500
00:31:27,120 --> 00:31:31,280
Speaker 1: kind of out it all started. And UM and and

501
00:31:31,280 --> 00:31:33,680
Speaker 1: and David, if you have, UM you obviously played an

502
00:31:33,680 --> 00:31:37,240
Speaker 1: Intel park for us here and getting this technology rolled

503
00:31:37,240 --> 00:31:41,840
Speaker 1: out with UH with with Turner and the league. So, UM,

504
00:31:42,040 --> 00:31:44,400
Speaker 1: there's anything you want to add on on where this started?

505
00:31:44,760 --> 00:31:47,960
Speaker 1: Police feel free? Yeah, I would you say, And it's

506
00:31:48,040 --> 00:31:51,400
Speaker 1: your point. Earlier a lot of this technology and research

507
00:31:51,480 --> 00:31:54,480
Speaker 1: into this technology as part of gaming, even theon gaming

508
00:31:54,520 --> 00:31:56,440
Speaker 1: has been around for a couple of years now, and

509
00:31:56,480 --> 00:31:59,360
Speaker 1: it hasn't really been until now, until the technology has

510
00:31:59,520 --> 00:32:03,120
Speaker 1: become uh, you know, smaller and more nimble than it's

511
00:32:03,160 --> 00:32:05,800
Speaker 1: you know, hitting this more consumer level focus. But I'm

512
00:32:05,840 --> 00:32:07,880
Speaker 1: sure in the past they've been using eye tracking to

513
00:32:08,280 --> 00:32:10,800
Speaker 1: look at how people respond to add online, you know,

514
00:32:10,800 --> 00:32:12,560
Speaker 1: when they do keep mapping on websites and the where

515
00:32:12,600 --> 00:32:15,440
Speaker 1: people respond UM. And it wasn't until I think a

516
00:32:15,440 --> 00:32:17,240
Speaker 1: couple of years ago, probably two or three years ago,

517
00:32:17,320 --> 00:32:20,920
Speaker 1: that one of our partner's team, liquid UM, they had

518
00:32:20,960 --> 00:32:24,120
Speaker 1: done some research of their own with I believe it

519
00:32:24,240 --> 00:32:28,200
Speaker 1: was the Mayo Research Clinic over in California, UM and

520
00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:32,600
Speaker 1: they had worked with ah I believe the professor there

521
00:32:32,600 --> 00:32:34,680
Speaker 1: who was researching kind of eye tracking as part of

522
00:32:34,720 --> 00:32:38,600
Speaker 1: video gaming, the level of cognition and just the uh

523
00:32:38,640 --> 00:32:42,040
Speaker 1: you know, research level analytics between some of the oldest

524
00:32:42,200 --> 00:32:45,320
Speaker 1: veteran players versus you know, young hot starts who are

525
00:32:45,400 --> 00:32:48,720
Speaker 1: coming out, you know, sixteen seventeen and dominating the scene. UM,

526
00:32:48,720 --> 00:32:50,600
Speaker 1: and the research that he saw on some of these

527
00:32:50,600 --> 00:32:52,800
Speaker 1: teams are really startling as far as you know, veterans

528
00:32:52,840 --> 00:32:55,280
Speaker 1: being able to still keep the edge ahead through their

529
00:32:55,320 --> 00:32:58,280
Speaker 1: experience and just how quick their eyes are and being

530
00:32:58,320 --> 00:33:02,400
Speaker 1: able to you know, cycle the between icons from you know,

531
00:33:02,400 --> 00:33:04,600
Speaker 1: a hundred different characters, and they have a lot more

532
00:33:04,640 --> 00:33:06,720
Speaker 1: in their memory banks and pull from and react from

533
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:09,959
Speaker 1: than a lot of younger players. UM And Again, at

534
00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:12,280
Speaker 1: that time, you know that research is probably being done

535
00:33:12,320 --> 00:33:14,600
Speaker 1: on a ten to twelve thousand dollar piece of equipment

536
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:17,680
Speaker 1: that was tracking your eyes and it was cumbersome, And

537
00:33:17,720 --> 00:33:19,840
Speaker 1: now we're seeing it to the point where again it's

538
00:33:19,880 --> 00:33:22,680
Speaker 1: able to be equipped into a laptop and it's something

539
00:33:22,720 --> 00:33:24,720
Speaker 1: that you know, pretty much a lot of consumers and

540
00:33:24,800 --> 00:33:28,600
Speaker 1: teams UM have at their immediate disposal. UM and what

541
00:33:28,720 --> 00:33:31,600
Speaker 1: I'm bringing this back home between liquid you know, as

542
00:33:31,680 --> 00:33:35,880
Speaker 1: more and more teams are growing in the space, and

543
00:33:35,960 --> 00:33:39,120
Speaker 1: as more and more traditional sports teams are also getting

544
00:33:39,160 --> 00:33:44,120
Speaker 1: involved in the sports, there's this growing desire to understand

545
00:33:44,240 --> 00:33:47,800
Speaker 1: again the dynamics of the athleticism or the cognition and

546
00:33:47,920 --> 00:33:51,360
Speaker 1: skill of a traditional athlete versus an e sports athletes.

547
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:53,720
Speaker 1: And I think we're barely scratching the surface of what

548
00:33:53,760 --> 00:33:57,080
Speaker 1: that means today. Um and has more and more other

549
00:33:57,160 --> 00:34:00,840
Speaker 1: technology catches up, I think we all dream of finding

550
00:34:00,960 --> 00:34:05,480
Speaker 1: other big in cycled ways that E sports can provide

551
00:34:05,560 --> 00:34:09,000
Speaker 1: a level of biometric data, um to allow us to

552
00:34:09,040 --> 00:34:12,360
Speaker 1: appreciate you know what the best you well and also

553
00:34:12,480 --> 00:34:14,920
Speaker 1: how you know, average Joe's like you and I can

554
00:34:15,160 --> 00:34:20,640
Speaker 1: strive to chase after some of that greatness in certain categories. UM.

555
00:34:20,640 --> 00:34:24,320
Speaker 1: So it's definitely very very exciting. That's so cool. And

556
00:34:24,320 --> 00:34:28,560
Speaker 1: and and you know I, I too am chasing after

557
00:34:28,680 --> 00:34:33,560
Speaker 1: that elusive chicken dinner over at pub g and it

558
00:34:33,560 --> 00:34:37,919
Speaker 1: it remains just outside my grasp. So being able to

559
00:34:38,080 --> 00:34:41,520
Speaker 1: see how not just not just how well someone plays,

560
00:34:41,560 --> 00:34:45,319
Speaker 1: but how they go about playing that way, there is

561
00:34:45,360 --> 00:34:48,560
Speaker 1: something really enticing about that. The not just you know,

562
00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:53,000
Speaker 1: when we watch professional sports typically we can see great,

563
00:34:53,640 --> 00:34:57,840
Speaker 1: great displays of athleticism, but you know, people are not machines.

564
00:34:58,160 --> 00:35:01,759
Speaker 1: We can break things down and use slow motion and

565
00:35:02,120 --> 00:35:05,960
Speaker 1: various camera angles to kind of analyze the basics. But

566
00:35:06,200 --> 00:35:09,200
Speaker 1: to me, the fact that we're talking about a digital

567
00:35:09,239 --> 00:35:12,320
Speaker 1: realm and then being able to track our physical motions

568
00:35:12,320 --> 00:35:15,040
Speaker 1: and map that to the actions of a digital realm,

569
00:35:15,080 --> 00:35:17,600
Speaker 1: it does seem like this is uh a much more

570
00:35:17,640 --> 00:35:23,520
Speaker 1: conducive to breaking things down into quantifiable aspects to really

571
00:35:23,560 --> 00:35:26,440
Speaker 1: talk about well, you know, this person is checking their

572
00:35:26,480 --> 00:35:31,279
Speaker 1: mini map more frequently than someone who is not a

573
00:35:31,280 --> 00:35:34,799
Speaker 1: professional gamer. That's a really interesting stat and could really

574
00:35:35,680 --> 00:35:38,880
Speaker 1: inform people how to play the game at a slightly

575
00:35:38,960 --> 00:35:41,440
Speaker 1: higher level than what they were doing before, knowing of course,

576
00:35:41,560 --> 00:35:48,080
Speaker 1: that it's not a magic substitute for the hours of practice,

577
00:35:48,440 --> 00:35:51,080
Speaker 1: as you know, countless hours of practice for some of

578
00:35:51,120 --> 00:35:54,319
Speaker 1: these professional gamers who will sit down for eight or

579
00:35:54,360 --> 00:35:57,680
Speaker 1: ten hours and play a game and that's largely how

580
00:35:57,719 --> 00:36:00,239
Speaker 1: they got as good as they are. But then also

581
00:36:00,280 --> 00:36:03,239
Speaker 1: a tool for them to look at afterward. Maybe they've

582
00:36:03,280 --> 00:36:05,840
Speaker 1: played in a tournament, Maybe they played really well and

583
00:36:05,840 --> 00:36:08,400
Speaker 1: they want to see what what they were doing and

584
00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:12,560
Speaker 1: remember to really hone in on those particular types of

585
00:36:12,280 --> 00:36:15,319
Speaker 1: of of strategies and future tournaments. Or they didn't do

586
00:36:15,400 --> 00:36:16,840
Speaker 1: so well, and maybe they want to see what the

587
00:36:16,840 --> 00:36:21,000
Speaker 1: differences between their performance and someone else's. I also like

588
00:36:21,080 --> 00:36:24,600
Speaker 1: the idea of this from if we're looking beyond the sports,

589
00:36:24,640 --> 00:36:26,160
Speaker 1: which we'll get back to in a second, I don't

590
00:36:26,160 --> 00:36:29,040
Speaker 1: want to leave that behind, but I like this idea

591
00:36:29,160 --> 00:36:32,720
Speaker 1: also from a game designer standpoint. The idea of getting

592
00:36:32,760 --> 00:36:36,880
Speaker 1: more information about what your players see as important in

593
00:36:36,920 --> 00:36:40,080
Speaker 1: your game means that game designers can actually use that

594
00:36:40,160 --> 00:36:44,680
Speaker 1: information to make more effective games down the line um

595
00:36:44,760 --> 00:36:47,960
Speaker 1: and beyond that, if you if you think about this

596
00:36:48,040 --> 00:36:54,160
Speaker 1: technology reaching a point where it becomes more of a

597
00:36:54,320 --> 00:36:58,280
Speaker 1: kind of a standard piece of tech that gets rolled

598
00:36:58,320 --> 00:37:03,080
Speaker 1: out into laptops in the future or computers in general

599
00:37:03,080 --> 00:37:06,000
Speaker 1: in the future, you could see this being incorporated into

600
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:09,480
Speaker 1: games themselves, where it's not just analysis, but it becomes

601
00:37:09,480 --> 00:37:12,920
Speaker 1: an element of gameplay. Like I think of a game,

602
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:17,480
Speaker 1: perhaps like l A Noir, where part of that game

603
00:37:17,600 --> 00:37:21,600
Speaker 1: involves the player watching a virtual character's reaction as you're

604
00:37:21,640 --> 00:37:25,319
Speaker 1: interrogating the character, and that in turn informs you as

605
00:37:25,320 --> 00:37:27,080
Speaker 1: to whether or not that character is telling the truth

606
00:37:27,120 --> 00:37:30,360
Speaker 1: they're telling a lie. Will imagine eye tracking technology where

607
00:37:30,360 --> 00:37:33,320
Speaker 1: the character appears to be aware of where you are looking,

608
00:37:33,920 --> 00:37:37,040
Speaker 1: and then that adds a whole new game element. So

609
00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:39,760
Speaker 1: to me, the eye tracking technology in the gaming world,

610
00:37:39,760 --> 00:37:42,040
Speaker 1: I mean, as you say, we're at the very beginning

611
00:37:42,080 --> 00:37:44,520
Speaker 1: of it. Even if you just and I don't mean

612
00:37:44,520 --> 00:37:47,880
Speaker 1: to just to to make this sound less than what

613
00:37:47,920 --> 00:37:50,840
Speaker 1: it is. But even if you are restricting that attention

614
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:55,640
Speaker 1: to e sports, there are so many incredible potential applications

615
00:37:55,640 --> 00:37:59,279
Speaker 1: for this technology, and it's really exciting to be in

616
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:04,720
Speaker 1: these fair early days talking about where we're going right now. UM,

617
00:38:04,880 --> 00:38:08,240
Speaker 1: so getting back to eat sports and getting back into

618
00:38:08,280 --> 00:38:11,320
Speaker 1: that realm. Can you talk a little bit about the

619
00:38:11,360 --> 00:38:15,879
Speaker 1: relationships that have formed now that you guys are really

620
00:38:16,000 --> 00:38:21,200
Speaker 1: kind of getting more involved with incorporating eye tracking technology

621
00:38:21,239 --> 00:38:24,640
Speaker 1: and the pro gaming realm. I want to hear more

622
00:38:24,719 --> 00:38:28,440
Speaker 1: about this, uh, this this relationship and how that has

623
00:38:28,480 --> 00:38:34,680
Speaker 1: developed over time. Yeah. Absolutely, you make some some great

624
00:38:34,719 --> 00:38:37,600
Speaker 1: point shock and I think you know, like we as

625
00:38:37,600 --> 00:38:40,680
Speaker 1: we think about where we are, we are very much

626
00:38:41,560 --> 00:38:46,640
Speaker 1: um just at the beginning point of showcasing this kind

627
00:38:46,640 --> 00:38:50,560
Speaker 1: of technology and I attracting technology um to the world

628
00:38:50,920 --> 00:38:55,600
Speaker 1: right and I'll definitely talk jump into the partners and

629
00:38:55,680 --> 00:38:58,680
Speaker 1: talk about the partners and what we've done. Um. But

630
00:38:58,800 --> 00:39:01,680
Speaker 1: you you have to make some really interesting comments about

631
00:39:01,680 --> 00:39:06,200
Speaker 1: where is who can get the most benefit out of

632
00:39:06,880 --> 00:39:10,440
Speaker 1: uh technologies like this, like eye tracking and and that

633
00:39:10,560 --> 00:39:14,760
Speaker 1: kind of thing. There's obviously some very clear benefits for

634
00:39:15,239 --> 00:39:19,920
Speaker 1: professional players and for amateurs that are trying to become professional, right,

635
00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:22,920
Speaker 1: just this notion of getting better learning from the pros

636
00:39:22,960 --> 00:39:26,239
Speaker 1: that are out there, just like traditional sports. But one

637
00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:29,239
Speaker 1: of the other parts that really intrigued us to you

638
00:39:29,960 --> 00:39:33,080
Speaker 1: as we're trying to trying to roll out this kind

639
00:39:33,080 --> 00:39:37,279
Speaker 1: of technology is for the partition of viewer um for

640
00:39:37,360 --> 00:39:39,879
Speaker 1: the fan. One of the things that has not kind

641
00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:45,279
Speaker 1: of cut up with traditional sports is the viewing experience

642
00:39:45,320 --> 00:39:47,600
Speaker 1: and the commentating. A lot of the commentating in the

643
00:39:47,600 --> 00:39:50,480
Speaker 1: past for the sports has been around, you know, the

644
00:39:50,560 --> 00:39:55,200
Speaker 1: commentator explaining what's going on, but verbally, there really wasn't

645
00:39:55,200 --> 00:40:00,440
Speaker 1: a visual visual cues of visual explanations of what's happening

646
00:40:00,520 --> 00:40:05,520
Speaker 1: in the match. You know, obviously with NFL or NBA

647
00:40:06,080 --> 00:40:10,320
Speaker 1: there's a lot of analytic things and things that happened

648
00:40:10,360 --> 00:40:13,560
Speaker 1: through the broadcast I think of teleprompters and and things

649
00:40:13,600 --> 00:40:16,040
Speaker 1: like that. Well, it really wasn't that for e sports.

650
00:40:16,840 --> 00:40:19,640
Speaker 1: And so as we were introducing the technology and figuring

651
00:40:19,640 --> 00:40:21,880
Speaker 1: out how can we bring this and how what should

652
00:40:21,920 --> 00:40:24,680
Speaker 1: we be doing, we really wanted to make that viewing

653
00:40:24,760 --> 00:40:28,640
Speaker 1: experience better for you know, the hundreds of millions of

654
00:40:29,280 --> 00:40:32,879
Speaker 1: gaming fans that are watching these sports globally. And then

655
00:40:32,880 --> 00:40:35,480
Speaker 1: we have to decide, you know, okay, how who can

656
00:40:35,560 --> 00:40:38,719
Speaker 1: who shares our values, who can who will work with

657
00:40:38,960 --> 00:40:43,520
Speaker 1: us to to bring this technology to the forefront and

658
00:40:43,680 --> 00:40:47,920
Speaker 1: you know earlier this year in January, UM we announced

659
00:40:47,960 --> 00:40:51,319
Speaker 1: the partnership and we've been working very closely with UM,

660
00:40:51,320 --> 00:40:54,920
Speaker 1: with Turner and with Elik around all the all the

661
00:40:54,960 --> 00:40:58,880
Speaker 1: tournaments that they're running. And UM actually just here in

662
00:40:58,960 --> 00:41:03,840
Speaker 1: September for the first time UM partnership between US, Toby

663
00:41:03,920 --> 00:41:08,759
Speaker 1: and an e League. UM we rolled out the the

664
00:41:08,840 --> 00:41:12,920
Speaker 1: getting Technical segment on the E League broadcast and really

665
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:16,040
Speaker 1: being able to to showcase the fans and to the

666
00:41:16,120 --> 00:41:20,320
Speaker 1: viewers this I gave technology that's being captured to the

667
00:41:20,800 --> 00:41:26,160
Speaker 1: tracking software, my tracking software. So UM, from a partnership side,

668
00:41:26,920 --> 00:41:30,799
Speaker 1: it has been it was it was very important to

669
00:41:30,920 --> 00:41:35,040
Speaker 1: us to select partners and work with partners that shared

670
00:41:35,160 --> 00:41:39,719
Speaker 1: quite honestly our vision of making this better for for

671
00:41:39,800 --> 00:41:42,440
Speaker 1: the viewer because we know professionals are going to continue

672
00:41:42,480 --> 00:41:45,840
Speaker 1: to innovate and get better where at the forefront working

673
00:41:45,880 --> 00:41:50,600
Speaker 1: with them on separate UH separate programs. Amateurs are always

674
00:41:50,600 --> 00:41:53,200
Speaker 1: going to look to get better because they want they

675
00:41:53,239 --> 00:41:57,239
Speaker 1: they want so badly to become a professional. But there's

676
00:41:57,480 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 1: a ton of people I just enjoy the sports because

677
00:42:00,480 --> 00:42:02,600
Speaker 1: of what it is and how full we make it

678
00:42:02,680 --> 00:42:06,160
Speaker 1: better for them. So UM, David, I'll hands over to

679
00:42:06,239 --> 00:42:08,560
Speaker 1: you because you again, I would love for you to

680
00:42:08,640 --> 00:42:11,560
Speaker 1: chime in and talk to uh just a relationship we

681
00:42:11,640 --> 00:42:14,160
Speaker 1: have with Turner and E League and how all that

682
00:42:14,200 --> 00:42:19,040
Speaker 1: came together. Yes, absolutely, I mean I feel like just

683
00:42:19,160 --> 00:42:22,560
Speaker 1: boils back down to a point of trying to be

684
00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:25,400
Speaker 1: a good steward as far as a leader in the

685
00:42:25,440 --> 00:42:27,600
Speaker 1: industry on behalf to be e sports, and really just

686
00:42:27,760 --> 00:42:31,799
Speaker 1: making it a bit easier for viewers overall to get

687
00:42:31,840 --> 00:42:34,720
Speaker 1: more out of the viewing experience, whether they're season veterans

688
00:42:34,719 --> 00:42:36,839
Speaker 1: who have been watching the game for a long time,

689
00:42:37,719 --> 00:42:39,520
Speaker 1: or something may be new to the game as well.

690
00:42:39,560 --> 00:42:42,400
Speaker 1: We've seen the studies who knew you that day. A

691
00:42:42,400 --> 00:42:44,520
Speaker 1: lot of the exports viewers don't even play the games

692
00:42:44,520 --> 00:42:47,440
Speaker 1: that they watched. So if we're trying to help the

693
00:42:47,520 --> 00:42:50,880
Speaker 1: sports grow in the Western world, that's likely going to

694
00:42:50,960 --> 00:42:53,399
Speaker 1: be introducing e sports to people who are very new

695
00:42:53,440 --> 00:42:56,120
Speaker 1: to the game. Maybe your family and maybe your friends

696
00:42:56,120 --> 00:42:58,640
Speaker 1: who put that um So when it came to working

697
00:42:58,680 --> 00:43:01,839
Speaker 1: with Eleague, I think it was no brainer for us

698
00:43:01,880 --> 00:43:05,080
Speaker 1: to start off with counter strikes. When you look at

699
00:43:05,080 --> 00:43:08,560
Speaker 1: the landscape of the sports titles out there, you can

700
00:43:08,600 --> 00:43:10,920
Speaker 1: look at your league legends, your Dodas and your mobiles

701
00:43:10,920 --> 00:43:13,759
Speaker 1: out there, it does have a rather high learning curve

702
00:43:13,880 --> 00:43:17,000
Speaker 1: for people who may not be yet familiar with the title. UM.

703
00:43:17,160 --> 00:43:19,000
Speaker 1: So definitely we look at a game like counter Strike,

704
00:43:19,200 --> 00:43:22,560
Speaker 1: there's really nothing to misunderstand about, you know, don't be

705
00:43:22,640 --> 00:43:25,759
Speaker 1: on the wrong point and end up gun um. And

706
00:43:25,840 --> 00:43:28,040
Speaker 1: so I think being able to find a game that

707
00:43:28,080 --> 00:43:31,920
Speaker 1: immediately resonates it and can be digested by a larger

708
00:43:31,960 --> 00:43:35,400
Speaker 1: audience helps us, uh not only again bring us to

709
00:43:35,440 --> 00:43:37,880
Speaker 1: a wider audience, but then when you factor in the

710
00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:41,800
Speaker 1: first person perspective and what eye tracking can really bring

711
00:43:41,840 --> 00:43:46,000
Speaker 1: in from a synergy perspective there, it really made a

712
00:43:46,000 --> 00:43:49,760
Speaker 1: lot of sense to find the right partner like easy

713
00:43:49,920 --> 00:43:53,960
Speaker 1: to have a right tournament. Where again, counter strikes with

714
00:43:54,000 --> 00:43:55,759
Speaker 1: their bread and butter for the better part of two

715
00:43:55,800 --> 00:43:58,960
Speaker 1: years now um they hosted the Major in January to

716
00:43:59,360 --> 00:44:03,800
Speaker 1: overwhelming excess UM and they're willing to continue to try

717
00:44:03,840 --> 00:44:05,560
Speaker 1: and see how they can push the limits of counter

718
00:44:05,600 --> 00:44:08,360
Speaker 1: Strike even further and further as you look towards the future.

719
00:44:08,440 --> 00:44:11,600
Speaker 1: But it really boils down to what ways can we

720
00:44:11,680 --> 00:44:15,880
Speaker 1: have this experience be more digestible to a huge gaming

721
00:44:15,880 --> 00:44:18,960
Speaker 1: audience out there. So for eye tracking and counter strike,

722
00:44:19,320 --> 00:44:22,120
Speaker 1: Where was the player looking, what were the context of

723
00:44:22,560 --> 00:44:25,719
Speaker 1: you know, how they made the decision that they did, um.

724
00:44:25,800 --> 00:44:27,359
Speaker 1: And we've seen a lot of excitement from it. We've

725
00:44:27,360 --> 00:44:29,520
Speaker 1: seen a tremendous amount of assignment from the stands. They've

726
00:44:29,560 --> 00:44:34,440
Speaker 1: been really uh receptive of the eye tracking uh clicks.

727
00:44:34,480 --> 00:44:36,719
Speaker 1: They've been telling us how they want to see you know,

728
00:44:36,920 --> 00:44:41,640
Speaker 1: other players, specific players get put under the microscope. Um.

729
00:44:41,719 --> 00:44:43,279
Speaker 1: You know, they would love to be able to get

730
00:44:43,320 --> 00:44:45,960
Speaker 1: a better clear breakdown of exactly how they pulled off

731
00:44:46,000 --> 00:44:47,799
Speaker 1: the eight that they did. We're seeing a lot of

732
00:44:47,840 --> 00:44:51,000
Speaker 1: really good reception from the commentators as well. So when

733
00:44:51,080 --> 00:44:54,000
Speaker 1: we look at the league, uh, the you know, enders

734
00:44:55,440 --> 00:44:57,960
Speaker 1: and a lot of the guys who are providing kind

735
00:44:57,960 --> 00:45:00,680
Speaker 1: of the color uh you know, play by play commentary

736
00:45:00,840 --> 00:45:02,640
Speaker 1: have been excited to be able to talk, you know,

737
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:05,840
Speaker 1: a little bit more about the nuances of for example,

738
00:45:05,920 --> 00:45:08,720
Speaker 1: how an in game leader on the team may indext

739
00:45:08,800 --> 00:45:11,640
Speaker 1: more between the mini map and looking at the economy

740
00:45:11,640 --> 00:45:14,200
Speaker 1: of the team and the other four players who are

741
00:45:14,239 --> 00:45:17,680
Speaker 1: more of the damage doers and the um you know,

742
00:45:17,719 --> 00:45:19,640
Speaker 1: the meet and guns of the team are just more

743
00:45:19,680 --> 00:45:22,600
Speaker 1: focused on plane UM. And so I think it really

744
00:45:22,600 --> 00:45:25,440
Speaker 1: opens up a way to present the game again, to

745
00:45:26,160 --> 00:45:29,200
Speaker 1: know why I variety of people, and it helps us

746
00:45:29,280 --> 00:45:32,840
Speaker 1: as a brand find meaningful ways to continue to the

747
00:45:32,920 --> 00:45:35,960
Speaker 1: game back to the community rather than you know, just

748
00:45:36,160 --> 00:45:39,560
Speaker 1: business as usual logo branding and culsorship rights and things

749
00:45:39,560 --> 00:45:43,400
Speaker 1: like that. Fascinating, I think. I also find it really

750
00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:48,440
Speaker 1: interesting that the counter Strike is the sort of the

751
00:45:48,480 --> 00:45:51,920
Speaker 1: go to game. It makes perfect sense. But I recently

752
00:45:52,080 --> 00:45:55,640
Speaker 1: did a multi part series on the history of Valve,

753
00:45:56,440 --> 00:45:59,920
Speaker 1: and so my listeners now know that counter Strike, that

754
00:46:00,080 --> 00:46:03,720
Speaker 1: the game that originally was you know, a modification, Uh,

755
00:46:03,840 --> 00:46:05,759
Speaker 1: it was a mod of Half Life that came out

756
00:46:07,320 --> 00:46:10,719
Speaker 1: thousand that it's gone through a couple of different variations,

757
00:46:10,760 --> 00:46:12,879
Speaker 1: the source version of it coming out a few years

758
00:46:12,920 --> 00:46:16,000
Speaker 1: ago twelve, I believe it was. And to see that

759
00:46:16,000 --> 00:46:20,479
Speaker 1: that game is still so so such a big part

760
00:46:21,080 --> 00:46:24,759
Speaker 1: of E sports it is, which makes sense. It requires

761
00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:28,759
Speaker 1: people to have very strong skill sets as well as

762
00:46:28,800 --> 00:46:31,400
Speaker 1: be very good team players if you want to have

763
00:46:31,440 --> 00:46:34,120
Speaker 1: a strong counter Strike team, and I can definitely see

764
00:46:34,120 --> 00:46:38,000
Speaker 1: where that value comes in. I remember distinctly when I

765
00:46:38,120 --> 00:46:42,799
Speaker 1: attended a c E S many years ago. Uh, one

766
00:46:43,000 --> 00:46:47,880
Speaker 1: of the the companies there, one of the the computer companies.

767
00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:52,600
Speaker 1: We're hosting Ubisoft's team at the time, the frag Dolls,

768
00:46:52,760 --> 00:46:56,960
Speaker 1: who were professional gamers, and the frag Dolls were taking

769
00:46:56,960 --> 00:46:59,880
Speaker 1: on all comers, and so people would step up the

770
00:47:00,200 --> 00:47:02,160
Speaker 1: form a team of four and then three of the

771
00:47:02,200 --> 00:47:05,200
Speaker 1: frag Dolls would just decimate them, and it happened over

772
00:47:05,200 --> 00:47:07,560
Speaker 1: and over and over again, and it was exciting to watch.

773
00:47:07,600 --> 00:47:10,680
Speaker 1: But it would have been so much more interesting to

774
00:47:10,800 --> 00:47:13,680
Speaker 1: actually see how they played together as a team, beyond

775
00:47:14,360 --> 00:47:16,640
Speaker 1: just knowing that they're coordinating much better, that they have

776
00:47:16,680 --> 00:47:18,600
Speaker 1: a good knowledge of the maps, being able to see

777
00:47:18,840 --> 00:47:22,680
Speaker 1: where they're looking and how frequently they're looking around. Do

778
00:47:23,160 --> 00:47:26,399
Speaker 1: they stare at one place for any given time, where

779
00:47:26,400 --> 00:47:29,879
Speaker 1: are they just constantly scanning? That sort of stuff would

780
00:47:29,880 --> 00:47:32,200
Speaker 1: have been really interesting to see. So I find this

781
00:47:32,239 --> 00:47:34,520
Speaker 1: really exciting. And as you point out, it also by

782
00:47:34,560 --> 00:47:40,560
Speaker 1: giving more information by informing the audience, you spend less time, uh,

783
00:47:40,800 --> 00:47:43,880
Speaker 1: trying to familiarize yourself with the way the game is working.

784
00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:47,520
Speaker 1: It becomes much more apparent early on if you're able

785
00:47:47,560 --> 00:47:50,360
Speaker 1: to see what other people are looking at, and I

786
00:47:50,360 --> 00:47:53,240
Speaker 1: think it removes that barrier. Uh. I think it also

787
00:47:54,200 --> 00:48:01,040
Speaker 1: really illustrates how professional gamers are are you know, just

788
00:48:01,080 --> 00:48:04,600
Speaker 1: incredibly good at what they do beyond raking up high scores,

789
00:48:04,640 --> 00:48:09,799
Speaker 1: Because I think still among certain populations at least, the

790
00:48:09,840 --> 00:48:13,680
Speaker 1: idea of professional gaming is somewhat scoffed at. UH. Whereas

791
00:48:13,800 --> 00:48:17,000
Speaker 1: you know, we accept professional sports pretty easily. That's been

792
00:48:17,040 --> 00:48:21,000
Speaker 1: part of our culture for for decades, and that is

793
00:48:21,120 --> 00:48:24,319
Speaker 1: pretty easy for folks to go along with. UH. I

794
00:48:24,360 --> 00:48:27,160
Speaker 1: think before anyone gets a chance to really see what

795
00:48:27,360 --> 00:48:31,719
Speaker 1: pro e sports is all about, they have an initial

796
00:48:31,960 --> 00:48:35,560
Speaker 1: reaction of like, well, that's a game that's not a sport,

797
00:48:35,920 --> 00:48:37,640
Speaker 1: and it's not until you're able to really kind of

798
00:48:37,640 --> 00:48:40,080
Speaker 1: break it down in this way and say, no, take

799
00:48:40,120 --> 00:48:42,840
Speaker 1: a look at this. These these are men and women

800
00:48:43,200 --> 00:48:47,000
Speaker 1: who are doing things at a level far beyond what

801
00:48:47,120 --> 00:48:50,360
Speaker 1: the average person is capable of doing. It is similar,

802
00:48:50,680 --> 00:48:54,400
Speaker 1: if not, if not identical, to what you see in

803
00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:59,480
Speaker 1: the actual physical sports realm. So I like that aspect

804
00:48:59,480 --> 00:49:02,880
Speaker 1: of it as well. It gives you that extra I

805
00:49:02,880 --> 00:49:05,160
Speaker 1: guess ammunition is the right way to put it when

806
00:49:05,160 --> 00:49:07,920
Speaker 1: you are talking about e sports and trying to explain

807
00:49:08,000 --> 00:49:12,239
Speaker 1: to someone how it really is a level of performance

808
00:49:12,320 --> 00:49:15,920
Speaker 1: beyond what the average person tends to be able to

809
00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:19,919
Speaker 1: do uh through this partnership. I'm sure you've you've seen

810
00:49:20,000 --> 00:49:24,799
Speaker 1: some really interesting stuff. Are there any particular uh stories

811
00:49:25,000 --> 00:49:29,240
Speaker 1: or particular revelations that you have encountered as a result

812
00:49:29,320 --> 00:49:34,960
Speaker 1: of this eye tracking technology being part of this experience. Yeah,

813
00:49:34,960 --> 00:49:39,000
Speaker 1: I mean, I would definitely say the just the middle

814
00:49:39,440 --> 00:49:45,920
Speaker 1: of nuanced gameplay between these counterslight players is insane. I

815
00:49:45,920 --> 00:49:49,040
Speaker 1: mean we talk about, you know, these guys being able

816
00:49:49,120 --> 00:49:50,919
Speaker 1: to be at the top of their games. I mean,

817
00:49:51,080 --> 00:49:53,160
Speaker 1: these are the guys who absolutely can tell the difference

818
00:49:53,200 --> 00:49:55,680
Speaker 1: between you know, two hundred and sixty hurts versus a

819
00:49:55,760 --> 00:49:59,719
Speaker 1: hundred and forty two hurts. There's jokes out there about

820
00:49:59,719 --> 00:50:01,840
Speaker 1: how the human I till and see you know thirty fps.

821
00:50:01,920 --> 00:50:04,440
Speaker 1: That is completely not true at all. Um. You know,

822
00:50:04,480 --> 00:50:06,640
Speaker 1: the counterstrect guys within the league, and a lot of

823
00:50:06,680 --> 00:50:12,319
Speaker 1: these guys here are just very um uh, their their

824
00:50:12,360 --> 00:50:14,759
Speaker 1: sensors are extreme, you know, when when you also could

825
00:50:14,760 --> 00:50:16,480
Speaker 1: how some of these guys play. There's a player like

826
00:50:16,560 --> 00:50:18,920
Speaker 1: j d M on Team Liquid who means back, you know,

827
00:50:19,000 --> 00:50:22,200
Speaker 1: three or four feet behind his chair. The distance between

828
00:50:22,320 --> 00:50:26,239
Speaker 1: his eyes to this screen is wildly different from you know,

829
00:50:26,280 --> 00:50:30,239
Speaker 1: another player who maybe near seven inches away. Um, we

830
00:50:30,360 --> 00:50:32,920
Speaker 1: found that could be interesting in the studio setting when

831
00:50:32,920 --> 00:50:35,520
Speaker 1: it comes to calibrating the eye tracking units for the

832
00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:38,040
Speaker 1: various players and making sure that the way that they

833
00:50:38,080 --> 00:50:40,200
Speaker 1: compete and how they're being calibrated at the time. But

834
00:50:40,880 --> 00:50:43,600
Speaker 1: I think just at a very high level, um, people,

835
00:50:43,760 --> 00:50:45,759
Speaker 1: once we slow down the game and once we get

836
00:50:45,800 --> 00:50:48,480
Speaker 1: to replays and all the technologies finally as caught up

837
00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:51,279
Speaker 1: to be able to subtily break down the nuances of

838
00:50:51,320 --> 00:50:54,160
Speaker 1: how quick they are in terms of middleseconds and hundreds

839
00:50:54,160 --> 00:50:57,719
Speaker 1: of middleseconds, we're gonna quickly see just you know, the

840
00:50:57,760 --> 00:51:01,400
Speaker 1: difference between the top one percent of players and investing

841
00:51:01,480 --> 00:51:03,520
Speaker 1: what that there and uh not going to be very

842
00:51:03,520 --> 00:51:09,640
Speaker 1: exciting to see. Yeah. And and you know something else

843
00:51:09,680 --> 00:51:12,760
Speaker 1: that stood out to me here with with the initial

844
00:51:12,880 --> 00:51:15,120
Speaker 1: ROD and it's kind of the first the first time

845
00:51:15,280 --> 00:51:18,279
Speaker 1: the getting Technical segment started to run on the the

846
00:51:18,440 --> 00:51:21,880
Speaker 1: league coverage has been the fan reaction. So you know,

847
00:51:21,920 --> 00:51:24,439
Speaker 1: I mentioned, you know, part of the reason that we're

848
00:51:24,440 --> 00:51:27,319
Speaker 1: doing this is we want to improve the viewership experience,

849
00:51:27,920 --> 00:51:30,960
Speaker 1: you know, selfishly for us as gamers and fans, because

850
00:51:31,440 --> 00:51:33,640
Speaker 1: we're watching these things ourselves and we want to be

851
00:51:33,680 --> 00:51:37,759
Speaker 1: able to a better viewing experience. Like if you look

852
00:51:37,760 --> 00:51:42,200
Speaker 1: at the feedback you know, just on on Facebook comments

853
00:51:42,280 --> 00:51:45,600
Speaker 1: on what you see happening on Twitch on the Elite broadcast,

854
00:51:45,680 --> 00:51:50,360
Speaker 1: Like the comments from fans is it's really encouraging around this.

855
00:51:50,520 --> 00:51:54,840
Speaker 1: They appreciate this technology, They appreciate being able to get

856
00:51:54,880 --> 00:52:00,080
Speaker 1: a better glint at how these professionals are performed in

857
00:52:00,239 --> 00:52:03,680
Speaker 1: real time, something you've never seen before. So you know,

858
00:52:03,760 --> 00:52:07,120
Speaker 1: as we as we roll out new new innovations and technologies,

859
00:52:07,160 --> 00:52:10,360
Speaker 1: we do obviously a ton of work, and we're working

860
00:52:10,520 --> 00:52:13,040
Speaker 1: and talking with our fans and our customers and just

861
00:52:13,120 --> 00:52:16,960
Speaker 1: gamers overall too UM to make sure we're delivering what

862
00:52:17,360 --> 00:52:21,040
Speaker 1: they want. Ultimately alien where is trying to deliver that

863
00:52:21,280 --> 00:52:24,400
Speaker 1: ultimate gaming experience. We feel this place right into that.

864
00:52:25,000 --> 00:52:29,160
Speaker 1: But it's always a it's always reassuring one when we

865
00:52:29,200 --> 00:52:32,200
Speaker 1: go down a path and we work with partners UM

866
00:52:32,239 --> 00:52:34,719
Speaker 1: and roll out new technologies and new features and so

867
00:52:34,880 --> 00:52:39,399
Speaker 1: on to see that. See the fan reaction is UM

868
00:52:39,600 --> 00:52:43,440
Speaker 1: is a positive is coming back positive and that to

869
00:52:43,480 --> 00:52:46,360
Speaker 1: me has definitely said out of and seen anything negative

870
00:52:46,400 --> 00:52:51,480
Speaker 1: around the technology. Just a lot of appreciation from from

871
00:52:51,480 --> 00:52:54,719
Speaker 1: the Game of community. Well, I love that There is

872
00:52:54,800 --> 00:52:57,839
Speaker 1: one thing I do want to add in the FANTE back.

873
00:52:57,960 --> 00:53:03,560
Speaker 1: People have been clamoring with what a anti cheating tool

874
00:53:03,760 --> 00:53:06,799
Speaker 1: that may wind up being. Um, it's curious to see

875
00:53:06,800 --> 00:53:08,359
Speaker 1: because what if one day they you know, we all

876
00:53:08,400 --> 00:53:10,759
Speaker 1: had monitors that always tracked our eyes and you can

877
00:53:10,800 --> 00:53:15,600
Speaker 1: never disable that. UM, that would be a very interesting future.

878
00:53:16,600 --> 00:53:18,520
Speaker 1: When we come back, we'll chat a bit more with

879
00:53:18,640 --> 00:53:21,359
Speaker 1: Robert from Turner about how they took the challenge of

880
00:53:21,400 --> 00:53:24,360
Speaker 1: taking the tech created by Toby and alien Ware and

881
00:53:24,400 --> 00:53:27,919
Speaker 1: they found a way to incorporate it into e sports broadcasts.

882
00:53:27,920 --> 00:53:31,400
Speaker 1: But first let's take another quick break to thank our sponsor.

883
00:53:38,520 --> 00:53:40,960
Speaker 1: So that kind of leads us naturally into a discussion

884
00:53:41,480 --> 00:53:46,320
Speaker 1: about the challenges of presenting e sports to an audience

885
00:53:46,360 --> 00:53:49,279
Speaker 1: in a way where they can really appreciate what's going on,

886
00:53:49,440 --> 00:53:53,720
Speaker 1: and that that ties into this topic of the eye

887
00:53:53,719 --> 00:53:58,040
Speaker 1: tracking technology. We know that Toby Tech was the company

888
00:53:58,120 --> 00:54:01,960
Speaker 1: to start working on the actual hardware and the basic software,

889
00:54:01,960 --> 00:54:05,400
Speaker 1: and we had Dell and alien Ware that we're working

890
00:54:05,520 --> 00:54:10,000
Speaker 1: on the various UH consumer products that incorporate that technology.

891
00:54:10,080 --> 00:54:12,319
Speaker 1: But when it comes to actually implementing it in a

892
00:54:12,360 --> 00:54:17,080
Speaker 1: way that makes sense both from an administrative perspective where

893
00:54:17,320 --> 00:54:19,960
Speaker 1: you guys are trying to find ways of adding value

894
00:54:20,120 --> 00:54:24,480
Speaker 1: to the presentation and from a consumer perspective or from

895
00:54:24,480 --> 00:54:29,239
Speaker 1: an audience perspective where they can appreciate even more the

896
00:54:29,280 --> 00:54:32,400
Speaker 1: capabilities of these elite players because they're getting kind of

897
00:54:32,440 --> 00:54:34,920
Speaker 1: insight into what's happening. Can you talk a little bit

898
00:54:34,920 --> 00:54:39,000
Speaker 1: about that implementation and what that experience was, Like? Sure, yeah,

899
00:54:39,000 --> 00:54:41,920
Speaker 1: I mean, um, you know what I would say is

900
00:54:43,080 --> 00:54:46,960
Speaker 1: it was birthed out of actually a very casual conversation

901
00:54:47,120 --> 00:54:51,000
Speaker 1: between David Chen and I David Chen from Dell and

902
00:54:51,080 --> 00:54:57,240
Speaker 1: I um at our major actually and that was in January. Um,

903
00:54:57,280 --> 00:55:01,080
Speaker 1: you know, I had seen a demo of some behind

904
00:55:01,120 --> 00:55:04,000
Speaker 1: the scenes software that a League of Legends team was

905
00:55:04,120 --> 00:55:09,480
Speaker 1: using to improve their performance with eye tracking, and thought, wow,

906
00:55:09,560 --> 00:55:14,400
Speaker 1: this is a really interesting, Um, how do we democratize that, Like,

907
00:55:14,480 --> 00:55:18,080
Speaker 1: how do we bring that to the audience watching the

908
00:55:18,080 --> 00:55:20,960
Speaker 1: game instead of making it like a back off its

909
00:55:21,040 --> 00:55:25,720
Speaker 1: tool that a team is using to try and optimize

910
00:55:26,160 --> 00:55:31,080
Speaker 1: its performance. And you know there are challenges for sure, Right.

911
00:55:31,200 --> 00:55:35,560
Speaker 1: So in March, um I went to Austin and we

912
00:55:35,560 --> 00:55:39,440
Speaker 1: we had a meeting, and in that meeting, Toby actually

913
00:55:39,480 --> 00:55:43,880
Speaker 1: brought their ideas on how it could work. UM, but

914
00:55:44,920 --> 00:55:49,319
Speaker 1: you know, to be candid, uh, they hadn't ever run

915
00:55:49,680 --> 00:55:54,560
Speaker 1: uh competitive gaming event. And as you alluded to earlier,

916
00:55:55,000 --> 00:56:01,520
Speaker 1: you know, competitive integrity is extremely important to extremely important

917
00:56:01,560 --> 00:56:04,799
Speaker 1: to the players, and so we have to be very

918
00:56:04,840 --> 00:56:09,399
Speaker 1: careful about what we do in the studio and how

919
00:56:09,480 --> 00:56:13,640
Speaker 1: we produce things. And as a result, UM, it is

920
00:56:13,680 --> 00:56:16,319
Speaker 1: certainly not as simple to do something like this eye

921
00:56:16,320 --> 00:56:20,520
Speaker 1: tracking as one would think it would be. UM. So

922
00:56:20,640 --> 00:56:24,520
Speaker 1: to kind of walk through the components of how it works, UM,

923
00:56:24,640 --> 00:56:28,880
Speaker 1: you need a computer with an eye tracker connected to it,

924
00:56:29,920 --> 00:56:34,319
Speaker 1: UM that is capturing gays in real time. Then you

925
00:56:34,440 --> 00:56:40,000
Speaker 1: also need a video feed of the point of view

926
00:56:40,160 --> 00:56:45,600
Speaker 1: of the player in real time. UM. And the two

927
00:56:45,680 --> 00:56:49,640
Speaker 1: things like the the eye tracker needs to be synchronized

928
00:56:49,719 --> 00:56:52,640
Speaker 1: for the resolution and aspect ratio that the player is

929
00:56:52,719 --> 00:56:55,600
Speaker 1: running the game at. And of course then the p

930
00:56:55,800 --> 00:56:59,279
Speaker 1: o V feed of the gameplay also needs to be

931
00:57:00,200 --> 00:57:03,520
Speaker 1: exactly what the player is looking at, so it can't

932
00:57:03,560 --> 00:57:08,239
Speaker 1: be at a different aspect ratio or resolution and have

933
00:57:08,400 --> 00:57:12,520
Speaker 1: it make perfect sense. And then you need to take

934
00:57:12,600 --> 00:57:16,720
Speaker 1: those two things that the video feed of the gays

935
00:57:17,400 --> 00:57:21,040
Speaker 1: and the actual p o V and then use broadcast

936
00:57:21,040 --> 00:57:24,920
Speaker 1: production equipment to merge those two things in real time

937
00:57:25,040 --> 00:57:31,200
Speaker 1: so you're getting an accurate UM feed of the two things. Well,

938
00:57:31,520 --> 00:57:34,600
Speaker 1: in order to do all of what I just mentioned,

939
00:57:35,200 --> 00:57:39,439
Speaker 1: it actually requires two computers that the players not even

940
00:57:39,480 --> 00:57:44,920
Speaker 1: playing on. UM. We have one machine that is the

941
00:57:44,960 --> 00:57:49,800
Speaker 1: dedicated gaze tracker that's actually outputting a green screen with

942
00:57:49,880 --> 00:57:54,800
Speaker 1: the gaze on it, So that computer is the tracker itself,

943
00:57:54,920 --> 00:57:58,920
Speaker 1: is mounted underneath the monitor that the player is sitting

944
00:57:58,920 --> 00:58:03,920
Speaker 1: in front of on stage age. And then we're using UM.

945
00:58:03,960 --> 00:58:05,560
Speaker 1: This might be a little too in the weeds, but

946
00:58:05,600 --> 00:58:10,440
Speaker 1: we're using UH USB Cat six extenders, so we're able

947
00:58:10,480 --> 00:58:13,760
Speaker 1: to run the USB three hundred feet to a server

948
00:58:13,920 --> 00:58:18,040
Speaker 1: room UM. And then the actual computer that the gaze

949
00:58:18,240 --> 00:58:22,240
Speaker 1: tracking software is running on is in this server room

950
00:58:23,200 --> 00:58:26,240
Speaker 1: hundreds of hundreds of feet away from the actual stage.

951
00:58:27,280 --> 00:58:30,400
Speaker 1: So we can't run the gays tracking software on the

952
00:58:30,400 --> 00:58:33,680
Speaker 1: computer that the players playing on because we can't do

953
00:58:33,760 --> 00:58:41,040
Speaker 1: anything that that could impact competitive integrity. Then for the

954
00:58:41,080 --> 00:58:45,840
Speaker 1: p o V UM, in order to get that p

955
00:58:46,000 --> 00:58:49,200
Speaker 1: o V, we cannot take it from the players computer,

956
00:58:49,400 --> 00:58:52,960
Speaker 1: So we don't ever take a video output from a

957
00:58:53,040 --> 00:58:57,880
Speaker 1: player's computer and feed that into our broadcast infrastructure. Because

958
00:58:58,200 --> 00:59:01,200
Speaker 1: the output from the video card on a player's computer

959
00:59:01,280 --> 00:59:04,560
Speaker 1: needs to go directly to the monitor, there cannot be

960
00:59:04,720 --> 00:59:10,520
Speaker 1: anything in that loop that introduces any latency. So and again,

961
00:59:10,600 --> 00:59:15,880
Speaker 1: in order to to maintain competitive integrity, we cannot use

962
00:59:16,040 --> 00:59:19,240
Speaker 1: the computer that the player is playing on to produce

963
00:59:19,360 --> 00:59:22,120
Speaker 1: the p o V footage that we're using to produce

964
00:59:22,240 --> 00:59:28,479
Speaker 1: this content. So instead, I have yet another computer in

965
00:59:28,520 --> 00:59:34,000
Speaker 1: the same server room that is connected to a relay

966
00:59:34,120 --> 00:59:39,520
Speaker 1: game server and is mimicking that player's point of view experience.

967
00:59:39,560 --> 00:59:44,160
Speaker 1: So what we've done is we very carefully keep track

968
00:59:44,200 --> 00:59:47,880
Speaker 1: of what aspect ratio the players running the game at

969
00:59:47,920 --> 00:59:52,520
Speaker 1: on stage, we mimic those settings and all of the

970
00:59:52,560 --> 00:59:59,320
Speaker 1: other settings that that players traditionally use on this secondary computer,

971
01:00:00,080 --> 01:00:04,320
Speaker 1: and then we're um linking it to that player so

972
01:00:04,400 --> 01:00:07,600
Speaker 1: that it shows their p o V the entire game,

973
01:00:08,400 --> 01:00:12,400
Speaker 1: and then feeding that into our broadcast infrastructure, and then

974
01:00:12,520 --> 01:00:16,520
Speaker 1: upstream from all of that, there is a broadcast switcher

975
01:00:16,680 --> 01:00:22,960
Speaker 1: that is merging the gays output with the green removed obviously,

976
01:00:23,760 --> 01:00:27,040
Speaker 1: and that p o V footage and feeding that to

977
01:00:27,080 --> 01:00:29,640
Speaker 1: the control room where a producer can watch it in

978
01:00:29,720 --> 01:00:34,680
Speaker 1: real time and decide is this something I want our

979
01:00:34,760 --> 01:00:37,520
Speaker 1: talent to talk about or not talk about. And so

980
01:00:37,960 --> 01:00:41,360
Speaker 1: we're we've now done this for three weeks of this tournament,

981
01:00:42,280 --> 01:00:44,720
Speaker 1: and we're you know, to be honest with you, if

982
01:00:44,720 --> 01:00:50,160
Speaker 1: you had talked to me before the tournament, UM, I my,

983
01:00:50,360 --> 01:00:53,720
Speaker 1: I was very careful to say, I don't know what

984
01:00:53,760 --> 01:00:56,360
Speaker 1: we're going to get. I don't know what kind of

985
01:00:56,400 --> 01:00:58,680
Speaker 1: insights we're going to get. I don't know if this

986
01:00:58,760 --> 01:01:03,080
Speaker 1: is really going to be like super interesting content or

987
01:01:03,240 --> 01:01:06,960
Speaker 1: just interesting content. Is it going to reveal things or

988
01:01:07,000 --> 01:01:11,000
Speaker 1: not reveal things? Um? All I knew was that we

989
01:01:11,040 --> 01:01:13,280
Speaker 1: had a proof of concept that we could capture this

990
01:01:13,920 --> 01:01:15,400
Speaker 1: and then we were going to see what we could

991
01:01:15,440 --> 01:01:18,680
Speaker 1: do with it. But I think we're really really pleased

992
01:01:18,760 --> 01:01:24,120
Speaker 1: with how the content has come come together and the

993
01:01:24,160 --> 01:01:30,680
Speaker 1: fans are just blown away. UM. I think you know,

994
01:01:30,800 --> 01:01:34,760
Speaker 1: it's it's a statement about what Turner Sports brings to

995
01:01:34,800 --> 01:01:37,960
Speaker 1: the E sports space, where we're trying to, you know,

996
01:01:38,120 --> 01:01:43,040
Speaker 1: constantly be additive and constantly be innovative, but not doing

997
01:01:43,080 --> 01:01:46,960
Speaker 1: innovation and additive things for the sake of doing them,

998
01:01:47,040 --> 01:01:50,760
Speaker 1: doing them to enhance the fan engagement and the fan

999
01:01:50,840 --> 01:01:55,040
Speaker 1: viewing experience. UM. And with this, you know, what I

1000
01:01:55,040 --> 01:01:59,240
Speaker 1: would say is there is no nothing analogous to this

1001
01:01:59,720 --> 01:02:03,960
Speaker 1: in traditional sports. You can see where a player runs,

1002
01:02:04,040 --> 01:02:07,000
Speaker 1: you can see them kick the ball, but you have

1003
01:02:07,040 --> 01:02:11,760
Speaker 1: no idea about like what they're looking at in real time,

1004
01:02:11,920 --> 01:02:15,800
Speaker 1: or what their intents are or what they even consider. Right,

1005
01:02:16,400 --> 01:02:20,400
Speaker 1: you don't really have any raw data about their thought

1006
01:02:20,440 --> 01:02:24,640
Speaker 1: process in traditional sports except what they tell you, right.

1007
01:02:26,360 --> 01:02:30,360
Speaker 1: But with this, this data, that this content, it reveals

1008
01:02:30,440 --> 01:02:34,680
Speaker 1: thought process in a way that nothing else in sports

1009
01:02:34,720 --> 01:02:38,320
Speaker 1: or e sports does. At this point, you see them look,

1010
01:02:38,960 --> 01:02:41,800
Speaker 1: you know, do their mental check? What's my health? How

1011
01:02:41,880 --> 01:02:45,320
Speaker 1: much ambo do I have? You know, where where the

1012
01:02:45,360 --> 01:02:47,960
Speaker 1: rest of my team on the map? Like you see

1013
01:02:48,000 --> 01:02:51,360
Speaker 1: that in real time in the content. We're not we

1014
01:02:51,440 --> 01:02:53,680
Speaker 1: haven't gotten to the point where we can really do

1015
01:02:53,720 --> 01:02:56,400
Speaker 1: this real time in a play are yet, although I

1016
01:02:56,440 --> 01:03:00,120
Speaker 1: want to do that at some point. Um. And I'm

1017
01:03:00,160 --> 01:03:05,200
Speaker 1: so excited because it's it is really like this super

1018
01:03:05,240 --> 01:03:10,760
Speaker 1: interesting combination of biometric technology that is not very invasive

1019
01:03:11,840 --> 01:03:16,320
Speaker 1: and um, this sport that is like sort of made

1020
01:03:16,320 --> 01:03:19,520
Speaker 1: out of data, And it would be almost impossible to

1021
01:03:19,600 --> 01:03:24,160
Speaker 1: do this for traditional sports, Like you know, I I am,

1022
01:03:24,200 --> 01:03:26,919
Speaker 1: I'm very fortunate in that I'm on. I'm a part

1023
01:03:26,920 --> 01:03:30,920
Speaker 1: of the team that also does the production for our

1024
01:03:31,040 --> 01:03:34,600
Speaker 1: NBA games, also does the production for our MLB games,

1025
01:03:35,040 --> 01:03:38,800
Speaker 1: and so I get to hear some of the behind

1026
01:03:38,800 --> 01:03:42,080
Speaker 1: the scenes stuff that is considered and talked about. And

1027
01:03:42,320 --> 01:03:44,760
Speaker 1: we certainly don't treat E sports any differently than we

1028
01:03:44,840 --> 01:03:48,760
Speaker 1: do those other things from a thought process perspective. But

1029
01:03:49,120 --> 01:03:51,360
Speaker 1: you know, as I'm sitting in the meetings in the

1030
01:03:51,440 --> 01:03:55,200
Speaker 1: last couple of weeks and we're talking about MLB, like,

1031
01:03:55,320 --> 01:03:59,520
Speaker 1: I'm actually thinking, Wow, wouldn't it be cool to see

1032
01:03:59,640 --> 01:04:02,800
Speaker 1: like Ace trace as a batter's in the batter's box

1033
01:04:03,240 --> 01:04:07,240
Speaker 1: and the pitches coming in. But like, there is no

1034
01:04:07,320 --> 01:04:11,360
Speaker 1: way to do that but be super cool. So so

1035
01:04:11,480 --> 01:04:14,240
Speaker 1: this is like that though, this is a step in

1036
01:04:14,280 --> 01:04:18,800
Speaker 1: that direction, right, Um, So I mean for me, like,

1037
01:04:18,840 --> 01:04:21,560
Speaker 1: I think it's super exciting and I would love to

1038
01:04:21,680 --> 01:04:27,840
Speaker 1: see this sort of like intent based data capture. Um,

1039
01:04:27,880 --> 01:04:30,280
Speaker 1: you know, what did he really look at? What did

1040
01:04:30,280 --> 01:04:33,560
Speaker 1: he consider? I would love to see that in baseball

1041
01:04:33,680 --> 01:04:37,360
Speaker 1: or football or basketball. How cool would it be to

1042
01:04:37,480 --> 01:04:44,000
Speaker 1: see the quarterbacks checkdowns in real time? In football? You know? Um,

1043
01:04:44,040 --> 01:04:46,200
Speaker 1: what did he consider before he threw the ball over

1044
01:04:46,240 --> 01:04:49,680
Speaker 1: there and what did he see before he threw that ball? Like,

1045
01:04:49,720 --> 01:04:53,560
Speaker 1: there's there's just not anything like this. So so to

1046
01:04:53,680 --> 01:04:56,880
Speaker 1: tack back the esports though, um, and the content that

1047
01:04:56,920 --> 01:05:00,800
Speaker 1: we've captured so far, you know, I think it's some

1048
01:05:00,920 --> 01:05:05,200
Speaker 1: of it is has revealed Oh that guy does exactly

1049
01:05:05,240 --> 01:05:08,600
Speaker 1: what we expected. And then in other cases it's like, wow,

1050
01:05:08,600 --> 01:05:13,080
Speaker 1: he spends a lot more time checking the more basic

1051
01:05:13,200 --> 01:05:16,280
Speaker 1: things than you would expect. And I think you know,

1052
01:05:16,320 --> 01:05:22,920
Speaker 1: with players, other players, like you know, regular stream of consciousness,

1053
01:05:22,960 --> 01:05:27,040
Speaker 1: like every day counter strike players, Um, this is an

1054
01:05:27,080 --> 01:05:29,520
Speaker 1: opportunity for them to kind of learn, oh wow, when

1055
01:05:29,560 --> 01:05:32,040
Speaker 1: I go around that corner, I don't look at that box,

1056
01:05:32,400 --> 01:05:37,320
Speaker 1: I start over there and sort of optimize their game too. Yeah.

1057
01:05:37,360 --> 01:05:39,920
Speaker 1: I also I also like how you know, you you

1058
01:05:40,000 --> 01:05:44,400
Speaker 1: had this incredible challenge of being able to like all

1059
01:05:44,440 --> 01:05:46,280
Speaker 1: the pieces were there, but in order for them to

1060
01:05:46,320 --> 01:05:49,920
Speaker 1: actually work, you had to go to these enormous considerations

1061
01:05:49,920 --> 01:05:53,800
Speaker 1: so that you did not affect the performance of any

1062
01:05:53,840 --> 01:05:57,400
Speaker 1: players machine because clearly, uh, it would be the same

1063
01:05:57,440 --> 01:06:01,120
Speaker 1: as if you were to uh to mess with uh,

1064
01:06:01,160 --> 01:06:04,120
Speaker 1: you know, a professional athlete in a traditional sport, if

1065
01:06:04,120 --> 01:06:06,200
Speaker 1: they were to mess with their equipment, it would be

1066
01:06:06,280 --> 01:06:09,280
Speaker 1: almost like sabotage. So you're you know, you're talking about

1067
01:06:09,280 --> 01:06:12,360
Speaker 1: like the not wanting to put any kind of load

1068
01:06:12,760 --> 01:06:16,080
Speaker 1: on a graphics processing unit that is meant to run

1069
01:06:16,080 --> 01:06:18,520
Speaker 1: the game on the player's machine. I would say that

1070
01:06:18,520 --> 01:06:20,600
Speaker 1: that's sort of analogous to what you were saying with

1071
01:06:21,240 --> 01:06:24,040
Speaker 1: professional sports in the in the physical realm, the idea

1072
01:06:24,080 --> 01:06:27,800
Speaker 1: that we can't really do that eye tracking technique with

1073
01:06:28,160 --> 01:06:31,800
Speaker 1: traditional sports largely because it would require us to outfit

1074
01:06:31,880 --> 01:06:36,360
Speaker 1: professional players with additional equipment that would then in turn

1075
01:06:36,520 --> 01:06:39,680
Speaker 1: affect their performance. Thus you end up you end up

1076
01:06:39,680 --> 01:06:43,640
Speaker 1: with the classic quantum physics issue of anything you observe

1077
01:06:43,920 --> 01:06:48,240
Speaker 1: you are affecting, right, So so it's it's interesting that

1078
01:06:48,640 --> 01:06:51,440
Speaker 1: you know, you had to find that work around in

1079
01:06:51,480 --> 01:06:56,960
Speaker 1: the professional sports arena for for pro video gamers. And

1080
01:06:57,200 --> 01:06:59,480
Speaker 1: I think once you do consider that in the realm

1081
01:06:59,520 --> 01:07:01,520
Speaker 1: of the the physical sports as well, even if you're

1082
01:07:01,520 --> 01:07:05,040
Speaker 1: not familiar with professional video game sports or e leagues

1083
01:07:05,120 --> 01:07:08,280
Speaker 1: or anything of those that nature, you start to say, oh, well,

1084
01:07:08,280 --> 01:07:09,880
Speaker 1: now I'm getting it. Now I'm getting it. I see.

1085
01:07:09,920 --> 01:07:12,520
Speaker 1: It's like, you know, if if I walked up and

1086
01:07:12,520 --> 01:07:15,360
Speaker 1: I realized that the bat that I want to use

1087
01:07:15,760 --> 01:07:17,400
Speaker 1: is nowhere to be found, and I'm gonna have to

1088
01:07:17,480 --> 01:07:19,200
Speaker 1: use a different bat, and it's one that's of a

1089
01:07:19,280 --> 01:07:22,480
Speaker 1: slightly different weight, and I'm not it's enough when you're

1090
01:07:22,520 --> 01:07:25,120
Speaker 1: talking about at that elite level of performance that it

1091
01:07:25,200 --> 01:07:29,439
Speaker 1: makes a measurable difference. So Uh, I'm glad that we

1092
01:07:29,440 --> 01:07:32,320
Speaker 1: were able to have this conversation and and kind of

1093
01:07:32,360 --> 01:07:35,360
Speaker 1: get that perspective, because I think it does. It's very

1094
01:07:35,480 --> 01:07:40,400
Speaker 1: enlightening to people who are unfamiliar with the subject. Uh.

1095
01:07:40,520 --> 01:07:44,400
Speaker 1: Is there anything that you have witnessed in your time

1096
01:07:44,520 --> 01:07:48,160
Speaker 1: with the E League that stands out as one of

1097
01:07:48,160 --> 01:07:51,920
Speaker 1: those really special moments, Whether it was in a tournament

1098
01:07:52,040 --> 01:07:54,400
Speaker 1: or maybe it was maybe it was when you were

1099
01:07:55,080 --> 01:07:58,400
Speaker 1: when you saw this this eye tracking technology all kind

1100
01:07:58,400 --> 01:08:01,080
Speaker 1: of come together, but anything that kind of is particularly

1101
01:08:01,160 --> 01:08:04,920
Speaker 1: special in your mind. I mean from my personal experience

1102
01:08:04,960 --> 01:08:08,520
Speaker 1: to kind of attack back to personal there's kind of

1103
01:08:08,800 --> 01:08:13,240
Speaker 1: three moments for me, um to to take a question

1104
01:08:13,280 --> 01:08:16,520
Speaker 1: that asks for one and to answer with three. Um.

1105
01:08:16,560 --> 01:08:20,160
Speaker 1: You know. The first was the finals of our first

1106
01:08:20,240 --> 01:08:24,320
Speaker 1: tournament we were we released game Command, which I have

1107
01:08:24,400 --> 01:08:27,320
Speaker 1: not mentioned, but it's a mosaic player, so like a

1108
01:08:27,479 --> 01:08:32,479
Speaker 1: user directed experience where UH end users can choose to

1109
01:08:32,520 --> 01:08:35,000
Speaker 1: watch any of the ten players who are playing in

1110
01:08:35,080 --> 01:08:40,519
Speaker 1: real time, or actually watch all ten. Um. Releasing that

1111
01:08:40,560 --> 01:08:44,920
Speaker 1: out into the wild and seeing the fan feedback on it,

1112
01:08:45,960 --> 01:08:48,920
Speaker 1: because there was literally nothing like it in the in

1113
01:08:49,120 --> 01:08:52,679
Speaker 1: the world at that point. Um, and they're there actually

1114
01:08:52,680 --> 01:08:55,040
Speaker 1: still isn't like there's still nothing where you can watch

1115
01:08:55,479 --> 01:08:59,640
Speaker 1: all ten players at the same time, um in one UI.

1116
01:08:59,680 --> 01:09:03,799
Speaker 1: But UM, that was the first, you know. The second

1117
01:09:04,120 --> 01:09:07,559
Speaker 1: was I've talked about the Major in January a few

1118
01:09:07,600 --> 01:09:11,640
Speaker 1: times already, but there was a moment during the finals

1119
01:09:12,240 --> 01:09:18,599
Speaker 1: where we crested a million concurrent viewers on Twitch, not

1120
01:09:18,800 --> 01:09:22,680
Speaker 1: just breaking the all time Twitch record, but shattering it

1121
01:09:22,800 --> 01:09:28,759
Speaker 1: by almost three hundred thousand viewers, and you know, setting

1122
01:09:28,760 --> 01:09:32,400
Speaker 1: the sort of bar for competitive e sports as far

1123
01:09:32,439 --> 01:09:36,160
Speaker 1: as viewership counts go. And then the third, honestly is

1124
01:09:36,240 --> 01:09:41,280
Speaker 1: this eye tracker stuff. Um, it's always interesting to start

1125
01:09:41,280 --> 01:09:43,759
Speaker 1: with the theory in I mean, I guess in March

1126
01:09:43,880 --> 01:09:47,640
Speaker 1: we started with a theory and go to proof of

1127
01:09:47,680 --> 01:09:51,160
Speaker 1: concept in June and then be sitting at a desk

1128
01:09:51,200 --> 01:09:56,120
Speaker 1: with white knuckles in September hoping that that vision and

1129
01:09:56,200 --> 01:09:59,760
Speaker 1: all of the workarounds and hard work come together and

1130
01:09:59,800 --> 01:10:04,639
Speaker 1: then to see the fans react so positively. I mean, really,

1131
01:10:04,680 --> 01:10:07,720
Speaker 1: that's what it's about, right, It's not about me or

1132
01:10:07,760 --> 01:10:11,160
Speaker 1: building a cool thing, as much as I love building

1133
01:10:11,200 --> 01:10:13,680
Speaker 1: cool things and that's kind of what I've made my

1134
01:10:13,760 --> 01:10:18,639
Speaker 1: living doing. Um. You know what's important is that other

1135
01:10:18,680 --> 01:10:21,640
Speaker 1: people are getting some value out of that, and no

1136
01:10:22,120 --> 01:10:25,920
Speaker 1: other people are more important than the like fans uh

1137
01:10:26,000 --> 01:10:30,040
Speaker 1: in the scene. So um to see that, and then

1138
01:10:30,200 --> 01:10:32,679
Speaker 1: to see what they do with it, right like they've

1139
01:10:33,280 --> 01:10:37,679
Speaker 1: they've taken it and turned it into memes and jokes

1140
01:10:37,760 --> 01:10:41,080
Speaker 1: and everything like, to me, that means it's been accepted,

1141
01:10:41,200 --> 01:10:44,080
Speaker 1: right like at the highest level. When they start making

1142
01:10:44,120 --> 01:10:48,439
Speaker 1: Reddit threads about joking about past tournaments with eye tracking

1143
01:10:48,479 --> 01:10:51,519
Speaker 1: turned on, then to me, that means we've we've done

1144
01:10:51,520 --> 01:10:56,080
Speaker 1: something new. Like those three moments for me are the

1145
01:10:56,120 --> 01:10:59,599
Speaker 1: are the three most special among many many special moments

1146
01:11:00,160 --> 01:11:03,600
Speaker 1: that the last three years. Those are those are great stories.

1147
01:11:03,640 --> 01:11:06,920
Speaker 1: And I love that this trend has been picking up

1148
01:11:07,080 --> 01:11:09,800
Speaker 1: steam for the last not to use a valve joke,

1149
01:11:10,080 --> 01:11:11,960
Speaker 1: but has been picking up steam for the past few

1150
01:11:12,080 --> 01:11:16,920
Speaker 1: years and seeing not just the the professional video game

1151
01:11:17,000 --> 01:11:21,320
Speaker 1: sports industry really coming into its own in the United States,

1152
01:11:21,360 --> 01:11:23,559
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously it's been a big deal in other

1153
01:11:23,560 --> 01:11:26,080
Speaker 1: places as well. It started really in the US, but

1154
01:11:26,200 --> 01:11:28,160
Speaker 1: I would say that it kind of blossomed in South

1155
01:11:28,240 --> 01:11:31,360
Speaker 1: Korea and then as now finding more acceptance in the

1156
01:11:31,479 --> 01:11:34,120
Speaker 1: United States, which which is great, but we're also seeing

1157
01:11:34,520 --> 01:11:39,840
Speaker 1: uh people turning into kind of an entertainment figure through

1158
01:11:39,920 --> 01:11:43,639
Speaker 1: their video game playing and reaching audiences that way. Clearly

1159
01:11:44,280 --> 01:11:50,320
Speaker 1: there is a a uh interested invested audience they get.

1160
01:11:50,880 --> 01:11:55,599
Speaker 1: They get really attached to certain players and certain titles. Uh.

1161
01:11:55,640 --> 01:12:00,640
Speaker 1: It's exciting, and I'm glad that we're kind of like

1162
01:12:00,920 --> 01:12:04,680
Speaker 1: right at the point where I think it's going to explode,

1163
01:12:04,720 --> 01:12:07,000
Speaker 1: like it's already. I guess you could argue hitting a

1164
01:12:07,040 --> 01:12:10,720
Speaker 1: million concurrent Twitch viewers all at once that's kind of

1165
01:12:10,720 --> 01:12:15,280
Speaker 1: an explosion all in of itself. But seeing this, this

1166
01:12:15,280 --> 01:12:18,639
Speaker 1: this cusp of acceptance is really exciting to me because

1167
01:12:18,640 --> 01:12:22,200
Speaker 1: I've been following professional gaming for a while in its

1168
01:12:22,280 --> 01:12:26,479
Speaker 1: various formats, whether it was through UH league, you know,

1169
01:12:26,520 --> 01:12:29,760
Speaker 1: tournament league play, or whether it was a group of

1170
01:12:29,840 --> 01:12:33,320
Speaker 1: sponsored players who were there to help represent a particular

1171
01:12:33,360 --> 01:12:36,719
Speaker 1: game developer, anything like that. I've been following that stuff

1172
01:12:36,720 --> 01:12:39,439
Speaker 1: for years and seeing it now get to a point

1173
01:12:39,920 --> 01:12:45,519
Speaker 1: where there's there's a real awareness and celebration of it

1174
01:12:45,600 --> 01:12:50,080
Speaker 1: is exciting to me. I love games. I love playing games.

1175
01:12:50,520 --> 01:12:55,559
Speaker 1: I am awful at them, but I still enjoy it. Uh. Yeah,

1176
01:12:55,640 --> 01:12:59,160
Speaker 1: we were talking before we started recording about the games

1177
01:12:59,200 --> 01:13:02,400
Speaker 1: that we would stream, and I believe you mentioned a

1178
01:13:03,280 --> 01:13:08,080
Speaker 1: very popular M m O RPG that you occasionally would play. Yeah,

1179
01:13:08,240 --> 01:13:11,040
Speaker 1: I'm not afraid to break out World of Warcraft on occasion.

1180
01:13:11,439 --> 01:13:15,320
Speaker 1: That's fair among other games. Yeah, I I might go

1181
01:13:15,400 --> 01:13:18,840
Speaker 1: to so I I used to. Uh, so people can

1182
01:13:18,880 --> 01:13:23,080
Speaker 1: know interest of full disclosure. I the game I'm most

1183
01:13:23,120 --> 01:13:25,719
Speaker 1: known for streaming, because I don't do it very frequently

1184
01:13:26,080 --> 01:13:29,880
Speaker 1: is Minecraft, because I would hold a a marathon session

1185
01:13:29,880 --> 01:13:32,800
Speaker 1: of Minecraft as part of a charity event every year,

1186
01:13:33,000 --> 01:13:37,120
Speaker 1: and I would play twenty four hours straight of Minecraft,

1187
01:13:37,160 --> 01:13:40,760
Speaker 1: and then for whatever when people would make donations, at

1188
01:13:40,760 --> 01:13:43,280
Speaker 1: whatever level they would donate, I would build a monument

1189
01:13:43,600 --> 01:13:48,360
Speaker 1: in Minecraft out of materials that were, uh, comparatively difficult

1190
01:13:48,360 --> 01:13:51,559
Speaker 1: to find. So the more you donated, the more rare

1191
01:13:51,600 --> 01:13:54,080
Speaker 1: the material had to be in order for me to

1192
01:13:54,160 --> 01:13:57,439
Speaker 1: make a monument significant for that donation. And I it

1193
01:13:57,560 --> 01:14:00,439
Speaker 1: was not creative mode, it was you know, regular her mode,

1194
01:14:00,600 --> 01:14:03,640
Speaker 1: turned on all the enemies everything, and um, let me

1195
01:14:03,640 --> 01:14:06,960
Speaker 1: tell you somewhere around our number sixteen, things get special.

1196
01:14:07,280 --> 01:14:10,519
Speaker 1: But uh, but yeah, I I have a love of

1197
01:14:10,600 --> 01:14:13,439
Speaker 1: this as well, so I cannot wait to check out

1198
01:14:13,920 --> 01:14:16,720
Speaker 1: the the elague play. I cannot wait. I plan to

1199
01:14:16,800 --> 01:14:19,960
Speaker 1: actually be at the finals, so I cannot wait to

1200
01:14:20,000 --> 01:14:23,800
Speaker 1: see that in person. And uh, where can people go

1201
01:14:24,080 --> 01:14:28,360
Speaker 1: to experience this? I mean, Elite dot com is is

1202
01:14:28,439 --> 01:14:32,519
Speaker 1: the one stop shop for everything you'd want when we're live.

1203
01:14:32,560 --> 01:14:35,920
Speaker 1: That will point you to all the different viewing experiences

1204
01:14:35,960 --> 01:14:39,519
Speaker 1: that we have and it'll give you schedule information anything

1205
01:14:39,520 --> 01:14:43,519
Speaker 1: else you would want. Excellent, Robert, thank you so much

1206
01:14:43,560 --> 01:14:46,559
Speaker 1: for your time. I really appreciate it, and I hope

1207
01:14:46,560 --> 01:14:49,719
Speaker 1: but we get a chance to talk again in the future. Awesome.

1208
01:14:49,720 --> 01:14:52,320
Speaker 1: Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate the conversation.

1209
01:14:53,280 --> 01:14:56,400
Speaker 1: Clearly there's a healthy audience out there for professional gaming,

1210
01:14:56,520 --> 01:15:00,400
Speaker 1: from entertainment personalities to tournament players, and it be really

1211
01:15:00,479 --> 01:15:03,240
Speaker 1: interesting to see how the industry evolves from here. Could

1212
01:15:03,240 --> 01:15:05,519
Speaker 1: we one day see video games take a place with

1213
01:15:05,600 --> 01:15:09,320
Speaker 1: traditional sports and something as celebrated as the Olympics, or

1214
01:15:09,360 --> 01:15:12,160
Speaker 1: will there always be at least some level of stigma

1215
01:15:12,240 --> 01:15:15,040
Speaker 1: in place that will prevent that from ever happening, and

1216
01:15:15,120 --> 01:15:17,559
Speaker 1: doesn't really matter as long as people are having a

1217
01:15:17,600 --> 01:15:21,320
Speaker 1: good time playing or watching games. I can say this.

1218
01:15:22,240 --> 01:15:25,840
Speaker 1: I am in my early forties and I watch a

1219
01:15:26,040 --> 01:15:29,640
Speaker 1: lot of let's play style videos and live streams. I

1220
01:15:29,800 --> 01:15:33,959
Speaker 1: enjoy watching people play games. I'm dazzled by the skills

1221
01:15:34,080 --> 01:15:37,960
Speaker 1: of pro level gamers, and I find myself thoroughly entertained

1222
01:15:38,000 --> 01:15:41,559
Speaker 1: by certain personalities when they interact with each other while

1223
01:15:41,840 --> 01:15:47,400
Speaker 1: playing together. Cough achievement hunter cough. I think there's plenty

1224
01:15:47,439 --> 01:15:50,400
Speaker 1: of room for growth in that realm of entertainment, even

1225
01:15:50,439 --> 01:15:53,160
Speaker 1: if it never truly reaches the level of acceptance of

1226
01:15:53,200 --> 01:15:56,519
Speaker 1: traditional sports. But I'm curious what you guys think. Are

1227
01:15:56,560 --> 01:15:59,640
Speaker 1: you a fan of watching other people play games? Do

1228
01:15:59,680 --> 01:16:04,040
Speaker 1: you just find that completely incomprehensible. If you do find

1229
01:16:04,040 --> 01:16:07,840
Speaker 1: it incomprehensible, do you watch sports, and where do you

1230
01:16:07,960 --> 01:16:11,280
Speaker 1: think the gap is in between them. I'm really curious

1231
01:16:11,280 --> 01:16:12,680
Speaker 1: to hear more about this. I kind of wanted to

1232
01:16:12,680 --> 01:16:16,320
Speaker 1: be a conversation and maybe in a few episodes, maybe

1233
01:16:16,360 --> 01:16:19,240
Speaker 1: a month or two down the line, I'll revisit this

1234
01:16:19,320 --> 01:16:21,559
Speaker 1: and talk about some of the listener feedback. I got

1235
01:16:21,600 --> 01:16:24,000
Speaker 1: so I really want you guys to respond. If you

1236
01:16:24,000 --> 01:16:26,400
Speaker 1: want to reach out to me, you can always email me.

1237
01:16:26,680 --> 01:16:29,479
Speaker 1: The address for this show is tech Stuff at how

1238
01:16:29,560 --> 01:16:32,360
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. You can drop me a line

1239
01:16:32,400 --> 01:16:35,719
Speaker 1: on Twitter or Facebook. The handle for both of those

1240
01:16:35,800 --> 01:16:40,160
Speaker 1: is tech Stuff hs W. Remember every Wednesday and Friday,

1241
01:16:40,360 --> 01:16:43,599
Speaker 1: I stream live as I record this show. You can

1242
01:16:43,640 --> 01:16:46,400
Speaker 1: go to twitch dot tv slash tech stuff and watch

1243
01:16:46,479 --> 01:16:50,280
Speaker 1: me live. Also, if you enjoy the show, and if

1244
01:16:50,280 --> 01:16:53,280
Speaker 1: you just can't get enough of tech, I recommend checking

1245
01:16:53,320 --> 01:16:57,320
Speaker 1: out tech Stuff Daily, my brand new daily show. It's

1246
01:16:57,360 --> 01:17:00,280
Speaker 1: a short form show last between four and six minutes

1247
01:17:00,320 --> 01:17:04,000
Speaker 1: per episode. It should be live right now. Go check

1248
01:17:04,040 --> 01:17:07,320
Speaker 1: that out. You can subscribe to it. If you are

1249
01:17:07,360 --> 01:17:10,240
Speaker 1: a member of tune In, you can watch episodes or

1250
01:17:10,240 --> 01:17:14,000
Speaker 1: listen to episodes a week before everybody else, and then

1251
01:17:14,080 --> 01:17:18,479
Speaker 1: they go live everywhere you find your podcasts. That's it

1252
01:17:18,680 --> 01:17:22,080
Speaker 1: for me. I'll talk to you guys again really soon

1253
01:17:28,840 --> 01:17:31,280
Speaker 1: for more on this and thousands of other topics. Because

1254
01:17:31,320 --> 01:17:32,840
Speaker 1: a housetop works dot com, which