YouSaid · the spoken record

Richard Garriott

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66
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2022-07-15
most recent
2022-07-15
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1
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podcast

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  1. “Okay, so I want to go back in his life when he's younger, and this is when he first sees, he sees his first video game. I'm always amazed at how much the work that we can do can influence others. He's about to see the first video game that he ever played was Pong. Pong was developed at Atari. Atari was founded by Nolan Bushnell. Nolan Bushnell winds up hiring a 19-year-old Steve Jobs and mentoring him. And if you ever want to read a book, a really easy to read book that's written by a crazy character, that'd be Nolan Bushnell, obviously. I did it for Founders Number 36. It's Finding the Next Steve Jobs, How to Find, Keep, and Nurture Talent. Nolan's very unique. Not only did he think about it, he founded Atari, and then he also found Atky Cheese. And that book starts with Nolan at the time his companies were making hundreds of millions of dollars a year. And he meets up, he's throwing this huge party in Paris and like a 25-year-old or 26-year-old Steve Jobs shows up and they wind up having the next day they wind up going for a long time.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  2. “Storytelling. Think about storytelling as old as language. Much of my life is about telling stories. The real ones I've lived and those that I make up. More than anything else that I am or have accomplished, I am a storyteller”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  3. “Open up and unlocks all these other opportunities, you know, he had to pay for a private spaceflight. I think it was like $20 million, $15 million. I can't remember exactly. That doesn't happen without all the stuff that's happening now as a teenager. Go back to this. The more people enjoy listening to my stories, the more I enjoyed telling them. Every storyteller is familiar with the pleasure that comes from sitting with your friends around a fire, pouring a few drinks and weaving a yarn. This is one of my favorite sentences in the book. This was man's first form of entertainment. And when done well is still his best.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  4. “Most CEOs didn't know what they were talking about, couldn't even hold their product correctly. Steve not only knew it, but he used that story to drive product development. That's insane. That's an insane thought. That's why that's when I began to really understand the power of storytelling. And so Richard's like, okay, how do I get better at this? I was far from the best storyteller at the D&D gatherings, and my first stories were not good at all. Watching other game masters, I knew their narratives were better thought through than mine. I became a better storyteller by observing the strengths and weaknesses of other game masters. And so the reason I'm giving this background is because what he says here on the next page, playing D&D was the seed that would eventually grow into my elaborate computer games. He is telling us what I'm learning from this experience I will use later for creating games and then I use the creation of games to build the creation of my business empire, my financial empire, the things that open.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  5. “I'll add something onto it. I learned that each game was only as good as the ability of the Game Master to craft a story and manage the negotiations into a compelling narrative. We also took turns being Game Master, and it was quickly obvious that while some people were very good at it, most were not. That is when I began to really understand the power of storytelling. So let me tell you what Richard's saying in this book. With another book, I saw an excerpt from. I haven't read it yet. The guy that worked with Steve and helped lead the development of the iPod, Tony Fidel, has this new book. And I saw this quote from it. And it was on something that's very unique. And again, it's all going to be tied to the fact that Steve Jobs knew the power of story. And it's on the fact that the story defines the product and it's not the other way around. So I just want to read a few paragraphs from this real quick. Steve was a master at this. Before he told you what a product did, he always took time to explain why you needed it.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  6. “So I jumped ahead a little bit, but it's just fascinating how all these things, I just love the fact how all these people in different domains are writing completely different experiences. They just think and they arrive and they're like, oh, this is truly possible to create something new, something that never existed. That is insane to me. So let me go back to the book because I'm getting way ahead of myself and we'll get there in time. This was before the emergence of computer games. So he's talking about, hey, I'm a teenager. I'm an online, or excuse me, I'm a teenage dungeon master in D&D. There's going to be a slight digression here, which is why I started the podcast where I did, because a huge theme of the book is the importance of storytelling. Steve Jobs has told you and I over and over again that storytellers are the most powerful people in the world. Richard tells us that, listen, storytelling is extremely powerful, just like Steve Jobs said, but it also can be learned. You can learn how to do this. I learned that each game was only as good. So again, this other paragraph here, too, let me tie back to what I started this on. This is really to me a metaphor of building a company. Well, let me just read it to you.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  7. “Only thinking I'm obsessed with DD, I'm a teenage dungeon master. And you're going to see as this story continues, this like, oh, wow. Okay, not only can I make my own game, right? And then he progresses through trial and error and doing that, but then he's like, oh, wait, I can sell this thing that I was doing for free that I'm completely obsessed with, that I love so much. And then by doing that, I can go on my own adventure. I can create my own company. That is one of the best feelings in the world”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  8. “Know every time, but eventually he seemed to have drifted away. Several years later, his obituary appeared in the newspaper. Daniel Dukes had died at SeaWorld. Initially, authorities believed that he had jumped into the killer whale tank and had been bitten, but they found his camera and the undeveloped photographs told a different story. He had been hiding in the bushes for several days before jumping into the tank, taking photographs of women's backsides. He had died from hypothermia. He had not been bitten. The fact that he was found on the back of the whale led the authorities to speculate that the whale had recognized him as an air breather and might have been trying to save him. And that is how I learned to tell a story.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  9. “He just continued walking his back to me. I lost sight of him, but I could hear him walking around once again talking to someone. I stood there, frozen in place. The police finally arrived. They found him in a guest bedroom sitting nearly naked on the edge of a bed. Nothing about the entire incident seemed to affect him. He was alone. The officers began questioning him. It immediately became clear that he was very troubled. His name was Daniel Dukes, and he told them that he had seen a hologram over my house of me beckoning him there to receive the reward he'd earn for completing his quest. The police placed him under arrest, his parents told law enforcement that he had suffered from a mental disorder for a long time and that they had given up on him. The police detained him as long as legally possible, and then they released him. The police arrested him several more times the following year.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  10. “The dispatcher answered matter of factly. Mr. Garriott, if you feel threatened inside your own home by an intruder, you shoot him. It was as if one of my stories was coming to life in my life. A few seconds later I heard footsteps crunching on the broken glass directly below me. Then the intruder started walking up the stairs. He moved slowly and didn't look up at me for the first few steps. Finally, he paused, and for the first time he saw the Uzi pointing at his head. I warned him. Stop right there or I'll shoot. He stopped. We stood there, six feet apart, staring at each other. I held the gun steady. At that distance I would not miss. Then he turned and started walking back down the stairs. I remember thinking I don't want to kill this person, but it would be dangerous to let him walk away thinking I wouldn't fire my weapon. That would be an invitation to return, so I aimed the gun just a few inches to the side and fired. He didn't even fly.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  11. “Dispatcher told me the officers would be there in 15 minutes. 15 minutes? It would take the intruder only a few minutes to find his way to my bedroom. My gun safe had about a dozen weapons in it, but I had those guns for the same reason I had crossbows, battle axes, bows and arrows, even a working cannon. They are all part of the pantheon of collectible history for me. Knowing about them is essential for creating games. Until that moment I had never even considered the possibility that I might actually have to use one of those guns to protect myself. I picked up Anoozi. I pulled back the slide and snapped the clip into place. I could hear him moving around downstairs, talking to someone. I hadn't seen another person. I still had the police dispatcher on the phone. He's talking to someone, I whispered. Then I asked what do I do in this situation?”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  12. “A few seconds, we stood like that, just glaring at each other. Then I said to him in a clear and loud voice, get the fuck out of my house. He stood perfectly still for a few more seconds, and then he walked into the house. I called 911.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  13. “Hours later, someone hurled a large rock through my rear glass doors. It was the stranger. I realized that he must have been standing in the darkness for hours, just watching my house and waiting. I rushed to the window and looked down to see him cautiously entering my house. If this was simply a robbery, he probably waited and watched until he was certain that no one was home. So if I banged on the window above him, I thought, he would realize somebody was in the house and probably take off. I started banging on the window, and I was so agitated that my fist went right through the glass. The window shattered. The intruder stopped and looked up at me.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  14. “I didn't answer the door, instead I stood there watching him to see what he was going to do. I stood at the window for about half an hour. Occasionally he would walk around the side of the house and I moved from window to window to follow him. He didn't leave. I couldn't figure out what he was doing. Then it occurred to me that he was waiting for me to get home. I began wondering how I could encourage him to leave without letting him know that I was home. The front gate could be opened remotely, so I closed it, and as I had hoped, he looked around, surprised, watching the gate slowly shut. He must have realized that he was on the wrong side of the perimeter because he hopped over the fence and disappeared into the darkness. I watched for several more minutes to see if he'd come back. Weird, I thought. But when he didn't return after thirty more minutes, I went back to bed.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  15. “Hours earlier, my house had been filled with friends who had come to watch huge fragments of the Comet Shoemaker Levy 9 crashing into Jupiter, the first time in history it was possible to watch an extraterrestrial collision in our solar system. I'd built this house on the highest point in Austin just for nights like this, and its centerpiece is a large telescope. When my friends arrived early in the evening, I had opened the security gates in the front of the house and turned off the exterior lighting so it would not interfere with our observation. The spectacle lasted only a few hours and by 10 o'clock my guests were gone. When the doorbell rang just after midnight, I didn't think too much about it. Guessing that someone had just left something behind. I had forgotten to close the front gate. I went to a window. Standing at the front door, shifting nervously from side to side with his hands jammed into the pockets, was a stranger. He was wearing a baseball hat. The hat was pulled down over.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source

  16. “It was almost three o'clock in the morning when the sound of a glass door being smashed woke me up. I was alone in my house. A few seconds later, I heard someone walking on the broken glass. The stranger had come back.”

    2022-07-15 · Founders · #257 Richard Garriott (Video Games and Space Exploration) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source