A. I spent about two years trying to think of a way to make a business out of all of my Internet knowledge and skills. Whenever I couldn't come up with an idea I would relax, take a break, and play some video games. Then one day it hit me! Why not make a Web site that reviews all of this stuff?

Q. How does your site make money?

A. Currently our main source of income is through advertising. We get paid for all of the banners/buttons on the site.

Q. What is the most fun part of running your business?

A. Being the boss of the entire operation is fun. As much as I hate the word boss (I like to think of us more as a team), it really is what I am and what I do. Sure, I get to tell 20 people what to do, but if anything bad happens I am the one who our investors come after. Finding the fine line between telling everyone what to do and trying to make them feel comfortable around you is very rewarding. And when everything works out then you know you've done the job right.

Should I not say staying up all night and waking up at noon is also fun? I have to say that making my own hours is one of the best perks I have experienced as well. Don't get me wrong, I love being in charge of my own company, taking long distance business calls, and getting paid to play video games with friends, but what can I say, I'm a night person.

Q. What is the least fun part of running your business?

A. The minor details can become extremely tedious. Filing papers, signing forms, and doing general server updates is not what most people think of when they think of a president of a company. It seems that most people my age lose sight of this and just think it's all about hanging with friends and driving fancy cars. The minor things are not the most fun things to do, but they do provide a reality check and remind you that there is still business to conduct.

Q. What did you not foresee when you started up your business?

A. I have always thought that there is nothing (within reason) that I can't do. I have tried to live by something an old football coach taught me: "Set your goals 100 times higher than what you can actually achieve, so that if you miss you'll still have done a great job!" (Thanks, Mr. Coleman!) What I didn't expect, however, was to grow so rapidly. On our grand opening we were thrilled when we had 200 visitors; by the end of the month we had over 100,000; and by the fourth month we averaged over 1,000,000 page views per month.

Because of this we ran into an issue we weren't expecting — how were we going to run enough features to keep all of these visitors interested? We weren't prepared to do a feature every day, but felt the need to now that we were being seen as more of a "big league" game site instead of an amateur one. Let's just say that it's a good thing I saved most of my money from the previous job I had. I dug deep into my pockets and said to my mom, “This is a win-win situation, the company will either take off and I'll make all my money back, or I'll lose it all, but gain the experience that couldn't be taught for 100 times the amount I have spent."

Q. Can you describe how your business works (without giving away the company secrets)?

A. A few companies send us games to review, and we go out and purchase other games. We then send those off to our reviewers (who are based all over the United States) who write up the reviews that we post on the site. Soon we will be posting tons of articles and also be covering general gaming news throughout the industry on a daily basis. But these will have to wait till we release our new format and layout. Everything else is classified, being stored in a shoebox under my desk.

Q. What did your friends/parents say when you said you were starting your own Web business?

A. Actually I received lots of mixed reactions. My family was all for it while some of my friends had their doubts. However there were a few friends who kept the faith and I provided those ones with jobs ;).

Q. What about your business would people be surprised to discover?

A. Well, I'm sure that most of the people reading this know how old I am, but everyone I have done business with is very surprised to find out I'm 18. The average age most people think that I am is about 35. Needless to say, I take this as a compliment.

Besides, people might be surprised to know that I was able to start the entire business for under $50 and run it for four months without spending more than $300 total. … All of which I earned while working at Fred Meyer (a grocery store) as a stocking clerk just trying to think of a way out.

Q. Since you run a Website on video gaming, what is your favorite game and why?

A. Surprisingly, this is one of the toughest questions for me to answer. My roots are on the old Atari, playing the cat and mouse maze game (if anyone can remember it's name please email me!!!), but there are a few games today that make me very glad to be in the industry. What you would find me playing now is Black & White and Counter-Strike. Besides these, there are two other games that make my favorites list, Starcraft and a game that took over my life for months on end — Quake II (which during an online tournament I took 3rd in the world). See ... I told you it was a tough question for me to answer.