Women in Esports: Diversity is the Key to Achieving Sustainability and Success

Welcome to the Women in Esports podcast series that champions women in the esports industry who want to lead the charge and foster lasting change. In season two of this ongoing podcast series, we’ve opted for a more intimate conversational format to tackle the topic of Women in Esports from a variety of viewpoints and multiple angles. Listen up to level up!

Hosted by Kat De Shields-Moon, episode one dives into statistics versus reality with Marcus Howard, CEO of MetArena, and the President of Tampa Association of Gaming, a non-profit dedicated to growing the gaming industry and STEAM youth programs in the Tampa Bay region.

Special thanks to PNC Bank for their valued support in making the Women in Esports series possible. Together, with teamwork, we will overcome the challenges facing women in gaming.

Join the conversation. Be a part of the solution.

Watch the complete episode below or read on for the full episode transcript of this Women in eSports episode: Where is the diversity in gaming?

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Kat De Shields-Moon: Women make up nearly 50% of all gamers, yet only a small percentage of women play esports professionally. It’s time we figure out how to change that. The Knights want to empower women to build their esports empire along with our partner PNC Bank. We are adamant about creating a more equitable future for gamers. There is no one size fits all solution, so we'll be tackling the issue from all angles, featuring insights from a variety of subject matter experts and professionals. I'm Kat De Shields-Moon with the Knights. Welcome to the Women in eSports Podcast. Hello everyone, and welcome to the first episode of the Women in eSports podcast series powered by PNC. Over the next couple of weeks, we will be talking to some of the best and brightest minds working in and outside of the esports industry to understand better why women aren't more prevalent in esports. And the work we can all do to create a more inclusive ecosystem. For this very first episode. I am honored to be talking to you drumroll, please. I'll spare your eardrums. Marcus Howard, welcome to the show, Marcus.

Marcus Howard: I hit the table because it's too close to the microphone. I just want to pantomime some drum roll. Thank you. This is awesome. I appreciate it.

Kat De Shields-Moon: Absolutely. So for those that don't know, if you're on LinkedIn and you follow eSports, you've probably run into one of Marcus's posts. He is a true visionary, dare I say futurist when it comes to the esports scene, and is currently the CEO of MetArena and esports activist and a member of the 2020 inaugural Game Awards future class, which is pretty dope. So I'm sure you get asked this question a lot, but it's one of my favorites. How did you get started in gaming and esports?

Marcus Howard: Great question. And I'm sure you'll see this coming. But Super Mario Brothers three. Actually, the quick story is this, I used to have my own personal copy in my entrepreneurship journey over the last eight years, I guess two or three years ago, unfortunately, I lost my personal copy of Super Mario Brothers at a pitch event. And my brother and sister were pissed. Actually, I don't my sister might not know yet. So shoot, we definitely test. But yes, oh god that was when I was six. And that inspired me to learn more about technology and learn more about coding in ninth grade started coding, my first app has a TI on the TI 83 Plus as a video game, because you could put games on those things, graduated from college in 22,008. And my brother and I started our own tech consulting firm, but we still love playing video games. So we said, hey, now that we know how to code, let’s try this game design in gaming game development. And again, and so we started building a puzzle game with some RPG mechanics. And at that point, we recognize that game discovery has been broken for decades. So we built a multimedia search engine to solve that problem. And in 2015, we started doing live events, because we recognize that 70% of our audience was international, we didn't have a strong local presence. So we started introducing kids and their parents and teachers in the ecosystem to family-friendly games that are also cool, right? Because Rocket League is cool. Minecraft is cool, bro holla. Those are all technically indie games. So that's what we were building in our showcase. And I got invited to speak at Dream Hack 2017. And that's when I saw eSports in person for the first time. And I knew immediately like this is what we needed to be the next two years eSports made up 75% of our revenue. So we shut down the search engine and now we’re here with MetArena, connecting brands of all sizes, to video games so they can authentically individually engage their entire community. I know that was a mouthful, but that's what’s mattering in a nutshell.

Kat De Shields-Moon: No, that's wonderful insight. You know, and the work you're doing in Arena is incredible. But the work that you're doing to grow the esports scene in Tampa is also incredible. Can you tell us a little bit more about what you're doing there? Sure.

Marcus Howard: I'm the president of the Tampa Association of Gaming, and it's a nonprofit consortium, if you will, of gaming and esports companies designed to grow both the gaming and esports industry here in the Tampa Bay region, which is about 12 counties but also to champion steam youth programs. Because as I'm sure you know, there are over 100 Steam career opportunities in gaming and eSports. It's not just playing for prizes or for consecration, though those are great. So we just want to open up the door and windows of opportunities to youth around the region.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's amazing. Well, thank you again for lending your time and talents, and perspectives to the show. Super excited to have you here. I would like to take a hot second. Just want to address the elephant in the room. Why the heck do we have a man on a woman in esports-focused podcast so see, the thing is, is that we can't put the onus slowly on women to fix a problem that they didn't create. So, though there is definitely a place for women to share their perspectives and experiences and those voices will definitely be on the show. It's also vitally important to be inclusive and acknowledge and address the many things that contribute to the overall lack of representation in this space. So, now that we got out of the way, let's dive into our topic for the day. Democratizing eSports. Diversity is the key to esports sustainability. So, Marcus, I want to ask what drives you to be an advocate in this industry.

Marcus Howard: Simply put, I want the esports industry to be as diverse inclusive, as successful as the gaming industry, the gaming industry is over $175 billion industry with over three billion gamers worldwide. But if you look at esports, it's only half a percent of that just under a billion dollars, industry, there are maybe 1,000 or so professional players, and it just quite candidly is filled with white and Asian males, when, who are 16 to 24. It just doesn't represent the global gaming industry, population, and opportunity. So I just want to make the esports industry more like the gaming industry and less like the sports industry.

Kat De Shields-Moon: Exactly. Now, that's a great point. And you know, just to bring up another interesting data point that I've run across them, one of your LinkedIn posts is that 57% of gamers between the ages of six to 29 will be people of color, yet representation in the game development in esports spaces woefully underwhelming. So there's a whopping 2% of Africa n Americans actively working in gaming and esports. And statistics released that 59% of us gamers are male and 41% are female. So it certainly begs the question. With such a diverse landscape, why don't we see more representation? And that brings us to the next point, you are a minority in this space? You know, so I would like to spend some time talking about how, how do you feel about the struggles of the minority groups that are in gaming and esports? Even though each challenge, that set of challenges faced are different? Are there themes or common struggles that all underrepresented groups faced in the esports industry?

Marcus Howard: I think there are some common themes. I think the biggest one, the most significant one is a lack of representation in front of the camera because so much happens behind the scenes, but in front of the cameras, what ends up on YouTube and Twitch and in Esports Observer, you know, various media outlets when you don't see that representation. As a gamer. I think naturally, you'll believe that that space just isn't a space for you to have a career. And, and I think it’s important for us to address that piece first. But it's also about creating equitable access from an infrastructure and support perspective. You know, minority communities typically game on mobile and console devices. And I pick on Call of Duty all the time because they're the ones who are most prominent at this. Their game is on multiple platforms. And I just spoke to someone in Singapore yesterday. In Asia, they have significant support for mobile college esports. But as you know, here in the US, there's practically none, no support for mobile college in esports. And I think when you don't have those infrastructures, you don't create opportunities for everyone to have a seat at the table.

Kat De Shields-Moon: No, that's That's exactly right. I couldn't agree more. So just you said your first major encounter with eSports was attending dream speaking at Dream PAC 2017. So how do you feel about where eSports was then versus where it is now, from a diversity perspective.

Marcus Howard: Excluding the last 18 months, I think it's the same. I'm still seeing the same demographics in front of and behind the camera, the same demographics, leading organizations, the same demographics on the news media outlets. Again, you know, seeing Queens collective and glad to see that group growing and flourishing. And obviously, there's community and HBCU heroes and these different organizations sprouting up again in the last 18 months, but those are pockets. Those are almost exceptions to the rule, and it needs to become not the exception, the standard.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's a great point. And sticking with that tangent just for a second. Do you feel that some of the advocacy groups are too siloed in addressing the problem like do we need there was an article I think, in the gamer a couple of weeks ago talking about how there needs to be more to be in might be saying this one intersection between the different advocacy groups to collectively make it more diverse. What do you think about that?

Marcus Howard: I think that would help that would bring more support. That's the reason that we created the Tampa Association of Gaming, you know, I wasn't able to get the support from the Tampa Bay community with just mattering a high point gamer wasn't able to just that one company, a handful of us were trying to get the support, and we couldn't. But as a collective group, we now have our collective voice, our collective communities, our collective resources we can bring to the table to drive change and scale change. So I think it would be helpful if we could get diverse groups, you know, women advocacy groups, and why, obviously, advocacy groups and Latin X advocacy groups all come together to help create, again, that esports ecosystem that more closely resembles the gaming industry, but I am opposed to the siloed organizations because I feel like that's a self-perpetuating cycle where the group may be growing. But if you’re only growing in that kind of silo, you're not really getting exposure to the larger ecosystem and affecting the larger ecosystem.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's a great observation. Thank you for that. So putting your futurist cap on, in a slightly doomsday scenario, maybe if esports doesn't become more diverse and inclusive, what do you think is going to happen to its growth trajectory in the United States?

Marcus Howard: I think we'll see the esports ecosystem Correct. I won’t say crash, I’ve used the term bubble crash frequently. And I get a lot of flack for it. So I'll use the term correctly. Because it's a well-guarded secret for the ecosystem that esports is actually not profitable. And people will say, Oh, you just have to give it yours. And look at what baseball and basketball and football did. But the reality is, is that the people who are invested in are leading the esports ecosystem now came from those traditional sports. And they brought over those that growth and those experiences into esports. That's why you have teams, that's why you have managers and jerseys and all the broadcast rights, all that stuff that makes esports alive now comes from traditional sports. But the revenue obviously, isn't there. And the reason that it's not there is because esports is exclusive. And if it's not inclusive, you're not going to get the viewership, you're not going to get the merchandising spin the spin in general, you just won't have the financial and attention engagement that you need for the space to be sustainable long term.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's, that's, that's good. Okay. So taking a step back talking about some of the work that you did with ProjectMQ, prior to starting with MetArena, we both know that esports would not exist without going. Right. So in your experience in the game development pool, and in the esports side of things, what steps can game developers take to create a more inclusive space, particularly those game developers with titles that are deemed esports? Ready?

Marcus Howard: I think it's helpful to bring in people from outside your lived experience and have them be your experts. So as an example, hypothetically, you spoke on an event a couple of weeks ago with me and Jessica Madeiros, just having people come in and speak from the perspective of a woman or from the black community, instead of trying to assume you understand what that community resonates with and what they need. I think doing that, and yes, that's, that's paying an outside consultant. But the reality is, you don't have that expertise inside your team. Otherwise, you wouldn’t need a consultant.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's a good point. It's an excellent point. And you're doing a lot of interesting work. It's as an indie game fan. It's definitely something that resonates deeply with me about the role indie games will play in advancing the esports scene. Can you tell us a little bit more about your perspective and your thoughts on that?

Marcus Howard: Certainly. And I wrote about this on the eSports bars blog eSports bar as a major event group that produced an event in France and in South Korea, and here in Miami, at least not last year, but they were doing several years before then, that I believe eSports or any games are the future of eSports. And the reason for that initially is because of just the numbers, indie games make up 75% of the supply of all games in the gaming industry. 1.3 million games in the industry. So naturally, there are more games from indie game developers that have esports potential than those who triple A publishers. But then when you dig deeper into That, in my experience, indie games typically are more niche-focused. And by extension more family-friendly, some of them are not right. There are a lot of nonfamily from the indie games, but there are a lot there are, you know, again, Minecraft started indie Rocket League started indie bra haula started in the League of Legends technically started MD, right, it was just the two founders and their team before Ten cent came in. And now they're a multi-billion-dollar company. But I think that you can get more family-friendly games out of those teams. And what they need is the visibility, the brand partnership, the ancillary revenue that comes from esports. But they also were more in tune with their communities, they depend on the community for the game to be successful. Whereas you might not be able to say the same thing about like Madden Madden knows, you know, just like the sun's gonna come tomorrow, they released the next Madden 2022, they can guarantee your percentage of gamers are automatically gonna buy that game. You can't say that about the average indie game developer, the indie game developer has earned the trust and support of their community.

Kat De Shields-Moon: Excellent observations. So do you feel in the same way that indie games could be the future of esports, that they also play a big role in democratizing esports? By extension?

Marcus Howard: I do agree with that. Because, again, you look at the wide variety of different types of games that you get out of indie. And that's the philosophy behind veteran is that we believe you can go to a school and say, here are some racing games and some fishing games and some polo games, and some painting games, but not necessarily Call of Duty or Halo or even Rocket League. If you cast a wide net, you can then engage a larger percentage of the gamers in your community. And that helps democratize access to esports.

Kat De Shields-Moon: Excellent, thank you. So an interesting thought came up in conversation as I was rolling through social media, and it was that maybe game developers providing incentives for Esports organizations that are trying to be more diverse, maybe a way to propel representation in the industry? What would that look like? Would that work? Would it not work? What would it take, you know, for something like that to happen?

Marcus Howard: You can say the word incentive, you could also easily say the word mandate, you know, it's the publishers who control the space. So if they say, you know, if you don't have, and I hate to use kind of quotas, because that creates a whole issue of list of other issues. But if you have a publisher, say, you know, we're going to, we would like to see, our top teams have, I don't know, 40% of their team, rosters have women in them for being made up of women, then the teams have to comply because the only way that they continue playing the game is that they maintain their integrity, their business relationship with the game publishers, you know, you can do something else where you have specific sponsored prizes, maybe that's less draconian, but have, you know, a million-dollar women's tournament for valor, and you started again, you know, Queens Gaming Collective is starting to do things like that. But I agree with you, yes, you could put together some financial incentives aligned with what the esports teams need, which is money. Right. And they will probably comply with whatever the friendly request is.

Kat De Shields-Moon: Friendly requests. And that was it, speak softly and carry a big stick kind of approach? All right. So flipping the conversation, what would you like to see more of from esports organizations to promote diversity and inclusion?

Marcus Howard: I'd love to see more grassroots initiatives. No, I think that's what recreational traditional recreational sports goes very well as it taps into the local community. So you know, quite candidly, I don't know any of the names of any of the players across the top 10 teams, their Esports. My colleagues, contemporaries, who do very well, I just didn't come traditionally from that space. So and I also don't follow traditional sports. So it's just not that interesting to me. But I do know that my next-door neighbor would spend all of his time supporting his nieces and nephews that they were playing esports. So I think there's a greater opportunity to have that grassroots focus and then tap into the relationships and the loyalty and the community of a local, you know, market.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's a great observation. So by grassroots does high school and collegiate esports kind of fold into that, or are they two very different things?

Marcus Howard: I think that high school and collegiate can be grassroots I also, this is not a popular opinion, I think that those ecosystems are even more exclusive than traditional sports. Because it's always the top gamers that can have those coveted positions, Rocket League as an example, you've got three players, and maybe an alternate, you compare that to basketball is 15 to 30 people on the team football 50. Plus, there's just not enough space for the entire student body to be actively participating there at best spectators or depending on the game completely disengage.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That drew right, I didn't think about it that way, from sticking with the high school in the collegiate thread for a second, what needs to be done in that space with so many esports teams, you have nascent naces doing a lot of different things you have high school esports league you have play versus you have, there's a whole bunch of organizations that serve the high school and college population. And though, what do high schools and colleges need to consider to forward diversity and inclusion for the next generation of esports professionals?

Marcus Howard: This is gonna sound counterintuitive, I think you still need not need I think there's the value of being part of the native or native, but I think schools should own their own ecosystem, the accountability and responsibility for growing an ecosystem because you can't expect nacer native to understand, again, like who makes up your the percentages and the demographics of your student body, your 400 students or 1600 students, if it's a high school, or 10s of 1000s if it's a college, but as a university, you can do that you interact with these students for high school, you interact with the students on a day to day basis. And I think at scale, if someone takes that approach, eventually it might cannibalize like a nice or nice, because, again, you can be more effective at a local level that global organization can and more nimble, I think the same thing can be said about Esports teams, I was talking to my eSports Director Sebastian about this yesterday, I think, at scale, if you know brands pay to sponsor a team anywhere from a six-figure to a low seven-figure number, imagine if they just repurpose $1 those dollars to just sponsoring their own team. In that way, they can get they already have a community they can engage. And they can leverage smaller influencers who may still be great players, but just don't have the popularity to get access to the community and the reach and engagement they want. And so then I think it kind of shifts the relationship between brands and teams.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's an interesting point. I love ownership. That is so important. And it seems like it's it's easy, especially when we're talking about diversity and inclusion in eSports. To look for this massive pill that will solve the entire problem, instead of looking at what you can do in your own community, your own organization, your own school, etc. To take ownership of the community or the people that are better right there. I absolutely love that. That's that's phenomenal.

Marcus Howard: Think that token it provides career development duties, right, you may be able to have a student be a leader, this you can, I think you can realistically expect parents or teachers to be as intuitive the spaces is current games, especially younger gamers. But that doesn't mean you can't have one of those gamers, students volunteer to be like the liaison to the subject matter expert or the consultant if you will, to help the organization as a school building strategy.

Kat De Shields-Moon: No, that's excellent. And you brought in parents, you know, that's a massive part, you know, in addressing representation. So what, what as can current esports professionals, rising professionals, people in the space or close to it do as ambassadors to reach the parents that are raising the kids that may feel the future?

Marcus Howard: USF here in Tampa Bay is doing a great job of that with a new initiative. And maybe it's early to call it a great job but they've made significant inroads in that direction. They're hosting two camps this summer esports camps one is for students. And another one is for parents to help parents understand the lingo of gaming like GG is a “good game,” right? Like helping them understand the terminology and the components and that way that parents can speak more intelligently about bout Esports to theirs, their kids, the students. So I think that's a great way it all comes ultimately down to me to education, which is a core philosophy for mentoring. We want to educate the entire community. And then that way we can all work together because we all have a shared understanding of the ecosystem on how to achieve any one group's goals, whether it's parents goals for their students, or their kids, teachers goals for the students, or even the kids’ gamers goals for their parents and their teachers. I wish my teacher didn't delete the game off my calculator. But I also didn't spend time there on what was important for you to learn. I did I was cheating, even though it was learning to code while I was doing that. So empowering students help them empower teachers and empowering kids, helps them empower parents.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That's awesome. No, I that should be tweeted quoted, put on shirts like that. That's amazing. Because you know, the kids they are they play, they are their own ambassadors, you know, and if they're not equipped with the language, like you said, to say why this is important, then they're not going to be able to be that sparkle of influence in their own home. So that is, that is awesome. So before we head into our next segment of the show, I would like to open up the floor for anything that you would like to talk about. In regards to the democratization of eSports.

Marcus Howard: One of the things I'm really excited about speaking about against Singapore is we're actually the young lady who's over in Singapore is going to be relocating here to Tampa Bay. And I invited her to be a part of the leadership team for the Tampa Association of Gaming. Now, about three or four months ago, I partnered with junior achievement. So it's tagged, it's one of the largest nonprofits in the country that helps provide like entrepreneurship and financial literacy, general education support to underrepresented communities youth. And they asked me to produce a video for TAG to just showcase the ecosystems of the students. And in the middle of that video, and I'll send the clip to you, I had to acknowledge the fact that I didn't have any women representative speakers in that video. And it's hypocritical of me to be an advocate for the space, you know, nationally and globally, ecosystem-wide and not have that representation here locally. And it's not because I don't want women on the leadership team. I do want women on the leadership team, but my network doesn't natively have here in Tampa Bay don’t natively have women that I have in my network, my community, who I recognize as leaders in the space. So I personally, had to apologize and behave to make a concerted effort to go identify those leaders, because I'm sure they exist, there's not in my immediate view. So I think each leader needs to do that for their own organization.

Kat De Shields-Moon: No, that's powerful. And I mean, kudos to you for even acknowledging that, because some people will just let it we’re not gonna say anything. But yes, absolutely. So you're incredibly well connected on LinkedIn. Like, I'm always seeing you promoting somebody making introductions, you know, talking about the latest news, providing insight and opinions. How do you use How can one in your position, you know, an esports, leader or professional, use NET, LinkedIn to expand their network, you reach those people that they might not, you know, normally they come to rub elbows with, what’s some of the best practices and tips that you have for them.

Marcus Howard: One of the things I recommend is a post content regularly. So I was actually looking at this analytics platform, it said last year, I posted on average, 1.4 times a day. So at least once a day, sometimes more than once. Posting rarely helps because LinkedIn wants people to stay on its platform. So if you're creating engaging content, it's going to continue to share your content with your network. And then when people like to engage in my content, I actually actively go out and connect with them. My philosophy is if they will engage with one piece of my content, there's a greater than zero chance they'll engage with something else in the future. And I've been right. So I think that that that approach can work for anyone. If you're if you find someone who engages your content, if it's eSports, if it's indie games, if it's diversity inclusion, if it's blockchain or crypto, and those are all the areas I work in STEAM education, but whatever yo ur industry is, just post content about the things that you're passionate about. And if people are resonating with it, invite them to be a part of your direct community so that they will see it and then once they engage with it. Now, you're third connection or second degree of separation, that person's connection now sees your content and they may engage.

And so if you continue to do that, Let them engage you to connect with them, you try to add value to them, I do that as well offer, how can I help? Then you're constantly investing into your ecosystem into your community. And you would improve the value of your community by investing in the people within it.

Kat De Shields-Moon: No, that's great. And that's golden advice. So everybody out there listening, definitely take that into consideration and how, how many new perspectives or takes Have you received just by engage going after the people who are engaging with your content?

Marcus Howard: Frankly, I don't see as many as I should, because you know, I'm wearing so many hats that I don't spend. And that was telling my eSports Director, he and I are going to try to do this more actively spend more time engaging with other people's content, not less time necessarily posting content, maybe instead of posting 1.4 times a day, I can reduce it to once a day and spend that point four percentage time engaging with other people's content. Because then not only am I learning more from their perspectives, but I'm adding value to their content and building those relationships. So I think that's a good way to do that is just to engage with other people and even people who have differing opinions. No, I think that my opinion is not very popular in this space. And most of what I see is kind of mainstream, thought leadership, about eSports. at the airports wasn't appropriate there. But I thought leadership about eSports. But even though the difference in my opinion doesn't make it any less valuable, and it helps me inform my perspective, and really helped me understand the gaps and the opportunities.

Kat De Shields-Moon: That sage advice right there. I love it. You know, Marcus, I'd like to thank you so so much for your time and your time today. It's been a true pleasure speaking with you learning from you. And I hope that everybody that's watching has gotten more than a couple of gems using a reference from your eat for life podcast that you're on. Definitely go check that out if you haven't seen it already. Every Sunday. Sorry, plugging stuff before I'm supposed to. But yes, go check it out. Get some gems, if you're enticed by what you learned here. But yes, thank you again, so much for coming on the show. We really appreciate it.

Marcus Howard: Thank you. If I can make a shameless plug. This has nothing to do with me. But Knockout City is launching on Friday in two days. And you talk about diversity and inclusion and making it accessible. That game I think fundamentally represents the shift from what my eSports Director Sebastian refers to as eSports 1.0, where we are now to eSports 2.0, where not only is it accessible by device, so you can play it on Nintendo Switch and Xbox and PlayStation in steam. But because Xbox is Game Pass, it's now accessible through mobile devices, iOS, and Android, using a Bluetooth controller. Now, regardless of the device you have, anyone can play. The other thing they did was they were intentional about having diverse representation. So if you look at the cover image, there's a person of color and there's, there's a woman and they make sure that you can see yourself and represent yourself in the way you design your character so that your culture can be part of your character as opposed to saying everyone plays a white male. And you know, nothing against white males. But that's not the entire gaming ecosystem is certainly doesn't represent the entire world population.

Kat De Shields-Moon: No, that's valid, that's valid and fair as a knockout city. Go check it out. It's really cool. I've enjoyed what I've seen about it. I do have one last question. There's always that one that sneaks in what is your greatest hope for the future of gaming and eSports in the United States.

Marcus Howard: My first hope is again that esports becomes more like the gaming industry to diverse gaming industry from a represents the health or the wealth of diversity in the player base. And obviously, the game creation piece needs some work. But that the player base of esports represents the player base in gaming, and that gaming can be used to create wealth generation and career opportunities for under specifically underrepresented communities because that's where the greatest need is, I think that it should be an opportunity for anyone regardless of their age, race, gender, geography, but the greatest need is in underrepresented communities. And that's again one of the goals and missions and visions of Metro.

Kat De Shields-Moon: You heard it MetArena’s doing it Marx is doing it. Let's all band together and make it fun. If you want to follow Marcus to learn more about his work can check out the social handles below. I promise you though, I promise. I promise if you read his LinkedIn posts, it will elevate your perspective on the industry. I'm always like, dang, man. Wow. So definitely give him a follow on LinkedIn if you’re on there. And for all of you who have tuned in for the show, thanks so much for joining us for the women eSports podcast series powered by PNC Bank, be sure to follow us on social media and tune in next month for the next episode of the series we will have Jenna Trenton with Loyola College and she will be breaking down academic research that she and her team have conducted about gamer girls and what the seeds of the underrepresentation of women in eSports where that stems from and what we can do to cut this problem off as a group. So be well be great and game on and we will see you next time. See you later.

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