League of Legends Growth Explosion

An individual is expected to live 700,000 hours (80 years). I estimate a person has ~300,000 productive hours in their lifetime (take out sleep, infant, and elderly years).

Given the great accomplishments of individuals with far less than a million productive hours, what could be accomplished with 1.3 billion man hours (> 3000 lifetimes of productive work)?

Almost incomprehensible, individuals collectively spend 1.3 billion hours each month playing League of Legends, an online, multiplayer video game.

Assuming phenomenal organization, League of Legends players in 2 months could construct:

• Panama Canal – 1.9 billion hours
• Transcontinental Railroad – 0.5 billion hours
• Hoover Dam – 0.2 billion hours

Surprisingly I was unable find a comprehensive timeline plotting the growth of League of Legends. I was, however, able to piece together information from multiple sources.

• I admit my blog is an odd place to find a League of Legend’s timeline, but as you may notice from browsing other posts, I have many interests :)

League of Legends Growth Explosion

Data Links -

October 2009 – League of Legends Officially Launched in North America and Europe

July 2011 – Riot Games Press Release

October 2011 – Riot Games Infographic

October 2012 – Riot Games Infographic

January 2014 – Wall Street Journal

Growth Graphs -

My LoL Timeline and History

Why I decided and continue to play League of Legends (LoL) –

• Friends
• Video games are an accessible medium to spend time with friends across the world. As I value developing these friendships, I decided to transition from Starcraft 2, largely single player game few of my friends play, to LoL, a multiplayer game many of my friends play.
• Fun
• While a grind in the beginning, I have more fun playing LoL today than at any other time.
• Competition and Multiplayer
• There is something in me desiring competition and measuring myself against the pool of other players. Single player games do not provide the level of competition or accurate feedback required to fulfill my desire.
• I find team games also provide greater rewards, albeit greater frustration at times.
• Popular
• As terrible as it is to be a bandwagon player, I prefer mainstream games. As stated in my inaugural blog post, I have a difficult time engaging in conversation with people, popular video games have a greater potential to build conversational bridges.

Why others play LoL –

• Free :)
• Low performance PC/Mac platform. Does not require an additional $400 video game console purchase or a super computer to run. My 6 year old laptop runs the game.
• Heavily rewards time invested
• It is difficult for a naturally skilled player to understand all the champions and game dynamics. Thus less skilled players can gain a knowledge advantage allowing them to compete with higher skilled, less knowledgeable players.
• Random events
• Random events keep players interested for longer as there are always opportunities to learn and improve.
• Team Play
• Life is better together. (picture)
• So happy together?
• Variety of play styles
• Allows for everyone to find a niche. Myself for instance, I avoid squishy champions and gravitate towards more forgiving top, mid, and support roles.

What I don’t like about LoL –

• Promiscuous images
• I do not support the objectification of women. I am all about freedom, but as Lord Acton stated, “Freedom is not the permission to do what we like, rather, it is the power to do what we ought."
• Games can take too long with no means of breaking them up
• Sometimes it would be nice to leave the game without ruining it for 9 other people, answer the phone, or take a 1-2 minute break. Not possible with LoL.
• Large Learning Curve (double edged sword)
• A large learning curve also keeps players interested, however, finding a combination of simple to pick up, yet difficult to master is a fine line.

Season 4 SMART Goals –

• Ascend to Silver V or above
• Purchase a 3rd Rune Page with hybrid penetration or attack speed runes
• 50%+ win rate on 5 champions
• 2 mid, 2 top, 1 support
• Own 22+ champions
• Need additional support champion

While I do enjoy playing League of Legends, I do find video games can be an unproductive and foolish way to spend time and energy. It amazes me how much time (1.3+ billion hours per month) is invested into a single video game (LoL). 

The average user invests ~8 hours per week playing LoL. I am surprised it is this low. In fact, according to Business Insider, the average American spends ~3 hours playing video games per week, which is surprisingly similar to the amount of time spent reading, exercising, relaxing, and socializing (3 hours for each of the afore mentioned activities). In fact, the only outlier is time spent watching television: ~19 hours per week.

I encourage all to consciously decide how to best invest their time, talents, and treasures. I have determined during my current season of life I am willing to allocate ~5 hours per week playing video games for the reasons cited above. This will look differently for all individuals. I am not here to judge values or how people spend their lives, I simply do not want anyone to be ignorant or foolishly invest their 300,000 productive hours, talents, and resources.

Next Post Topic: Minimum Wage Part I: For and Against

Gardening Part II: Gardening Goals

SMART Goals. Specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time bound. I love setting goals and am a supporter of using the SMART model of goal setting. 2013 is my third year of gardening. I believe I am turning the corner of becoming a successful gardener. I had no goals in 2011, one goal: preventing deer from eating my garden, in 2012, and have established the following as my goals for 2013, 2014, and beyond:

2013 -

• Profitable (even if minuscule)
• Current progress
• Expenditures: $40.96 (excluding rain barrels)
• Does not include time or water
• Revenue: $22.00
• 53.6% of the way to turning a profit as of 7/14/13
• Garden size > 200 ft²
• Of note, median/mean garden size is 96/600 ft²
• Some big gardeners out there
• Learn how to grow plants from seeds
• Build and test rain barrel

Russ' Remarkable Rain Barrels :)

2014 -

• Garden size > 300 ft²
• Return on Investment (ROI): 3:1
• I believe 2014 will be a breakthrough year. I feel I have learned enough to start maximizing production and many of my upfront costs out of the way.
• $1 per square foot ROI

• Cost effective plants via Cheap Vegetable Gardner
• I utilize ~75% of my garden for planting purposes (25% for rows)
• Need ~$1.33 per square foot of growing space
• Thus (for 2014) 300’(0.75) x $1.33 = $300
• Transplant rhubarb/asparagus
• ~10 ft²of rhubarb and 15 ft²of asparagus

Long Term -

• Increase garden size by 100-200 ft² per year
• $1.5 per square foot (total ft²); $2 per planting square foot (excludes rows)
• Greenhouse effect
• Living in northern Minnesota I need to lengthen growing season
• Expensive, will need to do research
• Self sufficient garden with use of composting

Please send me pictures and your own gardening goals (past, current, or future) you may have. I look forward to evaluating if I met my goals in the fall!


Next Post Topic: Fantasy Football: How to Win Your League Without Watching Any Games Part I

Why you need this blog.

Even though I truly believe I will benefit from blogging even if no one reads my posts, I sincerely want the time you spend reading my elementary writing to be worthwhile, intellectual, and entertaining. It is my hope readers will leave my blog with a greater and more respectful understanding (as opposed to wrathful) of the particular perspective I present.

It is my aim to bridge competing perspective’s gaps on ‘hot button’ issues rather than widen the huge schisms already all too present. Most of all though, if you do chose to spend a part of your day reading what I author, I hope you find it enjoyable. Please do not read my blog if you do not find it enjoyable. 


Without further adieu, the 3 reasons you need this blog:

1) We are ignorant and unstable people.

Many of us are fully capable of having a well researched and rational understanding of what our favorite sports team should do: personnel changes, play calling, and diagnosing what is working and what needs to be changed. For those who do not relate to sports, many are able to express very comprehensive thoughts pertaining to what would be best for celebrity relationships. 

We are also able to make very compelling statements as to why various movies, TV series, and written material were successful, or what could have been done differently for those that failed to live up to our expectations. The quote: “everyone is a critic” seems to be true.

However, myself included, we know not the names, nor recognize the faces of our elected officials, let alone know their stance on any given number of issues: how they intend to spend OUR money (yes they are spending the money we give them from taxes), how they propose to enact their social agenda, and even if they are trustworthy.

In summary, you need this blog because we are ignorant of the policies and agendas of our elected officials and unstable when attempting to discuss them with other people.

2) No accountability.

Secondary to our ignorant and unstable nature, we do not understand how to hold those responsible accountable for their actions. Thus we end up with huge corporations getting bailed out with taxpayer money for their irresponsibility. No accountability.

For Example:

• TARP: Troubled Assets Relief Program
• Bank Bailout
• Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac Bailout
• AIG Bailout
• Auto Industry Bailout
• Quantitative Easing 1 and 2 (QE): ~$2 trillion, ouch…

Click here for QE details

QE: The US Federal Reserve held between $700 billion and $800 billion of Treasury notes on its balance sheet before the recession. In late November 2008, the Fed started buying $600 billion in Mortgage-backed securities (MBS).[42] By March 2009, it held $1.75 trillion of bank debt, MBS, and Treasury notes, and reached a peak of $2.1 trillion in June 2010. Further purchases were halted as the economy had started to improve, but resumed in August 2010 when the Fed decided the economy was not growing robustly. After the halt in June holdings started falling naturally as debt matured and were projected to fall to $1.7 trillion by 2012. The Fed's revised goal became to keep holdings at the $2.054 trillion level. To maintain that level, the Fed bought $30 billion in 2–10 year Treasury notes a month. In November 2010, the Fed announced a second round of quantitative easing, or "QE2", buying $600 billion of Treasury securities by the end of the second quarter of 2011.[43][44]

42. Conerly, Bill (13 September 2012). "QE3 and the Economy: It Will Help, But Not Solve All Problems". Forbes. Retrieved 13 September 2012.
43. Inman, Phillip (14 July 2011). "Moody's sounds note of caution while Bernanke promises support for U.S. economy". The Guardian (London). Retrieved 19 July 2011.
44. Zumbrun, Joshua (13 September 2012). "Fed Undertakes QE3 With $40 Billion MBS Purchases Per Month". Bloomberg News. Retrieved 13 September 2012.

Good Wall Street Bailout Article: Econmatters

I have been unable to locate exact dollar amounts. However, this only supports the point there is a lack of accountability. When taxpayers can no longer see where the government is spending their money, there is no potential for accountability.

You need this blog in order to learn how to demand those individuals in powerful positions be held accountable and be subject to the consequences of their actions or lack of action.


3) We are prideful people.

Please excuse my lack of clarity on this reason. You also need this blog because we need to learn how to agree to disagree. It is not my goal to convert my readers to my beliefs, but rather facilitate an environment where discussion about difficult, controversial issues – money, politics, religion, ect, are discussed respectfully, passionately, and intellectually.

Thus, we need constant training and refinement in not only being educated on controversial subjects, but also in discussing these subjects with those who may not hold the same viewpoint in a civilized and respectful manner.

In conclusion, you need this blog only if you will first and foremost enjoy reading it, followed by:

1. A need to no longer remain ignorant in our knowledge and understanding of political/social policies and agendas.
2. Learning to hold those responsible accountable for their decisions or indecision.
3. We are prideful people (myself included) who have a near impossible time discussing controversial issues in an intellectual, respectful, and civilized manner.

Next week’s topic: Fantasy Football Part 1: Draft Day Planning

Why I need this blog.

I must confess my introductory post is the one I find most difficult to write. I have never been a writer, and I have little confidence in my ability to quickly capture my audience. Thus the best I can give you are my feelings of inadequacy in writing a structurally impressive piece of creative writing. I believe I am a much stronger writer of say... biology lab reports :)

While brainstorming on how to introduce my blog, 

I decided I wanted to primarily write about current issues our country and world is facing. Due to the political nature of my blog I decided upon the name: 

“The Republic of Russ”

In brief I am 26 year old pharmacist living in Bemidji, Minnesota (As my friend Matt puts it: “So, you live in Canada.”). For a more extensive personal history, please my biography.

A few of the reasons I decided to start blogging:

• Writing helps me organize my thoughts and aids me in my everyday conversations.
• I continually encourage my wonderful wife, Renae (pictured below), she should blog more (here is her wonderful blog: Devotedly Red), therefore I feel a strong urge to avoid hypocrisy.

• Gain a broader understanding of topics
• I fear I may be narrow-minded in my young age and lack of real world experience. Therefore, I hope to acquire competing perspectives on issues.
• PLEASE take the time to comment on my posts, I look forward to reading and learning from the insight of others.
• Please email or comment anonymously if you desire for your identity to remain hidden.

(Insert transition) Often times when I write I understand a certain element of writing, in this case a transition, is needed. However, as I have limited writing experience, such elements can be profoundly challenging and distracting. Thus, when writing, I will just put in parentheses what needs to go there and go back and add it in later. As I find it humorous I do this while write, coupled with the fact I still cannot think of anything to put there, I will just leave this one in its "rough draft" form.

Speaking of challenges, I will end with what I envision will be difficult for me in my blogging adventure.

• Holding your interest when (not if) my thoughts become too intellectual and drawn out.
• If you haven’t noticed by the 409 word introduction, I like to use a lot of words; I will try to trim it down as best I can.
• Being disciplined in writing and publishing posts.
• It is my goal to publish 2 posts a month.
• By the time I publish this post I will have actually have written 8-10 posts.
• Consider me a cheater, or consider me intelligent…
• Achieving an optimal mix of posting current issues and current events in my life.

I apologize for the abrupt ending, however, I originally had written a lengthier introductory post and upon review 1.5 years later :), I decided to break it into two posts. Next week I will detail why you need this blog, followed by my best attempt at summarizing the beliefs/values that shape my identity.