Crowd Power: What Is Crowdfunding? [INFOGRAPHIC] by Monica Appelbe

27 Inspiring Young Online Entrepreneurs

One of the fantastic things about the Internet is that there is no such thing as age discrimination when it comes to being successful online.  It doesn't matter if you're 13 or 83 — you have as much chance as anyone to become rich and famous through your online efforts.  To prove the point, here are 27 young entrepreneurs who are making their dreams a reality through online business.

Juliette Bindak, 20 of MissOandFriends.com — Juliette Bindak founded her company, Miss O and Friends, a site for girls, by girls, at the age of 10.  By the time she was 19, just last year, the company had a value of more than $15 million.  She also published her first book at the age of 16, which has sold over 120,000 copies.  Juliette is a true inspiration to any teen, pre-teen, or adult looking to start an online empire!

Twitter: @MissOandFriends

Pete Cashmore, 24 of Mashable.com – From the Mashable site: "Pete Cashmore is the 24 year-old CEO and founder of Mashable.com, a Technorati Top 10 blog worldwide. He founded Mashable in a small Scottish town in 2005 at age 19. In 2009, Cashmore was chosen as one of Inc Magazine’s 30 Under 30, Forbes’ Top 25 Web Celebs and the Huffington Posts’ Top 10 Game Changers 2009."

Twitter: @petecashmore and @mashable

Michael Dunlop, 21 of IncomeDiary.com — Michael Dunlop started his first profitable website when he was just 16 years old.  Now, at the ripe old age of 21, Michael is truly living what he calls the Internet Lifestyle.  Michael's blog is all about helping others achieve this same dream.  Through interviews with some of the true thought-leaders in online marketing, as well as instructional content, Michael brings great information to anyone looking to become a pro blogger.

Twitter: @michaeldunlop

Adam Horwitz, 18 of AdamHorwitz.tv – 18-year-old Adam Horwitz says on his site that he has a goal to make a million dollars a year by the time he's 21.  All signs point to that becoming a reality.  Adam started out in Internet marketing at the age of 15 and has become an expert in the areas of affiliate marketing and PPC (pay-per-click) advertising.  Now he makes money teaching others to make a living in these areas.  His blog is full of informational videos, tips, and lots of goofy stuff that might not make you a better entrepreneur, but just might make you laugh.

Twitter: @AdamHorwitz

Jonathan Mead, 23 of IlluminatedMind.net – Full-time blogger and life coach Jonathan Mead delivers a steady dose of inspiration and how-to content on his blog, and through his popular e-books, Reclaim Your Dreams, and The Zero Hour Workweek " How I Liberated Myself From the 9 to 5 by Getting Paid to Be Me. At just 23, Jonathan has figured out the "secret formula" for becoming a successful entrepreneur by sharing his story and expertise through blogging.

Twitter: @jonathanmead

Kevin Sproles, 25 of Volusion.com – Kevin Sproles started designing web sites at the age of 16.  After receiving lots of requests for a shopping cart solution, Kevin, with very little money and a great deal of perseverance, started coding shopping cart software.  Now, at the age of 25, his company supplies the most award-winning e-commerce solution to over online 100,000 entrepreneurs as well as major companies.

Twitter: @volusion

Catherine Cook, 20 of myYearbook.com – Since co-founding myYearbook with her brother in 2005, at the age of 15, Catherine Cook and her team have raised over $20 million in capital and have grown the site into one of the largest US social media sites with over 20 million members.  The site makes meeting new people easy by introducing members to innovative social games that are all tied together by a single virtual currency called “Lunch Money.”

Twitter: @myYearbook

Aaron Levie, 24, and Dylan Smith, 24 of Box.net - Aaron Levie originally created Box.net as a college business project with the goal of helping people easily access their information from any location. Box.net was launched from Aaron’s dorm room in 2005 with the help of co-founder, and now CFO, Dylan Smith. Aaron is the visionary behind Box’s product and platform strategy. He has spoken about content and collaboration tools at events such as Accenture Global Summit, South by Southwest, and Svase.  Dylan has been instrumental in Box.net’s growth and development since starting the company with Aaron.

Twitter: @levie & @boxdotnet

Sam Lessin, 26 of Drop.io – After graduating from Harvard, Magna Cum Laude in 2005, Sam Lessin started Drop.io.  Drop.io is a simple, private, real-time, sharing, collaboration, and presentation site where users can upload files of any kind and have the ability to access, share, and edit those files from any Internet-connected computer.  Sam is also the co-founder of SocialGreat.com, a location-based social media site with a growing user-base.

Twitter: @lessin

Gurbaksh Chahal, 27 of gWallet.com – Gurbaksh Chahal has an amazing entrepreneurial story.  After dropping out of high school in San Jose at age 16 to start ClickAgents, a performance-based ad network, he grew the company for two years, at which point it was acquired by ValueClick in a $40 million all-stock deal. His next venture, another ad network called BlueLithium, was acquired in 2007 by Yahoo! for $300 million cash.  Gurbaksh started gWallet, a virtual currency platform for social media, in September of 2009.  In 2008, Gurbaksh published his memoir in a book called The Dream.

Twitter: @gchahal

Nat Turner, 23; Zach Weinberg, 23; and Scott Becker, 23 ofInviteMedia.com – Nat Turner and Zach Weinberg had the idea for Invite Media, a buying platform for online display media, while in college.  They, along with Scott Becker and Michael Provenzano, launched the company in 2007 and have since landed millions in venture capital funding.  Invite Media is the first “universal buying platform” for display media, and their board of directors includes those involved early on in such companies as Real Media, Tacoda, Strategic Data Corporation, and Right Media.

Twitter: @natsturner, @zachweinberg (protected tweets), and @scottbecker

Eric Koger, 25, and Susan Koger, 24 of ModCloth.com – High School sweethearts Eric and Susan Koger founded ModCloth, an online clothing, accessories, and decor retailer in 2002, while they were freshmen in college.  The company has since grown to over 100 employees and more than $15 million in annual sales.  What sets ModCloth apart from other online clothing retailers is their focus on connecting with customers through various social media outlets.

Twitter: @Eric_ModCloth & @SusanGKoger

Ryan Allis, 25 of iContact.com – Ryan Allis is the co-founder and CEO of iContact, a leading provider of email marketing tools for small businesses.  Ryan has built North Carolina-based iContact from its start in 2003 to its current size with more than 175 employees, 50,000 customers, and $28 million in annual sales, while raising $10.8 million to grow the firm.  Ryan is also the author of the book Zero to One Million, which reached the Wall Street Journal Bestseller list in 2008.

Twitter: @ryanallis

Matt Mickiewicz, 25 of SitePoint.com – Originally called Webmaster-Resources.com, Matt Mickiewicz founded what is now known as SitePoint in 1998.  The site has grown to be one of the most visited sites on the Internet with half a million newsletter subscribers.  Matt is also the founder of 99Designs.com, a community-based site where those in need of design expertise can connect with designers of all disciplines to fill their needs.  The site currently has over 180,000 members.  Additionally, Matt is co-founder ofFlippa.com, a site that facilitates the buying and selling of websites.

Twitter: @sitepointmatt

Milun Tesovic, 25 of MetroLyrics.com – Started in 2001, while Milun Tesovic was a Vancouver, BC high school student, MetroLyrics is now the most popular music lyrics site on the Internet.  Metrolyrics gets more than 32 million unique monthly visitors and is the sixth most popular music site on the web.  Milun was named the 2009 National Student Entrepreneur Champion by Advancing Canadian Entrepreneurship (ACE) Canada, and received the Simon Fraser University Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2008.

Twitter: @miluntesovic

Derek Johnson, 25 of Tatango.com – Derek Johnson was bit by the entrepreneur bug early in life, starting his first business of selling candy bars to fellow students at recess by the age of eight. Derek, a self proclaimed workaholic, puts in 100+ hour workweeks to help fulfill the vision of Tatango.com.  Originally launched as networkText.com in 2007, Tatango has since facilitated the sending of tens of millions of text messages to groups of varying sizes, through their simple-to-use group texting platform.

Twitter: @TheDerekJohnson

David Karp, 23 of Tumblr.com – Started by David Karp in 2007, the Tumblr platform now has 4.2 million users and has landed $5.5 million in venture capital.  Tumblr is a free online service that lets you effortlessly share anything.  Users can post text, photos, quotes, links, music, and videos, from their browser, phone, desktop, email, or wherever they happen to be.  To date, Tumblr has facilitated over 500 million posts of all kinds.

Twitter: @davidkarp

Zhang Rui, 30 of Mosh.cn – Zhang Rui is founder of Mosh.cn, one of China’s largest social networking websites, a site that has taken China’s young people by storm in the past few years.  Unlike other social networking sites, one focus of Mosh is to encourage face-to-face meetings among its members.  As the site is in Chinese, not much information could be obtained directly, but as of 2006, the site had 300,000 users and was growing at over 700 users per day.  If the rate remained steady, they should be at well over a million users today.

Twitter: N/A

Kevin Rose, 33 of Digg.com – In the fall of 2004, Kevin Rose withdrew $1000 out of his account and paid a freelance web developer $12 an hour to mock up a webpage, and purchased some server space for $99 a month.  He then paid $1200 for the domain name digg.com, and the project began.  Today Digg has over 40 million users, and Kevin's net worth is estimated at over $60 million.  Rose also co-hosts a weekly podcast Diggnation with Alex Albrecht, where they discuss the top stories from Digg.com.

Twitter: @kevinrose

Jake Nickell, 29 of Threadless.com – With $500 and an idea for what Jake Nickell thought was going to be a side project, he started Threadless.com 10 years ago.   Today, the company has turned into what Jake describes as, "a global t-shirt phenomenon."  The site features t-shirt designs submitted and voted upon by its thousands of members.  Jake also recently invested in Graphic.ly, which provides an immersive social experience and marketplace around digital comics and associated merchandise.

Twitter: @threadless

Andrew Gower, 31 of Runescape.com – As founder of Jagex, Ltd., Andrew Gower wrote the code and developed the concept of Runescape with his brother Paul in 2001.  Today Runescape is the #1 free multiplayer game on the Internet with over 150,000 players online at any given time, and Andrew shares with his brother and estimated net worth of $217 million.

Twitter: @OfficialJagex

Adam Toren & Matthew Toren of YoungEntrepreneur.com – Ok, so this is perhaps a shameless plug, but my brother Matthew and I do have a great young entrepreneur story.  We are proud to say that we truly epitomize the entrepreneurial spirit. In addition to being co-founders of YoungEntrepreneur.com (which launched back in 1999), we have many teaching and research interests including marketing, business development, entrepreneurial emergence, entrepreneurial strategy management, business growth techniques, innovation, and new venture creation. We have bought, sold and still operate several online ventures. We have recently released a book called, Kidpreneurs, and operate the blog site, Blogtrepreneur.com.

Twitter: @thebizguy & @matthewtoren

After reviewing this list of success stories, ask yourself – What can they do that you can't?  Chances are you won't find that they have anything special, beyond a drive to succeed, and the belief that it's possible.  So whatever your age, whether you're younger or older than those above, know that you too can make your dreams of business success a reality, if you'll just go for it and keep at it through whatever may come.

Read More Stories About: Tags: Entrepreneurs, Young Entrepreneur

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Adam Toren

Adam Toren is a serial entrepreneur, mentor, investor and co-founder ofYoungEntrepreneur.com. He is co-author, with his brother Matthew, ofKidpreneurs and Small Business, BIG Vision: Lessons on How to Dominate Your Market from Self-Made Entrepreneurs Who Did it Right (Wiley). He's based in Phoenix, Ariz.

100 Websites To See Before You Die (Part 1)

Shape the Hive

What are humans, really, but so many bees, buzzing away? That’s the question (we think) asked by Shape The Hive, a visual “experiment in digital collaboration.”

In more concrete terms, Shape The Hive is a massive, color-coded hex grid, where anyone can use a sort of virtual kaleidoscope to fill in hexes with distorted images or videos. It’s fun to have a look around, and easy if you’re inclined to participate, so have a look.

Get The Glass 

We’re not the biggest fans of blurring the line between advertisement and gaming, but we’re willing to make exceptions in two instances: 1) When it comes to frosty, delicious milk. 2) When the game in question is a beautifully imagined and well thought-out virtual board game, with graphics that still look amazing three years after the fact.

And what do you know—Get The Glass succeeds on both of those counts! It’s almost like we planned it that way.

The Wilderness Downtown 

The Wilderness Downtown is a collaboration between Arcade Fire, director Chris Milk, and Google that uses the media capabilities of HTML 5 to create an internet music video that’s personalized to the viewer. Even if you’re not a fan of the music, it’s worth checking out as a technology demo for HTML 5 from some of the crack engineers at Google.

False.jp

What we have here is a collection of simple visualizations (most respond only to the movement of your mouse cursor, and the left mouse button) from a Japanese graphic designer. You won’t find any deep content on this page, but we suspect these mesmerizing visualizations will keep you entertained for longer than you’d like to admit.

Pretty Loaded 

Adobe (née Macromedia) Flash technology has allowed for a boom of rich media on the web, but it’s brought its share of problems as well. One such problem is the vile loading period, keeping you from enjoying your web content or video game. Thankfully, some designers realize that it’s important to keep users engaged during this period, and have elevated the preloader progress bar to an art form. PrettyLoaded celebrates these unsung heroes of web development, showcasing the very best of preloaders from around the web.

HubbleSite

Sometimes, you need to be reminded that—no matter how big your personal problems might seem—you’re just an insignificant mote in an unfathomably large universe. Other times, you just want to see kick-ass images from the most righteous piece of optics we’ve ever blasted into the cosmos. In either case, hubblesite.org has you covered.

We Feel Fine 

Say what you will about the touchy-feely sentiment behind WeFeelFine, the site is an interesting technological experiment in extracting data from the far-flung corners of the internet. Just click the big pink heart for a swirling, up-to-the-minute graph of how everybody’s feeling on the internet. Click a particle to read the sentence in question, and click the question to visit the blog it came from.

Line Rider 

For some, Line Rider is a canvas. For others, it’s a way of life. But for most, Line Ride is just a flash game—where you draw out a course for a little sledder guy to ride on.  It’s a kick, and something everyone should try, if for no other reason than to understand the effort it takes to make the kind of Line Rider videos that get passed around on sites like Reddit and Digg.

EyezMaze

EyezMaze may not sound familiar to you, but if you’re a fan of browser games you’ve probably played on of their internet-famous GROW series. If you haven’t, you should check them out right away. The basic conceit is this: You have to place a set number of elements into a scene, in a certain order. The order matters, so you have to follow the clues in the impossibly-charming animations to figure out the optimal order and win the game. We recommend you start with GROW v.3

Anasomnia 

The first thing that’s amazing about Anasomnia: The densely-packed, surreal dreamscape animations that only play when the lights in your room are out (although you can trick it if you cover up your webcam with your hand).

The second thing that’s amazing about Anasomnia: Every dream is different. Through some sort of procedural generation trickery, Anasomnia will be a different show every time you turn your lights out.

BLU 

If you’re in the kind of mood to have your mind blown, allow us to suggest that you visit the website of the street-artist BLU. Street art like graffiti? Sort of, but in motion. Check out the “Video” tab on the BLU website for a collection of four stop-motion street animations that are as insane as they are long. To see the craziest one first, start with “Big Bang Big Boom.”

Mr. Wong’s Soup’Partments 

In another testament to the fact that nobody wastes time as spectacularly as hundreds of people wasting time together, Mr. Wong’s Soup’Parments is a collaborative pixel-art image of a tower—each individual floor drawn and submitted by a different person. The final product is the “tallest virtual tower in the world” and a great way to kill a few minutes. Prepare to wear out that scroll wheel!

Blue Ball Machine 

Another example of community-driven pixel art, the Blue Ball Machine consists of tiled animated gifs representing the Rube Goldberg-esque workings of a giant blue-ball-processing facility. Originally spawned as part of a challenge on the Something Awful forums, the original Blue Ball Machine image became a popular YTMND site, and spawned a number of follow-ups.

The Million Dollar Homepage

The Million Dollar Homepage contains only a single image. That image is a giant, ugly, expensive advertisement. And that giant, ugly advertisement made some college kid in the UK one MILLION dollars.

The idea is simple: Create a 1,000,000 pixel image, and sell those pixels off for a dollar each (in blocks of 100). People are free to use those pixels to link to advertise whatever they want (online casinos and scams mostly, it seems). Every single pixel sold out, and Alex Tew of Wilshire England made a cool milli. How could he make so much off of something so dumb? Because he thought of it first

80 Gigapixel London 

It can be hard to keep up with who’s currently winning the “world’s largest photo” race, but right now the king is this360-degree panorama of London. Clocking in at 80 Gigapixels (that’s 8,000 times the resolution of your average point-n-shoot camera, for reference) this panaroma is detailed enough to read the license plate on a faraway bus.

Waybackmachine 

Another piece of internet history (both itself, and as a tool for exploring internet history) is the Wayback Machine. Simply put, the Wayback Machine will take any URL, and create a gallery of historical versions of that website for you to explore. Check out some of your favorite websites, and marvel at how far we’ve come in just 5 or 10 years.

Cleverbot 

You can’t call yourself a true connoisseur of internet curios until you’ve attempted to have a full-fledged conversation with a chatbot. People have been trying to make convincing Chatbots since the 70s, and even though we’re still far from something that’ll pass the Turing Test, it can be a real kick to try talking to one of these. Like it’s predecessor Jaberwocky, Cleverbot learns more with each conversation it has.

After you’ve fooled around for a while, check out the “cleverness” section for a collection of funny or impressive conversations between Chatbot and other people.

Rules For My Unborn Son 

We don’t have a whole lot of blogs on this list because—by their very nature—they’re not really a single-serving kind of thing. All the same, Rules For My Unborn Son’s been getting regularly updated for long enough that pretty much anyone can get a healthy dose of awesome advice just by spending an hour or two paging through the archives.

Demoscene.tv 

If you’re not familiar with the demoscene, here’s what you need to know: there’s a subset of computer programs, musicians and artists who engage in competitions to fit the most impressive and extravagant visual displays (and sometimes even games) into teeny-tiny chunks of script. We’re talking whole music videos crammed down into 64K or smaller. At Demoscene.tv, you can get a feel for what the demoscene is all about without having to run any strange code on your computer—all the demos are streamed, a la YouTube.

Perry Bible Fellowship

One of the few truly classic webcomics, The Perry Bible Fellowship is a pitch-perfect mixture of whimsical art, extra-dark humor and good, old-fashioned surrealism. The author Nicholas Gurewitch still updates sporadically, but you can absorb the whole archive in one sitting (if you’ve got an afternoon to spare). 

Zombo.com

What is Zombo.com? 

You can do anything at Zombo.com.

You’re The Man Now Dog 

From the “know your internet history” department, every nerdling worth their salt should visit Yourethemannowdog.com at least once. If you’re a newcomer to this whole internet thing, you might find yourself a bit confused.

“What is this?” you might ask. “Is this supposed to be funny?”

Well it is, or it was, and more importantly it spawned a wave of text-on-image imitators that became known as “YTMNDs.” The meme’s seen better days, but you can still find a never-ending stream of new YTMNDs at www.ytmnd.com.

Canabalt 

Sometimes the simplest games are the best. That’s the case with Canabalt, a game that only uses two buttons—and they both do the same thing. Canabalt’s running-and-jumping action might seem shallow at first, but the high speed, satisfying physics and gorgeous pixel art make it hard to stop playing.

Dino Run

Another running/jumping type of game, Dino Run has more features than Canabalt, and also the added melodrama of running from the end of the world itself.

Keep your eyes open to collect all the hidden eggs.

LMGTFY

A truly brilliant web-burn, LMGTFY.com delivers a one-two punch of snark and technological superiority to anyone stupid or unfortunate enough to ask you for help online.

Wait, you want to know what LMGTFY.com is? Well, how about we take care of that for you?

Protip: Combine with a URL shortener like bit.ly for extra effectiveness.

Let’s Play Archive 

Ever wanted know what all the fuss about a game is, but don’t have the time or willpower to actually play it? Head to the Lets Play Archive, where you can check out tons of archived “let’s play” threads from the Something Awful forum—where people post guided walkthroughs of video games, frequently accompanied with hilarious commentary and illustrations.

Desktop Tower Defense

You’re not going to find any shortage of flash games in the Tower Defense genre online, but Desktop Tower Defense is THE classic. It’s a open-field-style tower defense, so you have to create and update a maze of defensive structures to  fight off wave after wave of bad guys. Careful—VERY addictive.

TV Tropes

You might check out TVTropes and think “Hey, this isn’t a single-serving site, this is an amazing resource that I’ll come back to again and again!”

Well it’s not. The diabolic thing about TVTropes is that any actual utility is an illusion—your life will never be enriched because you know what a “Woobie” is, or who the members of a Five Man Band are. It’s an elaborately designed trap, meant to capture all your free time.

Therefore, go once, waste a day, and then never look back. You’ll thank us later.

Globe Genie

If you ask us, the coolest thing about Google Maps is the street view, which allows you to get a like-you’re-really-there 360-degree view of any location that Google’s vans have trawled. It’s an awesome way to get some perspective on places you’ve never been, but it can be hard to choose where you want to “visit.”

Globe Genie takes the work out your Google Maps globetrotting. Just select which continents you’d like in the running, and then click the Teleport button.

For added fun, uncheck the “Current Location” button and try to guess what country you’re in based on just your surroundings.

Autotopsy

Who knew an educational site about auto insurance could be so interesting? In this dramatic simulation, you tag along as insurance company investigator surveys the scene of a horrific accident. Suprisingly solid visual effects and live-action cutscenes combine to give you a morbidly entertaining look into the way that insurance companies determine who gets paid and who doesn’t.

The Best Page In the Universe

As much as anything on the internet can be considered “old school,” The Best Page In the Universe (better known as the home of Maddox’s epic rants) is old school. Online and semi-regularly updated since 1997, anyone who’s been on the internet long should have visited it at least once by now. If you haven’t, now’s the time to catch up on some comedy and net history.

Cyrkam Airtos

What happens when you take a normal timekilling activity and turn it into a flash timekiller? You get a veritable vortex of timekilling—A vortex named Cyrkam Airtos.

If you haven’t played it before, Cyrkam Airtos is a surprisingly challenging flash game about tossing crumpled-up paper into a garbage can. Sounds easy? Give it a try and tell us your high score.

Star Wars Weather 

We’ve had about enough of weather websites that just tell you boring, useless details like the “temperature” and the “humidity” and “whether or not it will rain.” Star Wars Weather cuts through all the BS and tells you what you really want to know: what Star Wars planet does the weather outside most closely resemble right now.

The F***ing Weather 

Ok, so Star Wars isn’t your thing. We’ve still got you covered. In the same vein as http://whatthefuckshouldimakefordinner.com/, http://www.thefuckingweather.com/ gives you just the facts about the weather—and it doesn’t sugarcoat them. NSFW if someone in your office is offended by large, Times New Roman profanity.

I Love Bees

I Love Bees was not the first ARG (Alternate Reality Game) or the last, but it was definitely the largest and most well publicized. Designed as marketing for Halo 2, it’s way too late to participate in the sci-fi mystery story, but you can still visit the site’s original entry point at ilovebees.com for a bit of internet history. If you want to know more about the I Love Bees story, check out its entry on the Halopedia.

Google Building Maker 

Google’s built a lot of cool tools and toys over the years, but for sheer “oh, neat” value, this one’s our favorite. The Google Building Maker allows you to pick a building from any of dozens of cities, and build a 3D model of it. If your model is any good, it’ll even get displayed for everyone to see on Google Earth.

What’s that you say? “I don’t know how to make 3D Models?” Well, that’s the real beauty of this site—it makes it so easy that anyone can do it, and it’s fun. Give it a try—we think you’ll have a hard time stopping after just one building.

Hero Machine

A Time waster with a capitol T, the Hero Machine lets you put together comic-book-style superheroes from an astonishingly large list of possible parts. You can try and make the coolest hero possible, or you can just hit the random button until you find something that makes you laugh.

Photosynth 

Photosynth is a project from Microsoft that allows you to take collections of digital photos and stitch them together into a kind of 3D panorama. Unlike a normal panorama, which is a large, flat image, in a Photosynth you can move through the scene and see objects from different angles. There’s an enormous gallery of user-submited Photosynths to browse through, and more are added every day.

Pandemic 2

Pandemic 2 is simultaneously a seriously-addicting flash game, and the best reason to move to Madagascar. In the game, you play the role of a disease, and you make decisions about how you evolve (do I want to cause a fever, or renal failure?) in order to wreak havoc across the globe. Counteracting you are the world’s governments, who can do things like shut down airports and develop vaccines. Virulent disease has never been this much fun!

Crimson Room 

The premise or Crimson Room is simple: you’re in a room, its crimson, and you’re trying to escape. You’ll have to make use of everything in your environment and solve some seriously fiendish puzzles to get out. Crimson Room was so well received that it spawned an entire genre of “escape the room” adventures that now includes dozens of games.