The DeanBeat: Big money and the super-rich have descended on esports

The 4,000 or so investors and VIPs who attended the Milken Global Conference this week heard sessions about luxury brands, avoiding war in North Korea, investing in China, cryptocurrency and blockchain, tax cuts, cannabis, and the global entertainment business opportunities. But the super-rich also listened to sessions that I moderated on esports and gaming breaking into mainstream culture, as well as another session on how to be an esports team owner.

Michael Milken, the creator of the conference and financier, is an investor along with his son Gregory in the esports team Immortals. Film studio Lionsgate, which made The Hunger Games, held a reception on the roof of a swanky hotel in Beverly Hills ahead of the Milken event, and it highlighted for me how Los Angeles has become the epicenter for the esports … uh, call it what you want. The phenomenon. The explosion. The overhype. The gold rush. The bubble.