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t.jeri buisnes
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JERI ELLSWORTH IN THE NEWS
from the Web
SMALL BUSINESS
Joy of electronics
sticks with woman,
sparking invention
She condenses hardware of
defunct C64 into a joystick
ANDREA J. WRIGHT
STATESMAN JOURNAL
Jeri Ellsworth of Yamhill, OR,
turned a lifelong love of electronics
into a popular invention. She created
a joystick that contains the circuitry
of Commodore 64 computers that can be
plugged into a TV to play video games.
MATT MONAGHAN
Statesman Journal
January 25, 2005
YAMHILL -- Jeri Ellsworth's innate
curiosity about technology has been a
constant throughout her life. As a
child, Ellsworth wasn't so much inter-
ested in playing with her electronic
toys as she was in dissecting them. "I
think she spent more time tearing them
apart than she did playing with them,"
said her father, Jerry, as much
bewildered as he is proud of his
daughter.
After years of tinkering away on
the innards of old computers and home
appliances, her inquisitiveness
finally is paying off. Last year,
Jeri, 30, developed a video game
system from the relatively primitive
circuitry of a Commodore 64 personal
computer for a New York toy
manufacturer. Ellsworth's invention,
which bears the name of the original
system, is a hand-held joystick
containing all the workings of the
Commodore 64 that plugs into the
television.
Ellsworth's updated version of the
C64 runs 30 games -- primarily sports,
racing, and shooting -- exclusive to
the old personal computer. An initial
run-up to the holiday season saw the
toy sell all 250,000 units produced
for Mammoth Toys. In the process, it
also catapulted Ellsworth's career and
made her a cult-like celebrity among
fans of the original Commodore 64.
"When I started playing with it
(Commodore 64) I thought it was a fun
project and I would get some pats on
the back," Jeri said. At the time,
making a joystick game system was the
farthest thing from Jeri's mind. Her
only goal was to condense the
Commodore's hardware into a single
chip. But Jeri hadn't been paying
attention to the wave of interest in
retro video games, something that
analysts say has been building into an
increasing chunk of the $10 billion
gaming industry.
Within weeks of showing off her
accomplishment to friends in the
technology industry, she got a call
from Mammoth Toys asking her to
develop the game system. When news of
Jeri's work hit the New York Times,
techies from around the world began
flooding her father's Dallas phone
number (Jeri's number is unlisted)
with requests to meet, collaborate
with -- even date -- his daughter.
Though Jeri said she hasn't gotten
rich yet, she now has development
deals with a couple of electronic toy
companies and spends two weeks per
month in Silicon Valley doing
consulting work. Not bad for someone
who dropped out of high school at age
17.
Ellsworth's academic story is the
classic case of a square peg in a
round hole. "School is kind of set up
to teach the average kind of person,
and if anyone falls out of that
average, either they have to bend or
they get lost in the whole system. I
didn't bend very easily," Ellsworth
recalled.
Her dad, Jerry, wasn't exactly
supportive of his daughter's decision,
but tells a similar story of her
discontent. "They (schools) like more
followers. They didn't like people
striking out on their own. She's a
striker," he said.
After making a little money
building race cars at Jerry's service
station, Ellsworth decided in 1995 to
open a chain of computer stores called
Computers Made Easy. For the next five
years, Ellsworth worked tirelessly to
keep the stores operating, at one
point even living out of her office
because she no longer could afford an
apartment.
By 2000, the drain of running
multiple businesses became too much.
At about the same time, she ran across
the old Commodore 64 she used to play
with amid a pile of old electronics
she had stowed away. The original
Commodore 64 came onto the market in
1982 as a personal computer that could
run a limited selection of programs.
Ten years later, the last Commodore 64
was produced, and by 1994 the company
was out of business.
Though Jeri's father bought the
Commodore 64 for her brother, she
remembers being fascinated by it, and
it ended up becoming hers."I started
feeling nostalgic about my old
Commodore and I got online to see if
anyone was doing anything with them,
and I found there were, like, hundreds
of people that tinker with them,"
Ellsworth said.
That encounter piqued her interest
in the Commodore 64 again, and within
months Jeri had boiled down the
relic's entire circuitry into a single
chip. Years of fiddling with
electronics and reading technology
engineering manuals were all the
education she needed.
Riding the success of Jeri's work,
Mammoth has contracted her to develop
another joystick game system, a kids'
television toy, and another she's not
allowed to talk about. She said that
another unnamed company has recently
signed her up to design a hand-held
education unit for children. "I always
wanted to own a computer store and I
did, and I always wanted to work for
Commodore, and in a way, I am. All
these weird little dreams I had as a
kid came true," Jeri said.