I'm thankful that a manager at Xbox took a big chance on me and helped me to get my foot in the door in video games when I only had a college degree and a boatload of passion. But I'm just as thankful that when I first moved to Seattle, there were a few companies that didn't take a chance on me, because if they had, I never would have even applied for that job in video games - now doing something that I never dreamed I'd be able to do: designing video games for a living.

Just as important to getting the opportunities is taking advantage of them. If Bijan had never agreed to take part in Spark, this may never have happened. So kudos to him for taking the bull by its horns.