Motivation - Ethan Friedman

Ethan Friedman

September 2018

Systems Essay

First grade was the first time I was told that I was great at math. My teacher put me in an advanced group so that I didn’t get bored of work that I already knew.

I wasn’t surprised by this move, I expected it. I knew my dad was good at math and logic questions. He wins all of the games we played at family events. He used to talk about how he used to come in second in the state math tournaments, losing to the kid in his class who had aced the SAT and is now a senior developer at Apple. I continued to be in the advanced groups in all of my math classes through fourth grade. That’s also the year I discovered Minecraft.

A couple days before starting fourth grade, I got the list of kids that were in my classes. Not one of my friends were listed. They were all in the opposite class. I was a very fragile kid. It hurt me a lot to know that I would have to make all new friends again. I had a good close group of friends since I started at that school in Kindergarten. At that school, they paired 1st and 2nd grade together and 4th and 5th grade together. That meant that every class but spanish and math were combined. Since I didn’t like any of the kids my age, my only option was to hang out with the kids above me.

The first kid I met was Joseph. It was around the time that minecraft started to blow up. We played on large networks with thousands of players. The people who created them were making millions of dollars a year. Me being my curious self, wanted to learn how to make a server just like the big ones. I did my own research and taught myself how to write Java fluently and created server mods and plugins.  Joseph helped me with everything. He wasn’t into Java as much as I was, but he wanted to be apart of my server and business. Since we is a year older than me, he knew more about grammar and punctuation that I did. He helped me make advertisements for my freelance services.

By this time, I had told everybody about what I learned. My family, my teachers, my friends, and even myself. Every night before I fell asleep, I would map out a bug or new project that I needed to work on the next day. Keep in mind that I was only 10 years old by then and Knew more about Java than math for my age.  My dad was excited that I taught myself something new because he also never really learned anything in school. He taught himself math and binary.

I started making a lot of money for a 10 year old. I was selling one plugin per week and making $10 for each. There were a lot of things I could do with $10. I bought lunch for my friends over the weekend, I ordered a new mouse, keyboard and bought myself Spotify Premium.

Just 2 years ago, I applied to SLA and made a presentation showing off my work. I was interviewed by Mr. Enzweiler. I was extremely nervous before my interview, so when I walked into the room, I didn’t really know how to act. First, I panicked. I couldn’t connect to the SLA internet because I didn’t know the password. Thinking about it now, It wasn’t even a weird question to ask, but for some reason, 13 year old Ethan was too scared. He kindly noticed the redness of my face and asked what the issue was. “Can I connect to the wifi so I can show you my presentation?”, I asked.

“Absolutely! The password is Philadelphia with a capital P”, He responded.

When I showed him my work and the list of people who wrote school recommendations for me, I could tell he was impressed. I wasn’t the best student in 7th grade, but I don’t think that really mattered after that interview. He was extremely interested in everything I was showing him. I instantly felt comfortable talking to him and I gave him a demo Java lesson. I rushed out of the room and down the block to see my dad who was waiting in the car for me. He was eager to hear about the interview. I didn’t really know what I tell him. I was excited inside, but I didn’t want to talk myself into believing that I would get in no matter what. There were over 1000 more kids who still needed to be interviewed. Most of them probably worked harder in 7th grade. I told him that I was really nervous and that it went fine.

Reflecting on it now, I’m really proud of being able to impress such a smart person as it is. And I’m also proud of being able to make money from nothing. I dedicated myself to something that I cared about. I couldn’t learn Java in school. I needed to learn it my own way at my own pace. That’s part of the reason why school mostly doesn’t work for me. I need to content to myself. Today, I make almost $300 a month selling the same old Minecraft plugins to sometimes 30 different people a week.