An Overview of the history of Gamezent

About Gameznet and the founder

This page is intended to provide a brief overview of the Gameznet Story,
You can get the full and complete History of Gameznet and personal History of Andrew in his own words "Here"

Andrew McMullen the creator of this site has held a fascination with computers and technology since first setting eyes on the high school microbe computers in the early eighties, Winning a children's television quiz show bought his first computer games machine to him- an Atari killing "INTELEVISION" and interest in computers and games grew and grew from there.

This interest coupled with a working life that controlled him swinging between work in the building trade and the unemployment roundabout eventually led Andrew to a desire to break free and create a life that he would have control of. This life, this new life, would feature computers AS A FUNDAMENTAL part of it. A life that would fulfil his burning desire to tinker with these toys and to help others, A life that he would enjoy, one that was filled with the instrument he was most interested in. and thus he discovered the wonders and joys of computers.

This passion, this desire, pushed and pushed and Andrew moved from a most probable lifetime of house painting and brickies labouring jobs into something that would nurture his soul an feed his desires.
The journey was a rough on , a rocky road that has led Andrew on a mission! A mission to find himself and to learn about the world at large.

Andrews journey starts young where he went from the early starts in life of being pushed and shoved from school into any job that would have him to getting up the balls to follow his dreams and register a business that would help him escape called Amac Enterprises at the age of 26 in 1996 and then went off h went to attend the NEIS scheme ( New Enterprise Incentive Scheme). A government run scheme which promised to help the unemployed, like him to escape from complacency and start their own business. Unfortunately for Andrew at the same time the Australian Government was changing hands from labour to liberal ushering in a new era and a new Prime Minister Mr John Howard into our lives and lounge rooms Unfortunately part of the impact was that the NEIS schemes and the CES (commonwealth Employment Service) funding was slashed. Leaving Andrew and many others who had been working hard towards building their own businesses out in limbo land.

Well Andrew couldn't, wouldn't and didn't give up! he worked hard at learning more about computers by pulling them apart and putting them back together and enrolled in office and Skillshare courses to build up business and office skills. He studied marketing books and mail order manuals, Steadily Andrew developed a small enterprise selling shareware with sales building slowly and surely , and with that a LIFEPLAN started forming as he found his life's purpose becoming clearer.
Andrews dreams grew and grew taking shape in his minds eye and a grand and brilliant vision began to form. A business plan was formulated thanks to the help of the NEIS course and the helpful people who did their best to encourage and nurture his drive and ambition. A plan was formulated with a projection for a successful business which should take 5 years to go from planning to operating at full steam. This was going to take a lot of work, a lot of dedication and most importantly co-operation from a team of dedicated people who shared the vision , or a "master mind alliance". Things built steadily for a while as sales of mail order shareware improved and small adds were placed in classified sections of newspapers. These adds said simply "free Software - send a stamped self addressed DL envelope for more details. A steady run of envelopes flowed in and shareware was sent out.

With perseverance and determination Andrew managed to turn Amac Enterprises into a small but growing shareware distribution business while also struggling with part time work and developing and refining the main business plan. The first drafts for a newsletter came together with the aim of selling it by mail order, the newsletter was to offer computer advice and help to new computer users which there seemed to be nothing available. Something Andrew had discovered whenever attempting to learn more on his own due to the unavailability of affordable computer help. As he progressed the business plan started expanding and morphing and the idea of forming a "gamers only ISP" started to enter into the plans. The idea to have several game servers that could serve up files to people who had modems and to compliment this with a "Network Gaming and Computer Support Centre" where people could go to learn about computers, play multiplayer games on them and surf the Internet. It would be a support centre offering help for any new computer user, a place that a complete novice would feel comfortable in , where they could get hands on experience with computers and learn exactly what they would need to buy and why in order to do those things that they themselves wanted to do Before they went and bought their first computer..

Knowing it would be almost impossible to do on his own he printed out the business plan and took his grand vision with determination to look for some support or backing , For weeks he mailed copies out . He mailed them to venture capitalists and government agencies he visited government office's and was passed from one place to another , leaving photocopies of the Business Plan at each place. Copies were sent to the premier (Ed note: insert file link- letter to politicians and replies) and many other politicians asking for advice for and guidance to find further assistance which would help put the ideas and business plan into action. After months and months of all avenues seemingly ending back at the same place with advice being to head back were to the CES. Some assured Andrew they would contact the CES themselves and make sure that they provide all the assistance they could. So back to the Joondalup branch of the CES he went, This time with a firm belief that they were going to offer help to find funding for the business plan and put him in touch with people who could help turn his ideas into a reality. This time it was different , he would get the help after all the premier and other politicians were seeing to it!

Well suffice is to say he didn't receive much help from the officers at the CES, the place was being wound down , they were closing the CES up and Andrew file seemed to get pushed from one person to another. The CES had been undergoing funding and staff cutbacks with many of the Public servants working there accepting rather generous redundancy packages as the winding down of the CES begun. Andrew got bounced from one officer to another and eventually ended up in the hands of an officer who was about to leave the CES employ in a just a few days. He was asked to take on this one last job before he left.

John , the CES officer in question had been helping get employees and employers together for some time and with the end of employment looking he was also wondering what he would do with his life now, John called Andrew up and told him how he had been handed his file as one of his last duties with the CES, he told Andrew he had not found anybody that could help him but that there was some things he may be able to help with himself.

So they arranged to meet at Andrews house where John explained that he had taken a personal interest in the business plan and decided that he really wanted to help out with it. He expressed interest in getting involved personally and helping to realise the visions contained in the plan. After many days of visits discussing the business plan at great length and discussions about the future and dreams he eventually joined forces with Andrew as a business partner. John encouraged Andrew every step of the way and advised and guided him as far as receiving DSS ( Department of Social Security ) funding so that the implementing of the business plan while not having to work could continue. Andrew was over awed, it seemed like the greater universe had heard his prayers and sent him an angel . Finally after so much hard work and shear determination he was going to be able to implement his dreams and run his own business. Andrew trusted John completely, he did after all work for the CES, he knew what the laws were , he was a mature age man, well schooled in life and completely stable in his finances who had just received a large redundancy payout which in Johns words had "made him very comfortable" John told Andrew that his experience with the CES had made him a lot of friends in good positions that could give them both a great deal of help.

Soon things changed as Andrew and John thrust themselves into a desperate bid to "get things going". Andrew started to feel the pressure as john demanded things move quickly . John began expressing desires to retire within 2 years , he talked of fly fishing around Australia while the business looked after itself without him. He slowly applied more and more pressure on Andrew to "build This grand Dream" with a focus squarely aimed at the creation of a money making machine and as quickly as possible.

Andrew managed to gain a 30 day account with a computer wholesaler and they sold a few computers to clients, there were bits of work starting to come in in various forms , things were starting to come together and everybody began to work in harmony for a while. That's when disaster struck and Andrew took his computer into the wholesaler to have them install a second hard drive. The technician at the wholesaler formatted the main hard drive and wiped out all of the business plans, client details marketing information, absolutely everything was gone. Andrew was devastated, all that work , 2 years of planning and developing. Journal entries, invoices, file templates, the whole lot was gone. Naturally Andrew and John were both quite devastated by this disaster and they organised a meeting with the manager to bring the matter up. Andrew had a single printed copy of the business plan which he was able to present to the manager and explain the plans of the business, the steps taken to this point and the amount of information that was now lost. The manager could see that a great wrong had occurred and was very apologetic. After much negotiation the manger offered to help fund some steps of the business plan . They were steps that should not occur for another year in the business plan but all our resources and plans to continue as was previously planned was now lost. John let Andrew know how vitally important it was for them to continue , he encouraged Andrew to do whatever it takes to get things moving and they agreed to be financed enough computers to start the shop stage of the business plan.

Now steps in the business plans were getting skipped and Andrew considered this to be major mistake as each step was such an important process in order to build a strong foundation for the business to grow on but John was adamant that they continue and take the offer from the wholesaler . it would seen that finding shortcuts to getting the money coming in was all important . The predicted 5 years to build the business was now unacceptable and rather than concentrating on slow and steady the push was to have things happen sooner. John was eager for even just some sort of continuos income. He was desperate to generate the money flow as he knew that he could not live forever on his redundancy package. e truth was that he could not support the fledgling business financially and he also knew that Andrew could not either.

The computers arrived and Andrew got to work learning how to install hardware and software and set up a LAN. to add to the struggle of doing this without any previous experience with LAN's many items of hardware delivered from the wholesaler had to be returned due to faults.

John had first agreed to buy into the business for a fee of $10,000 which had motivated Andrew to push ahead with the business plans and get them a place to work from in the rear of a sign company. He knew he had to push things now as if he didn't please the man who had come to make things happen, his Angel just might fly away and besides it was too late to turn back now, there were leases and contracts taking place so the only way was forward. Some time had passed by now and the money was becoming a real issue as John had still not put forward the agreed amounts to buy into the business.

Slowly John put some contributions in towards bills as they fell due and then contributed to the purchase of some equipment which was desperately needed. Dribbling money in small increments over a period of time made it impossible to use the funds for advertising or other actions that would have real impact on kick-starting things. John held tight like he had a dog on a leash, paying bills but not letting anything get away from him. Andrew was mow beginning to feel trapped in situation where he had to really push threw if he was going to make it work. The expenses began to pile up and John saw to paying them only when they were falling overdue, with nothing being put into building the venture they were just floating along. Andrew convinced john that some new equipment would have to come into the shop if it was to be used for its intended purposes, we would have to have computers and we would need to lease some equipment. John agreed to this and was especially eager to allow Andrew to see if he could place leases and contracts in his Andrews name only as it would be detrimental to Johns marriage and financial position if he was to put his name on anything that might cause any risk to his mortgage. They acquired a projector on an unsecured lease and managed to enter into a finance arrangement and along with the computers which were on there way that were now committed to generating an income or going bust.!

A time went by and Andrew managed to pick up some accounts with a software distributor who left a number of games in the store to resell, Andrew got to work promoting the place and putting together guides for the way the LAN should run and for a membership that the gamers could join, Soon John and Andrew agreed that Andrew could simple not manage to do all of the work that he was doing without burning out very soon. Andrew had been arriving for a 10am start and finishing around l3-4 am and even staying the entire night at times. Book keeping was almost non existent and Andrew protested to John about the amount of pressure and work he was being burdened with, pleading for John to find a solution to the books, they agreed to get some help running the office. Unfortunately they could not afford to pay anyone so they arranged to have some skillshare course students sent out for work experience to try and give a hand getting the books sorted out. This was helping a little as data entry was now getting done , however they were not trained office workers and more than anything the time and energy being spent with them was wasting away. This led to a time where a business consultant was called in to help get the books in order and train a girl to look after the books. The consultant ran up an exorbitant bill and spent half his time chatting up the girls instead of training them which by now included a young girl who would eventually to become Andrews partner in life. The relationship with the consultant ended when he offered Andrew and John a way to gain funds in an illegal manner and John and Andrew both agreed that they could not go down that path. After great discussions on what they should do from that point in order to grow they agreed they had to move into a better area. The LAN was starting to attract regular players, computers were beginning sold and they were picking up regular bits of work. Being located in the heart of an industrial area was no advantage. They decided they really had to move location to somewhere that had pedestrian traffic and had also been told by the co-tennent that the would be leaving when the current lease was up in a few months time. Andrew set out to find alternative ways to fund the venture and organised some meetings with venture capitalists, this resulted in Andrew being advised to aim higher as the $60,000 he was requesting in venture capital was not enough to build and sustain the business that was being proposed as far as the VC were concerned. One venture capitalist told Andrew to come back when he needed $6 million dollars. Eventually John agreed that the business definitely looked viable and that he could see good reason to invest in it further and that we couldn't,t move ahead as it was . He proposed to take out a personal loan in his name. He stated that he would require the loan to be the first priority in all bills and that he would maintain complete control over the money up to the point of seeing the loan paid, After that it was Andrew,s responsibility to handle the money. Andrew eagerly agreed as at that point there was only forward to go and it had seemed that something was guiding them. To think that not long ago he was knocking on doors and writing to politicians it was like the dream was being powered from beyond and was really starting to manifest into reality. Events although hard and a struggle seemed to be guided by a greater hand and it felt like everything was happening for a greater purpose.

We couldn't grow without things like advertising and marketing and we needed more time to research the concepts which we were working to build. John expressed often that he wanted things making money as soon as possible, I knew that we were not getting things off on the right foot and were skipping some of the major elements needed from the prior planning , feeding things and effort were required in order to build things for success . Our pursuit of the golden eggs without feeding and nurturing the goose that would lay them would eventually kill the goose and prevent the collection of any golden eggs.

John assisted with moving stuff into the shop encouraged and helped me to set up finance and accounts with various suppliers and take out leases while at the same time being careful to keep himself with only foot committed to the business and one foot ready to jump out. He was reluctant to sign anything, My name was always on any documents we signed and John only joined in signature when he absolutely had to.

IN the meantime while preparing my computer it had some problems so I took it to the wholesalers where it was purchased "Edge Computers" while kindly fixing the problem the head technician decided to also format both my hard drives and wiped out my entire setup. All of my work had been stored on my computer. I was devastated, I had one print copy of my business plan to work with and a few backups on floppy disk of my shareware stuff. Hundreds of hours of work was wiped out with all my plans. I went to see the manager and complained about he incident. We discussed how we could work things out and ended up agreeing that they would supply us with computers to set up the LAN that I had mapped out in my business plan. And so we placed an order for $30,000 worth of computer equipment.

Setting up the office My friend and his father came and helped us build walls and set partitions up.

I had to pull out the paint gear again!

Setting up Osborne Park

Visit Osborne Park

Eventually John handed over more of the capital which he had promised to inject, The shop was set up but John expressed concern that things would not be making money quick enough. Andrew expressed his belief that it would take at least 2-3 years before the business was self sufficient and John agreed that most businesses don't make a profit until around 4- 5 years of trading even when they have surplus capital so it would have to be built up slowly and methodically.

Then one day Andrew queried John about the final $2.500 from the $10,000 agreed upon. John refused to discuss it and stormed out of a meeting between himself Andrew and Dave . It was then that Andrew resigned himself to the fact that the money was never really available in the first place. By this time bills were beginning to fall overdue and John had been paying just enough to keep things afloat but slowly things were getting more and more behind. The fact that the bills were getting paid was enough to keep them coming into the office for another days work. Andrew was now doing 12- 16 hour days and John would come in for 3 or 4 hours a day interspersed with occasional 8 hour days. John was doing some good work on the marketing material and newsletter and talked quite positively about the future most of the time. Through a string of bad and good luck turns with a local hardware supplier we somehow managed to gain financing of $30,000 worth of computer equipment from a big computer supplier and Andrew was able to set up a gaming LAN which slowly but surely grew in popularity. We set up a small shop that got reasonable foot traffic and we sold a few computers and products. Games started selling and orders started getting placed for games and game accessories and we held several LAN parties which went very successfully. The feedback from people attending was always very positive. We soon realised that the potential was really good for the gaming LAN which we had designed so that it could be hired by groups and I had now made changes to my business plan to reflect the current state of affairs and direction things were going,

Confident that the business plan was solid and workable John arranged finance via his bank to move to a better location and I went out and found the ideal spot in and ex-chineese restaurant located at the Craigie Shopping Centre.

Downstairs Arcade

The LAN

Visit CRAIGIE

It was now time to make the move so Andrew hired a removal truck and with some help from John loaded up the computers and equipment into the truck and they moved operations to Craigie. It was here that the name"Gameznet" was born as there was now so much interest in the gaming LAN.. The Gameznet name was registered as belonging to Amac Enterprises and the shop received its name.
From starting in a small room in the back of a sign shop owned by a close friend of Andrew things had grown enough to warrant a try in a real suburban shopping centre.

There was now a transition period to get threw as the shop had to be prepared and decorated so Andrew worked days on clients computers and nights decorating the shop which was an old gutted out Chinese restaurant complete with cockroaches and no floor coverings . John concentrated on the newsletter from home.

From the start of moving to Craigie things began to unfold rapidly as Andrew and his now fiancé Natasha set up the shop, painting, organising and marketing meanwhile John worked on the website from home which was never to be published. John also worked on the newsletter which he failed to complete by deadline release dates. He seemed to loose interest very early after moving to Craigie and didn't go into the shop at all while Andrew organised the set up. Johns efforts were now slowing in the areas he had expressed he was strong in such as the publishing of the newsletter and building of the website but none the less they had the finance to get things going for at least a couple of months so Andrew continued to do the best he could to put together promotional material and started arranging software to sell and shop display areas, The LAN was moved successfully and most of those that had been visiting in osborne park continued to patronise the new shop, Feedback from members was powerfully positive but by now John was already loosing his patience to contribute to the baby business. John had seemingly lost all drive and ambition and refused to even look at the financial or business side of things, Andrew had no shop accounting experience or money handling expertise and was struggling to learn what needed doing at a time where the business really required expert assistance. Things were going good as far as people coming into the shop and a steady regular client base was growing., John was continuing to attend the shop depressed and stressed and at times was freaking out about the shop costing money and not making money. It wasn't long before John announced that he wanted to get out of the business. He began to make things very hard for Natasha and Andrew who had by now been working 12- 14 hour days together in the shop giving every waking hour to it in the hope of getting the return after a year or so more struggle. In a few short months they managed to do a lot, the place had flair and style and we were being received well by the public. It was apparent that a stage was being reached where it was all really starting to pull together and the shop takings were beginning to pay for the expenses. All that needed doing was managing the debts from the software and computers and once they were paid for all that money being paid to them would be freed up for future income. Natasha and Andrews relationship grew and by now they were expecting a child in 3 months time and were determined to have the shop running well so that they would be able to relax for a a while once the baby arrived and enjoy the experience.
Expenses had been above the income for a while but it was only a few months into the new shop and it was totally to be expected , the gap was closing and Andrew was supplementing the shop with his social security payments to pay what bills he could. Andrew was so very thankful that the government was paying the allowance through which was part of the NEIS scheme which was to be paid for a year while things got going, Things were not growing fast enough for John and he complained often, every day he moped around the store uninterested in positive talk complaining about everything. Things got to much for Andrew and he offered to try and get a personal bank loan in his name to take the shop to the next level , do some marketing and pay outstanding bills. John was clear that he would not be putting another cent in to the venture and said that if Andrew didn't raise some funds John would be leaving the business. With this Andrew proposed to Natasha that t hey attempt to obtain a personal load together which might help increase the chances of getting it .

Good hearted John assisted Andrew and Natasha by writing letters stating that they were both employed by him which was then presented to the banks. They obtained $20,000 in 2 joint loans putting $12,000 into the business with the remaining $8,000 being used to move into a small rental home together and purchase a car which they desperately needed especially with a new baby imminent. So this was great they could now get a room ready for the baby , move out of the sharing situation Andrew was in and Natasha could move out from her mothers place, Andrew could put some much needed funds into the business and John would regain his enthusiasm to achieve. They set out to make the shop work and Natasha and Andrew spent many many nights working until 2 and 3 am preparing promotional material, Felling very pregnant Natasha put every ounce of effort she could muster into helping, After all it would benefit her later John had promised her a full time John once we got things going and promised that the loan was safe so she l put all of her efforts into getting as much done while she could before the baby came. She worked cleaning and organising and helping to set up the office computers. She did her best to help get the record keeping and office stuff organised for John and Andrew to then take over and she tried here best to organise and prepare the accounting stuff which John had by now agreed he would be responsible for. They set about writing and editing store policy's and designed information sheets for clients. Natasha put together shop policies and Andrew and Natasha set about getting the shops decor done to the best of their ability on the limited finances. They used some of the funds just raised to purchase more stock of computer games and shop furniture from auctions. They also put together a plan to employ a sales team.

John was now handling all of the Internet clients accounts completely and had been doing so since the move, they were now numbering around 60 Internet clients for which they were paid $5 per month by the ISP in commission for reselling them and he became more and more secretive about what was going on with the money. . John started claiming that he had not made any payments on the loan which he had taken out to finance the move from Osborne Park to the Craigie shop. Eventually he announced that he was leaving the business and he did just that. While Natasha was in hospital about to give birth and they had just used up the last of the funds from the bank loans he dropped the bombshell. John arranged a meeting with the accountants who tried to tell Andrew that he was trading insolvent and breaking the law . Andrew was accused of misdealing with the bank accounts as he had been using a personal cheque account to run a business. John Gave Andrew the ultimatum to let him take over the business and Andrew could walk away debt free except for a few of the debts that were in his personal name. It was either that or Andrew takes on all of the debts of the business and paid everything up within 7 days. Andrew had limited choices. He felt he had to choose between either taking over the business himself or winding the whole thing up, To be fair and correct he felt this would require selling off all the stock and materials and using the funds gained to pay out all creditors thus leaving the balance for John and Andrew to sort out as partners which would have just about cleared everything away neatly leaving no one in debt or facing bankruptcy. John disagreed with Andrew and insisted on taking over the business and enlisted the help of the accountants to seize all of the business records on file and demanded that Andrew pay half of all debts within 7 days. Andrew felt he had no choice but to hand everything over to John. While he bided for more time to decide what to do, John walked out of the shop leaving Natasha and Andrew struggling to run it on their own with customers having paid for memberships, software orders to be filled and computers being worked on and Natasha now overdue to give birth. The day came and the baby decided to come into the world so in-between visits to the hospital Andrew confronted John and asked him to be reasonable, he begged John to please look after the shop while they dealt with the baby's arrival. Then the next afternoon Andrew returned home from the hospital to find a note stuck to the front door from John stating that he had taken over the shop and would be operating it under a new name. From that day on The Gameznet dream crashed down. John removed himself from the business name of Amac Enterprises and changed the name on the front of the shop, he continued to send all creditors after Andrew telling them that his new shop was nothing to do with Amac Enterprises and Andrew was the first name on all of the accounts. They followed his directions and hounded Andrew down. And to top that off Natasha and Andrew now had 2 fresh new Bank loans totalling $20,000 which were 5 year loans now only 3 months old.

Eventually with creditors banging on their doors and bailiffs threatening to take away their second hand furniture, fridge and washing machine Andrew was forced to declare bankruptcy, John got himself out of the shop lease and moved his new shop complete with all of the customers, stock, hardware and decor to a more upmarket and expensive location in mall in Joondalup City. Andrew not only lost everything he had put into the business but he never again would see a great deal of personal effects which had been used to decorate the shop, Collectible items like life-size cardboard movie standups, glow in the dark skulls and masks, his own couch from his loungeroom and some of the coolest game posters and magazines he had collected over a 5 year period . These were all taken away in Johns move. Eventually Natasha also had to declare herself bankrupt due to the $20,000 bank loans and after working so hard in the shop for only a few short months with promises the whole time by both Andrew and John that she would be paid for the time she had contributed .

Well that was the Gameznet story at a glance. John still operates his shop in Joondalup while Andrew and Natasha can't get a credit card or 6 month interest free finance and have trouble even applying to rent a home. They lost all hope of owning their own home to raise their children in for a long time. Struggling financially due to both being bankrupt Andrew gained some work for an ISP providing technical support for nearly 2 years before Natasha and Andrew both found work with a local Perth ISP called Eon Technology.
The owner of Eon was so impressed with Andrews games and business ideas that had him build up the same concept again only this time as a paid employee without all of the worries and stress that a partnership involves and so the risk of being openly exploited and tossed aside were not so great.

Andrews notes:

. Looking back I feel that John actually knew what he was doing all along and that he got what he intended from the beginning , he was looking for what he would do after taking his redundancy package and came across my ideas and concepts, he was how he could sit back and let me build it up waiting for the time to be right when he could manage it himself. He first told me he wanted to build towards a retirement nestegg and he thought he could plod along and build on the business for a few years before retiring completely and leaving me to run it while he sat on a river bank fly fishing. I never will understand how the law and the government allowed this to happen when I was only looking for some help. How is it possible that a partnership which is supposed to mean "shared responsibility" can result in one party going bankrupt over shoulder all of the commitments of the business while the other continues on using equipment, stock , clients and intellectual property that belongs to the partnership and other party. I contributed blood, sweat and tears into building things up and the efforts that Natasha put into establishing the Craigie store were selfless. In the end though I think that he has harmed himself spiritually more than he has harmed us financially, surely his soul will suffer for the betrayal he displayed. I believe that Gameznet would now be a great success story had we kept it going and we would all be reaping the rewards at this very moment had he worked even 1/4 as hard as Natasha and I did in those first few critical months in Craigie.
Time will eventually show this when other similar centres are making huge success and John will know that he made some very wrong choices, financially, morally and spiritually exploiting Natasha and I.

John managed to keep all of the computers and equipment and has since upgraded the computers to modern fast systems. I hear he still has the same guy helping him that I started training with us in Craigie and others are still around working for him and he still collects incomes from many of our regular Internet clients. The biggest creditor that we owed was Edge computes of $30,0000 for the first Gameznet computers and Edge eventually went bankrupt themselves. I received a letter from their lawyers stating that they had dropped all proceedings to recover the goods or monies and thus John has not had to pay a cent for any of the computer equipment. I am quite bitter that the goods were not recovered along with the other assets and used to pay for the debts which would have allowed Natasha and I to avoid our bankruptcy's.
Meanwhile we continue to struggle, still bankrupt over the debts incurred to bring a shop into existence which is still alive and kicking although in a different form and location. John stole a part of my soul when he took my personal possessions, my ideas, my invested time and money, and my credit rating and he now displays my collectible cardboard standups in his shop like trophies.

You can take a look at Johns website for his "Cyber Cafe"he calls Cyber Central at www.laudia.com.au
he used to display one of my favourite cut outs the "robot from lost in space" proudly on his website, several others he still has on display in his shop.

Obviously I still hold onto the dreams I had in the beginning as this site and my work at GamesDen were testimony too.,
I am now attempting to build on the website and my consultancy services. I know that Karma will play itself out for those that took and I still hope that some how justice will come our way releasing Natasha and I from the effects of bankruptcy and back into life financially. I still hold onto some small glimmer of hope that one day John will make some sort of amends and return my prided and personal belongings to where they belong. Until then Gameznet is a just a dream that became a memory and is now a website,

I hope that the website carries the message of the dream and that it functions as a portal and a place of interest where I can provide information , entertainment , resources and support to people who share some of my special interests. It is also a valuable record of my life which I am sure will some day be a useful reference for myself and my children.

A MAN POSSESSED?