Latest news with #DaveBaszucki
Bloomberg
9 hours ago
- Business
- Bloomberg
Roblox Taps Paramount's Naveen Chopra as New CFO
By Corrected Save Roblox Corp. tapped Paramount Global's Naveen Chopra as its new chief financial officer, effective June 30. 'Naveen's experience as CFO at leading companies equips him with invaluable financial and strategic acumen to foster Roblox's growth,' Roblox Chief Executive Officer and co-founder Dave Baszucki said in a statement.
BBC News
02-04-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Parents allowed to block children's games and friends on Roblox
Parents will be able to block their children from specific games and experiences on Roblox as part of new safety measures announced by the hugely popular gaming will also be able to block or report their children's friends, and the platform will provide more information about which games young users are playing. The measures will only apply to children who are under the age of 13 and have parental controls set up on their announcements comes after the CEO of Roblox, Dave Baszucki told the BBC that parents should keep their children off the platform if they were "not comfortable" with it. Roblox - the most popular site in the UK for gamers aged eight to 12 - has been dogged by claims that some children are being exposed to explicit or harmful content through its in his BBC interview, Mr Baszucki stressed that the company was vigilant about protecting its users, with "tens of millions" of people having "amazing" experiences on the latest safety features, Roblox's Chief Safety Officer Matt Kaufman said: "These tools, features, and innovations reflect our mission to make Roblox the safest and most civil online platform in the world."A spokesperson for the regulator, Ofcom, said the measures were "encouraging", but added "tech companies will have to do a lot more in the coming months to protect children online". 'Shoot down planes' In preparation for the interview with Mr Baszucki, the BBC found a range of game titles with troubling titles that had been recommended to an 11-year-old on the included games such as "Late Night Boys And Girls Club RP" and "Shoot down planes…because why not?"Parents with linked accounts of children who are 12 and under can now block such titles if they are uncomfortable with them. They will also be able to go further in managing who their children are friends with. They can already view their child's friends list - now they can block or report people on that list, preventing them exchanging direct between children had already been restricted in measures announced in November last parents will now be able to see the top games their child played on Roblox over the last week and how long they spent in each one. What do parents think? Sally, from the north of Scotland, told the BBC last month that her nine-year-old daughter was groomed on the platform in December last year. Despite reporting it to Roblox, she never received a welcomed the announcements as a "start", but said Roblox "needs to do better".She added: "What's missing is proper authentication of users. How does the company know that users are who they say they are - how will perpetrators be traced when grooming keeps happening?"Roblox highlighted to BBC News its community standards, which have a zero-tolerance policy for the exploitation of from Leeds told the BBC last month that his 15-year-old son is "addicted" to Roblox, and can use the site for up to 14 hours a has welcomed the changes announced today for younger users, but wants the platform itself to do more and target the availability of inappropriate games for children. Kathryn Foley's nine-year-old daughter Helene is a regular on Roblox. Kathryn ensures her daughter avoids games where other players would talk to her, or friend Foley told BBC News: "I know I will absolutely be using the game blocking feature, and to see how long my daughter spends on particular games - and also if she is playing games I didn't know she played."Kirsty Solman has spoken with the BBC about how Roblox has helped her 13-year-old son Kyle - who has ADHD, autism and severe anxiety - with social said: "These all sound fantastic especially the experience blocking, as a concern is the type of games our children are accessing."Roblox has also announced the expansion of its voice safety AI (artificial intelligence) model, to help moderate voice chats between players, with the feature now available in seven additional Roblox has outlined changes to its advertising model, with players to be paid in-game currency to watch adverts on the BBC has changed some names in this report to protect the identities of young people.
Yahoo
02-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Parents allowed to block children's games and friends on Roblox
Parents will be able to block their children from specific games and experiences on Roblox as part of new safety measures announced by the hugely popular gaming platform. They will also be able to block or report their children's friends, and the platform will provide more information about which games young users are playing. The measures will only apply to children who are under the age of 13 and have parental controls set up on their accounts. The announcements comes after the CEO of Roblox, Dave Baszucki told the BBC that parents should keep their children off the platform if they were "not comfortable" with it. Roblox - the most popular site in the UK for gamers aged eight to 12 - has been dogged by claims that some children are being exposed to explicit or harmful content through its games. However, in his BBC interview, Mr Baszucki stressed that the company was vigilant about protecting its users, with "tens of millions" of people having "amazing" experiences on Roblox. Announcing the latest safety features, Roblox's Chief Safety Officer Matt Kaufman said: "These tools, features, and innovations reflect our mission to make Roblox the safest and most civil online platform in the world." A spokesperson for the regulator, Ofcom, said the measures were "encouraging", but added "tech companies will have to do a lot more in the coming months to protect children online". How can you keep your child safe online? Plan to make phone use safer for teens watered down In preparation for the interview with Mr Baszucki, the BBC found a range of game titles with troubling titles that had been recommended to an 11-year-old on the platform. They included games such as "Late Night Boys And Girls Club RP" and "Shoot down planes…because why not?" Parents with linked accounts of children who are 12 and under can now block such titles if they are uncomfortable with them. They will also be able to go further in managing who their children are friends with. They can already view their child's friends list - now they can block or report people on that list, preventing them exchanging direct messages. Messaging between children had already been restricted in measures announced in November last year. Additionally, parents will now be able to see the top games their child played on Roblox over the last week and how long they spent in each one. Sally, from the north of Scotland, told the BBC last month that her nine-year-old daughter was groomed on the platform in December last year. Despite reporting it to Roblox, she never received a response. She welcomed the announcements as a "start", but said Roblox "needs to do better". She added: "What's missing is proper authentication of users. How does the company know that users are who they say they are - how will perpetrators be traced when grooming keeps happening?" Roblox highlighted to BBC News its community standards, which have a zero-tolerance policy for the exploitation of minors. Amir from Leeds told the BBC last month that his 15-year-old son is "addicted" to Roblox, and can use the site for up to 14 hours a day. He has welcomed the changes announced today for younger users, but wants the platform itself to do more and target the availability of inappropriate games for children. Kathryn Foley's nine-year-old daughter Helene is a regular on Roblox. Kathryn ensures her daughter avoids games where other players would talk to her, or friend requests. Ms Foley told BBC News: "I know I will absolutely be using the game blocking feature, and to see how long my daughter spends on particular games - and also if she is playing games I didn't know she played." Kirsty Solman has spoken with the BBC about how Roblox has helped her 13-year-old son Kyle - who has ADHD, autism and severe anxiety - with social interactions. She said: "These all sound fantastic especially the experience blocking, as a concern is the type of games our children are accessing." Roblox has also announced the expansion of its voice safety AI (artificial intelligence) model, to help moderate voice chats between players, with the feature now available in seven additional languages. Meanwhile, Roblox has outlined changes to its advertising model, with players to be paid in-game currency to watch adverts on the platform. The BBC has changed some names in this report to protect the identities of young people.
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Prediction: Roblox Could Surge by More Than 100% in the Next 3 Years
Roblox (NYSE: RBLX) hasn't exactly been a great performer recently. After rallying sharply through much of 2024 and into 2025, the stock fell sharply after reporting its fourth-quarter earnings and is down by nearly 20% from its February peak. To be fair, there were some good reasons for the decline. Roblox gave weak guidance for the first quarter, and certain growth rates declined more sharply than expected. But there's also a lot to like, especially from a long-term standpoint. Here's why I'm making the bold prediction that Roblox stock will double within the next three years -- and I'm putting my money where my mouth is. There is a lot to like in Roblox's recent results if you're focused on the long term. There are now 85.3 million daily active users (DAUs) on Roblox, representing 19% year-over-year growth. Plus, growth in paying users (Roblox calls this "monthly unique payers") grew by the same percentage. And the business is becoming more profitable, as operating cash flow increased 29% year over year in the fourth quarter. For 2025, Roblox expects revenue growth of more than 19% at the midpoint of its guidance, and about $830 million in free cash flow, which would be about 30% growth. The long-term opportunity here is huge. Management has said many times that it aims to scale to 1 billion users over the long term, which would be nearly 12 times the current DAUs. With an estimated 3.4 billion people worldwide who play video games, this is certainly possible, and the business clearly has momentum. At the company's recent developer's conference, management shared a goal of 10% of all gaming content globally running on Roblox's platform in the not-too-distant future, more than four times the current share. A new affiliate program could being many more creators onto the platform, and there is tremendous potential to leverage artificial intelligence (AI) technology. One near-term milestone will be the ability for creators to make AI-based characters on the platform. The company continues to grow its platform in ways that appeal to a wider spectrum of potential users, not just the under-13 demographic it is known for. As an example, both the NFL and NBA have a presence on Roblox. There are other potential uses of the platform as well, such as academics, e-commerce, and entertainment -- three areas recently discussed by CEO Dave Baszucki. Roblox continues to expand its potential reach, such as with its recent launch on Sony's PlayStation platform in the fourth quarter. And as metaverse technology evolves in the coming years, there should be more and more opportunities to grow the ecosystem. In fact, the global metaverse market is expected to more than 10x in size from 2024 through 2032, according to Fortune Business Insights, and this could create a massive growth tailwind for Roblox. To be clear, I'm well aware that this is a bold prediction. Doubling in three years implies an annualized gain of about 26%. And just for housekeeping purposes, Roblox stock trades for approximately $62 per share as I'm writing this, so I'll define a double as reaching $144 within three years from March 24, 2025. This would give Roblox a market cap of about $82 billion. A lot would likely have to go well for the business (and for the economy) for this to happen. But at the current growth rate, Roblox would actually more than double free cash flow over the next three years. So if user growth and monetization continue to make progress, it's more of a realistic possibility than you might think. Before you buy stock in Roblox, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Roblox wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $721,394!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 839% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 164% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of March 24, 2025 Matt Frankel has positions in Roblox. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Roblox. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. Prediction: Roblox Could Surge by More Than 100% in the Next 3 Years was originally published by The Motley Fool Sign in to access your portfolio
Yahoo
13-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Keep kids off Roblox if you're worried, its CEO tells parents
Parents who are worried about their children being on Roblox should not let them use it, the chief executive of the gigantic gaming platform has said. The site, which is the most popular in the UK among young gamers aged eight to 12, has been dogged by claims of some children being exposed to explicit or harmful content through its games, alongside multiple reported allegations of bullying and grooming. But its co-founder and CEO Dave Baszucki insisted that the company is vigilant in protecting its users and pointed out that "tens of millions" of people have "amazing experiences" on the site. When asked what his message is to parents who don't want their children on the platform, Mr Baszucki said: "My first message would be, if you're not comfortable, don't let your kids be on Roblox." "That sounds a little counter-intuitive, but I would always trust parents to make their own decisions," he told BBC News in an exclusive interview. Responding to the interview, Mumsnet boss Justine Roberts said parents on the forum had spoken of how they struggled to manage their children's use of Roblox. "There are parental controls, and our users would urge constant parental supervision," she told the BBC. "But we all know that with the best will in the world life sometimes gets in the way. "If you've got multiple children you're looking after and things happen, and you probably can't 24/7 watch everything they're doing, even if you've got all your parental controls set." US-based Roblox is one of the world's largest games platforms, with more monthly users than Nintendo Switch and Sony PlayStation combined. In 2024 it averaged more than 80 million players per day – roughly 40% of them below the age of 13. Its vast empire includes some 40 million user-generated games and experiences. In the UK the Online Safety Act, which comes in to force in April, has strict laws for all tech firms specifically aimed at protecting children from online harms. But Mr Baszucki says he remains confident in Roblox's safety tools and insists the firm goes above and beyond to keep its users safe. "We do in the company take the attitude that any bad, even one bad incident, is one too many," he says. "We watch for bullying, we watch for harassment, we filter all of those kinds of things, and I would say behind the scenes, the analysis goes on all the way to, if necessary, reaching out to law enforcement." Players who choose not to display what he calls "civility" can face temporary time-outs and longer bans, and Roblox claims to analyse all communications that pass between members on the platform, increasingly using more advanced AI systems and other tech to do so — and anything flagged is sent for further investigation. In November last year, under 13s were banned from sending direct messages, and also from playing in "hangout experiences" which features chat between players. However, the BBC was able to create two fake accounts, one aged 15 and one aged 27, on unlinked devices and exchange messages between the two. While the filters caught our attempts to overtly move the conversation onto a different platform, we found easy ways to re-word requests to chat elsewhere and make suggestions about playing more adult games. When we showed the Roblox boss these findings, he argued that our example highlighted the comparative safety of Roblox: that people felt they had to take content which might breach Roblox's rules to other platforms. "We don't condone any type of image-sharing on our own platform, and you'll see us getting more and more, I think, way beyond where the law is on this type of behaviour," Mr Baszucki says. He admits there is a delicate balance between encouraging friendships between young people, and blocking opportunities for them come to harm, but says he is confident Roblox can manage both. We also put to him some Roblox game titles that the BBC has discovered were recommended by the platform to an 11 year-old recently, including: 'Late Night Boys And Girls Club RP' 'Special Forces Simulator'' 'Squid Game' 'Shoot down planes…because why not?' When we asked whether he thought they were appropriate, he said he puts his faith in the platform's age rating systems. "One thing that's really important for the way we do things here, is it's not just on the title of the experience, it's literally on the content of the experience as well," he says. He insists that when Roblox rates experience, they go through rigorous guidelines and that the company has a "consistent policy" on that. How can you keep your child safe online? Plan to make phone use safer for teens watered down Mr Baszucki founded the platform with Eric Cassel in 2004 and released it to the public in 2006 – a year before the first Apple iPhone appeared, heralding the start of the smartphone era. Mr Baszucki describes his younger self as "less of a gamer, and more of an engineer", and the pair's first company was an education software provider called Knowledge Revolution. But they soon noticed that kids weren't only using the product to do their homework. "They wanted to play and build stuff. They were making houses or ships or scenery, and they wanted to jump in, and all of that learning was the germination of Roblox," he says. The name Roblox was a mash-up of the words "robot" and blocks" – and it stuck. The platform grew quickly in popularity – and there were also early warning signs of its future issues. Mr Cassel noticed some players "starting to act out" and not always behaving in a "civilised" way a couple of months after it launched, recalls Mr Baszucki. He says the roots of building a "trust and safety system" therefore began "very, very early" and that in those earlier days there were four people acting as safety moderators. "It kind of is what launched this safety civility foundation," he adds. But despite attracting decent numbers, it was a year later, when the firm launched its digital currency Robux, that it really started to make money. Players buy Robux and use it to purchase accessories and unlock content. Content creators now get 70% of the fee, and the store operates on dynamic pricing, meaning popular items cost more. Mr Baszucki says there was some initial resistance among the leadership team about Roblox becoming more than a hobby for its players, with the introduction of a digital economy. Robux stayed, and the firm is now worth $41bn (£31bn). Its share price has fluctuated since it went public in 2021, but overall Roblox shares are worth about one third more than they were six months ago, at the time of writing. Like many big tech firms its value peaked during Covid, when lockdowns meant millions of people were indoors. Mr Baszucki compares his experience of building Roblox with how Walt Disney may have felt about his creations. He describes his job as "a little like having the opportunity he had a long time ago when he was designing the Magic Kingdom", and is focused on Roblox's ongoing evolution into a Metaverse-style experience where people go about their daily lives in a virtual world, in avatar form. They have also been public in their ambitions to eventually attract 10% of the world's gamers. Asked to describe Roblox in three words, he replies: "The future of communication." We finish our time together playing a couple of his favourite games: Natural Disaster Survival and Dress to Impress. We use his account and he's constantly recognised by other players — but we still get smashed to pieces by a blizzard outside the Natural Disasters mansion. Additional reporting by Ammie Sekhon Roblox announces new safety features for under-13s 'Want to be friends?' - How safe are your kids online? Roblox: The children's game with a sex problem
