"People ask me whether it was easy money and I only really have one answer. Yes it was," he said. "It was such a huge amount of money, it is hard, if not impossible to say that it was difficult to earn. I had translated about 30 fantasy novels before, but I never knew it was possible to earn that much money."
While Chu's Fantasy Foundation continues to attract the attention of fans of fantasy games, literature and graphic design throughout the Chinese-speaking world, he now spends most of his time working with MIT and OOPS.
"In the Internet age, to do something for free or to help others is not considered cool. The Internet is all about money," said Chu. "Personally I think doing the online type of work that OOPS is doing for free is a romantic idea."
According to Chu, who dresses in black, has shoulder length hair and looks more like a zealous fan of Goth-rock than a millionaire with a close working relationship with one of the world's most prestigious institutes of higher learning, he spends an average of 16 hours a day coordinating and overseeing his OOPS project. He's now so busy, in fact, that he no longer bothers to commute to his place of work.
"There are about 700 volunteer translators based in Taiwan, China, the US, Australia, New Zealand, Macau and Hong Kong currently working on the OOPS project," Chu said. "I have an office, but with so many e-mails to read and send it's a waste of time getting the car and driving there. I just stay at home and work."
Chu's group is not the sole translation center for MIT's Open Courseware in Asia, but it is one of the most industrious.
OOPS's motley crew of translators have converted the complete texts of 25 of MIT's courses into Chinese, have partly completed another 150 courses and Chu already has another 200 courses on his laptop awaiting the attention of OOPS personnel.
All this do-goodism hasn't been unanimously applauded, however. A group known as COER, or China Open Education Resources, which is a paid fulltime crew of university professors and intellectuals in China working on translating MIT courses, have let Chu know that OOPS's volunteers are undermining their work.
The China-based group so far has only completed translations of two MIT courses.
On the odd days that Chu has to himself these days, he is active on the lecture circuit. He hosts seminars and lectures to students of all ages about both his work as a translator and his current projects.
As for the future and what he plans to do with his wealth, well, Chu has yet to decide. But the 30-year-old is sure of two things: first, he has no plans to become an author and pen his own fantasy novels and second, he won't enter politics.
"I don't want to become [stereotyped] as the guy who writes fantasy novels and lives in a fantasy world and I would rather eat shit than go into politics," he said.
"I'm just going to enjoy my life and help as many people as I can to better themselves along the way," he said.
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