Find a technology entrepreneur or someone affiliated with any kind of media. Here are some ideas: the founders of Apple, Microsoft, google, youtube, jibjab, Amazon, etc. Even MC Hammer is a techie!
Still not interested? Select a name from the Levison book. Your goal: In 150 words, tell us something about the person. Where are they from? What are they famous for? Did they go to college? What kind of childhood? What have they done with their wealth?
EVERYBODY: Please pick someone different from the other class members. There are plenty of people.
EVERYBODY: Please pick someone different from the other class members. There are plenty of people.
Due: Monday, September 19, 4:30 p.m.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteSteve Chen, co-founder of YouTube, was born in Taipei, Taiwan. At the age of eight he moved with his family to the United States. He then finished the remaining amount of his schooling Aurora, Illinois. He then attended the Illinois Math and Science Academy, and later attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. After School he got a job at PayPal where he met Chad Hurley and Jawed Karim, other founders of YouTube. In 2006 they sold YouTube to Google. Chen received $350 million in shares from Google and now is running a company named AVOS Systems with Chad Hurley. Chen is listed as one of the 15 Asian scientists to watch by Asian Scientist Magazine.
ReplyDeleteSteve Chen Wikipedia. (2011, September 14). Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Chen
Craig Newmark is the creator of Craigslist. Craig was born in New Jersey on Decemember 6, 1952. He has a B.S. and a M.S. in Computer Science. He worked for IBM for seventeen years. In 1995 he launched Craigslist in San Franciso. Craigslist is an online website that's the equivilent of a newspaper classifieds. Then in 2011 he launched craigconnects which is a website that supports technology and platforms that will make connectivity better. He is big about non profit organizations. He is currently is involved in more than thirteen of them. These organizations are involved in using the interent to solve social issues. Craig is an active social networker. He uses Twitter, Facebook, blogs, and is a contributor to the Huffington Post. Craigs future plans for Craigslist involves no major changes. He plans to add more cities and have better customer service. San Franciso is where he is now residing (Newmark, 2011).
ReplyDeleteNewmark, C. (2011). Meet craig. Retrieved from http://craigconnects.org/about
David Geffen was born in Brooklyn, New York on February 21st 1943. He is the son of Abraham and Batya Geffen. Geffen is credited for founding and co-founding Asylum Records with Elliot Roberts, Geffen Records, and co-foundering with Steven Spielberg and Jeffrey Katzenburg DreamWorks SKG studio. He also was the managed and signed several artists including Linda Ronstadt, The Eagles, and Jackson Browne.
ReplyDeleteThe son of Soviet Jews, David attended the University of Texas upon graduating high school in 1960. However, he dropped out after only one semester because of his lower than acceptable grades. That didn’t stop his entrepreneurship however. Geffen is said to have gotten his business ethics from his mother who owned her own shop where she sold women’s garments. This knowledge eventually led him to be one of the richest men in the film industry along with being a millionaire by the age of 25.
David Geffen. (2011). Biography.com. http://www.biography.com/articles/David-Geffen-9542656
Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico on January 12, 1964. With a Mother still in her teens and an absent father, Jeff had seemingly low chances of success. However, at a very young age, he showed signs of brilliance such as disassembling his crib with a screw driver and transforming his garage into a homemade laboratory for his school science projects. His education career was outstanding from high school forth, earning validictorian and leaving Princeton University with a degree in computer sciences and engineering. After graduating, he held several impressive jobs on wall street that prepared him to eventually create Amazon.com. The online sales service is now the largest online seller in the world with billions in annual sales. Bezos pursued his lifelong dream and formed a space research program to develop spaceflight technology with an ultimate goal of sustained human life in space. Jeff also created the Kindle.
ReplyDeleteSean Parker, a high school graduate from Fairfax County, Virginia, got his start in the entrepreneur world, when he teamed up with Napster at the young age off nineteen. It isn’t clear if he was a co-founder, or just an early employee. Parker also helped launch Plaxo, an online address book, which is affiliated with Microsoft Outlook. Parker left Plaxo after shareholder disputes. His most successful venture was when he teamed up with Facebook in 2004, and became the company’s first President when the company incorporated owning 7% of the stocks. In 2005, Parker was arrested for suspicion of cocaine possession, which he was not charged, but caused enough of a stir within the company that Parker was asked to step down from his position, though he still owns his 7% of the company. Parker is currently investing his time and money in a website called Spotify. Parker says that Spotify “is the answer to piracy” (1). Spotify, lets you stream all available music for a small monthly fee, which will hopefully start pumping revenue back into the dying music industry.
ReplyDelete(1) (Tsukayama, H. (n.d.). Spotify: sean parker says online music is finally social. In The washington post. Retrieved July 14, 2011, from http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/faster-forward/post/spotify-sean-parker-says-online-music-is-finally-social/2011/07/14/gIQA3gSjEI_blog.html)
(2) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1Hx8_y_g88
Tumblr, one of the many popular microblogging websites of today, was founded by David Karp in 2007. He is also the CEO of the blog site that allows users to make various posts consisting of text, links, images, videos, quotes, as well as audio to their “tumblelog”. Karp was born on July 6, 1986, to Michael Karp and Barbara Ackerman and grew up Manhattan on the upper west side. Karp attended Calhoun School from 3rd until 8th grade. Afterward, he went on to attend the Bronx High School of Science before dropping at age 15 and continuing his education at home. He interned for animation producer Fred Seibert and then went to work as a software consultant for UrbanBaby before beginning his work on Tumblr in 2006. He did not attend college or any other higher education and now lives in New York City with his dog, Clark, whom he avidly posts about on his own tumblelog.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.davidslog.com/
Pieree Omidyar is the chairman/founder of bay. He was 28 when he sat down over a long holiday weekend to write the original computer code for what eventually became an internet superbrand — the auction site eBay. The site was launched on Labor Day, Monday, September 4, 1995, as "Auction Web"; it was hosted on a site Omidyar had created for information on the ebola virus. The word 'eBay' was made up on the fly by Omidyar when he was told that his first choice for his web site, 'echobay,' had already been registered. Not wanting to make a second trip to Sacramento, he came up with 'eBay.' The service was free at first, but started charging in order to cover internet service provider. According to Forbes, as of March 2011, Pierre Omidyar is the 145th richest person in the world. He is the third richest person of Iranian descent.
ReplyDelete“A world where everyone can explore and create meaningful connections with the people and places they encounter.” This is the vision statement for CouchSurfing.com. This organization was created by Casey Fenton and launched in 2003. Casey, along with three other co-founders, run this site in which anyone can get on and literally travel the world without staying in costly hotels. Casey attended college for computer science and has since worked as a technology and an internet consultant. The idea was conceived after booking a cheap flight to Iceland. Instead of booking a hotel he emailed students there at the university asking for accommodations. He received over 50 replies and the rest is history. Casey was Couch Surfing’s Executive Director until recently. Because of this one idea as of August 2011 over 3 million people in 245 states and territories were registered with CouchSuring all around the world! Now lets travel!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.couchsurfing.org/media_faq.html
http://www.couchsurfing.org/our_people/Founders
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CouchSurfing
Redbox is dominating the movie industry these days and how could it not. The idea is to rent movies or video games at an automated kiosk for a dollar a night. There are no late fees or membership requirements and the disc can be returned to any Redbox machine. There are currently thirty-three thousand kiosk nationwide. Redbox was founded in 2003 and is owned by Coinstar. Mitch Lowe is the founding senior executive of Netflix and also a key founder and president of Redbox. He got his start in California opening a few video rental stores. In 1982 Lowe tried to produce a VHS movie vending company called Video Droid. This idea was very short lived and unsuccessful. He began working for Netflix in 1998 and was the Vice President until 2005. He also worked in a business development group for Mcdonalds that centered around the automated vending machine that became redbox.
ReplyDelete