Thursday, February 27, 2014

This would be funny if it wasn't so crazy!


 

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WhatsApp Founder lived on foodstamps, was rejected by Facebook
Today Jan Koum, the founder of WhatsApp, may be worth $6.8 billion, but things weren't always so good. He was once rejected for a job by Facebook. He and his family lived on food stamps. He also dropped out of college.
ABC news reported Koum will turn 38 on Monday. He and Brian Acton, a former co-worker at Yahoo, created the mobile instant messenger application. Facebook just purchased the app for $19 billion. Reportedly, Koum still owns 45% of the company. That would give him a worth of $19 billion.
He and his mother immigrated to the United States from the Ukraine when he was 16 and had to rely on food stamps for survival. After studying computer science at San Jose University, he dropped out.
His father died in 1997. His mother died in 2000.
Koum and Acton left Yahoo in 2007. They traveled around South America. Koum was using a lot of his $400,000 in savings he obtained from Yahoo.
Koum wasn't the only one to be rejected by Facebook. Acton also was denied a job there when he applied.
"Facebook turned me down. It was a great opportunity to connect with some fantastic people. Looking forward to life's next adventure," Koum tweeted in 2009.
Koum bought an iPhone in in January 2009. He and others created the app to show status messages next to friends in their address books. They app went on to become a mobile messaging system that gained 450 million monthly users. The company will still operate separately from Facebook with its 55 employees.
"Got denied by Twitter HQ. That's ok. Would have been a long commute," Koum once tweeted about another job he was denied, according to USA Today.
According to the website, businessinsider.com, Koum's family picked up their food stamps when they were younger at an office only about two blocks away from his current company in Mountain View, California.
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Now that I've got your attention, can I get you to watch some serious videos?
Please watch the first video and at least a few moments of the second...thanks!

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