Jack Dorsey

Jack Dorsey, born November 19, 1976 is an American software architect and businessperson best known as the creator of Twitter. MIT's Technology Review named him (in the Technology Review 35(TR35)) as an outstanding innovator under the age of 35.

Early years

Dorsey grew up in Saint Louis, Missouri, and by age 13, he had become interested in dispatch routing. Some of the open source software he created in the area of dispatch logistics is still used by taxicab companies. He went to high school at Bishop DuBourg High School and attended Missouri University of Science and Technology before subsequently transferring to New York University, where he first conceived the idea for Twitter.

While working on dispatching as a programmer he later moved to California.

In Oakland in 2000, Dorsey started his company to dispatch couriers, taxis, and emergency services from the Web. His other projects and ideas at this time included networks of medical devices and a "frictionless service market". In July 2000, building on dispatching and inspired in part by LiveJournal and possibly by AOL Instant Messenger, he had the idea for a Web-based realtime status/short message communication service.

When he first saw implementations of instant messaging, Dorsey had wondered if the software's user status output could be shared among friends easily. He approached Odeo, who at the time happened to be interested in text messaging. Dorsey and Biz Stone decided that SMS text suited the status message idea, and built a prototype of Twitter in about two weeks. The idea attracted many users at Odeo and investment from Evan Williams who had left Google after selling them Pyra Labs and Blogger.

Square, Inc.

Dorsey also began a new platform to accept debit and credit cards on a mobile device for small businesses called Square. The device is a small square-shaped object that has the ability to be attached to devices such as an iPhone, iPad or Android device through the headphone jack. This product is a mini card reader which allows a person to swipe their card, choose an amount to give to the recipient and then sign their name for confirmation. Square is also a system for sending paperless receipts via text message or email, and is available as a free app for iOS and Android OS.

Twitter, Inc.

Greer, Stone and Williams co-founded Obvious which then spun off Twitter, Inc. As chief executive officer, Dorsey saw the startup through two rounds of funding by the venture capitalists who back the company. On October 16, 2008 Williams took over the role of CEO, and Dorsey became chairman of the board. On March 28, 2011, Dorsey returned to Twitter as Executive Chairman.

As the service grew in popularity, Dorsey chose improving uptime as top priority, even over creating revenue – which, as of 2008, Twitter was not designed to earn. Dorsey described the commercial use of Twitter and its API as two things that could lead to paid features. His three guiding principles, which are shared by the whole company and through its culture, are simplicity, constraint and craftsmanship.