Anybody can build a company and sell the company the next day. That doesn't make you special, it doesn't make you unique, it doesn't make you all that great.
— Jan Koum
When I was a kid trying to communicate with family in the Soviet Union, it was very difficult. You had to go through the long-distance phone companies like MCI, which were difficult to navigate and expensive to make calls through.
A lot of what I experienced growing up in the U.S.S.R. and coming to the U.S. as an immigrant actually reflects itself in Whatsapp. Experiences from our youth shape what we do later in life.
Facebook, Google, Apple, Yahoo - there's a common theme. None of these companies ever sold. By staying independent, they were able to build a great company.
A lot of times, people start out with a lot of good ideas, but then they don't execute. They lose the purity of their vision. You end up running around in circles.
I only have one idea, that is WhatsApp, and I am going to continue to focus on that. I have no plans to build any other ideas.
Our phones are so intimately connected to us, to our lives. Putting advertising on a device like that is a bad idea. You don't want to be interrupted by ads when you're chatting with your loved ones.
There were a lot of negatives, of course, but there were positives to living a life unfettered by possessions. It gave us the chance to focus on education, which was very important in the Soviet Union.
I grew up in a country where I remember my parents not being able to have a conversation on the phone. The walls had ears, and you couldn't speak freely.
I grew up in a society where everything you did was eavesdropped on, recorded, snitched on. I had friends when we were kids getting into trouble for telling anecdotes about Communist leaders.
Ironically, I grew up watching Indian movies as a kid in Russia. I am quite familiar with Bollywood. I grew up watching 'Disco Dancer;' I watched it some 20 times as a kid.
I want to do one thing and do it well.
When advertising is involved, you, the user, are the product.
I grew up in a country where advertising doesn't exist.
No one wakes up excited to see more advertising, no one goes to sleep thinking about the ads they'll see tomorrow.
I didn't have a computer until I was 19 - but I did have an abacus.
Communication is at the very core of our society. That's what makes us human.
Marketing and press kicks up dust. It gets in your eye, and then you're not focusing on the product.
