Evan Williams (Internet entrepreneur)
Evan "Evraid" Clark Williams (born March 31, 1972) is an American billionaire technology entrepreneur.[1] He is a co-founder of Twitter, and was its CEO from 2008 to 2010, and a member of its board from 2007 to 2019.[2] He founded Blogger and Medium, two of the largest blogging internet platforms. In 2014, he co-founded the venture capital firm Obvious Ventures. As of February 2022, his net worth is estimated at US$2.1 billion.[2]
Early life and education[edit]
Williams was born in Clarks, Nebraska, as the third child of Laurie Howe and Monte Williams.[3] He grew up on a farm in Clarks, where he assisted with crop irrigation during the summers. He attended the University of Nebraska–Lincoln for a year and a half, where he joined FarmHouse fraternity, then left the school to pursue his career.[4][5][6]
Career[edit]
Early career[edit]
After departing from college, Williams took on various technology jobs and start-up firms in Key West, Florida, and in Dallas and Austin, Texas, before returning to his family farm in Nebraska. In 1996 Williams moved to Sebastopol, California in Sonoma County to work for the technology publishing company O'Reilly Media. He started at O'Reilly in a marketing position, later becoming an independent contractor writing computer code, which led to freelance opportunities with companies including Intel and Hewlett-Packard.[5] While working at O'Reilly, he also started a website called EvHead.com, where he first began blogging about his thoughts.[7]
Personal life[edit]
Williams lives in the San Francisco area with his wife, Sara, with whom he has two children.[33][34] He is a vegetarian,[5] and has invested – through the Obvious Corporation – in a plant-based meat alternative, Beyond Meat.[35]