Russia's Mark Zuckerbeg: How Pavel Durov started Telegram

Pavel Durov was born on October 10, 1984 in St. He was born in St. Petersburg. Due to his father's job, he lived in Italy for a while and started primary school here. After returning to Russia, he went to the Academic Gymnasium at the high school level and received a successful education. In 2002 St. He began to study at the faculty of philology at St. Petersburg State University. Here he won various scholarships from the state. It can be said that Durov's success story actually begins in this period.

Durov, who started to develop software and programs by himself at the age of 11, at an age that can be called a child, has a passion for software development dating back to his childhood years. He was such a good software developer that he could "hack" the "Welcome" sign at the entrance of the school to put a teacher he didn't like in a difficult situation. Standing out with his intelligence and leadership abilities among his friends at the university, Durov also founded VKontakte with his brother Nikolai.

Pavel Durov, who graduated from the university in 2007, explained the story of founding VKontakte in a post on this channel. Durov's first website was durov.com. This site contained answers to questions asked in philosophy classes at school. He also established a forum site called Spgru.ru, which also brings university students together. However, there was a problem. Everyone on this site was using nicknames, no one's real name was included. Later, a friend of Pavel's from the USA mentioned Facebook, and soon after, Facebook was launched in Russia.

Considered the Facebook of Russia, VKontakte (VK) was founded on October 10, 2006.

The company's first office is in St. He was on the 5th and 6th floors of the iconic Singer House in St. Petersburg, and Pavel was 22 at the time. VK was founded as a free site and was user-oriented. It looked like a simple search engine and had no ads. The number of users started to increase with the various advertising and marketing methods used by the VK founding team. A few weeks later, the VK founders increased the server capacity. Three months later, VK began to be recognized as one of the 50 brightest future websites of the Russian internet world.

Over time, new revenue models began to be used. First of all, it was aimed to increase the personal scores of the users on the site with the paid SMS method. Then the paid gift giving method was introduced. In other words, there was the exchange of various virtual objects bought with real money in VK currency. In 2009, advertisements for games and mobile applications began to appear. Accordingly, game and application developers gave some of their earnings to VK in return for advertisements.

In 2008, Pavel Durov, who had a disagreement with VK's first investors and the companies from which he received funds, sold his shares in VKontakte. Adopting the idea of ​​getting rid of things such as house and furniture, Durov both sold his shares and left Russia. Durov secretly went to New York with some VKontakte employees, where he founded a company.

There is no clear information about who the first investors of VKontakte were, but we do know that the internet company mail.ru bought the site. Durov, in a sense, "made an expense" by showing his middle finger to the investors who sold VKontakte to mail.ru at that time. VKontakte was also a platform used by anti-Putin Alexei Navalny to organize a political protest.

According to the news in the Moscow Times newspaper when he settled in the USA, he answered the questions asked about his new project by sharing a frame from the movie of Justin Timberlake, who played Sean Parker in the movie Social Network.

How Was Telegram Founded?

Pavel Durov, who sold his shares in VKontakte, decided to move on with another venture and founded Telegram. So the secret project in the USA was Telegram. Durov, who also got this idea from his US acquaintances, established Telegram with his own means, with money from VKontakte. Durov states that he spent 1 million dollars out of his own pocket to keep Telegram afloat in the first period.

Telegram has a unique technology that basically uses data encryption. The Russian State tried to block Telegram several times, whose message security is several times higher than that of other messaging applications. Because Telegram refused to give the passwords to the authorities. Even though Durov explained Telegram's working principle and its technology to the necessary authorities, the Russian Government took a contrary attitude towards Telegram. (Even if Pavel Durov gave the passwords of the messages to the Russian state, it would still not be possible to access the messages, which is another matter, of course.)

During this period, Durov shared a photo of a dog with its tongue sticking out to deny the state's request for access to messages and mock them. In other words, he implied that he would not take a step back against the insistence of the state. Durov stated that on the night of this incident, people in military costumes were walking around his house. So, in a sense, Durov was threatened.

A large-scale smear campaign was launched in Russia against Durov and Telegram due to the Telegram team's refusal to provide message passwords. News that Telegram is making the job of terrorists and drug dealers easier has been published. In April 2018, access to Telegram was blocked in the entire Russian Federation. In early 2018, the intrepid entrepreneur announced that he was starting a cryptocurrency project called TON Token. Durov earned around $1 billion when the TON Token was released to the public. In the second supply period of the money, it made a gain of $ 2 billion. This was a higher amount than all cryptocurrencies offered for purchase in 2017.

Despite Telegram being banned, people can access Telegram via VPN in Russia. Moreover, Durov advises people to do so. The number of people and institutions investing in Telegram, whose popularity has increased significantly due to this scandal, has increased.

According to an article in MIT Technology Review, it is stated that Telegram is a very brave initiative, but still needs new ideas. Telegram is committed to solving all problems related to the development of blockchain technology, but does not clearly explain how.

Pavel Durov, who is portrayed as a very tough and difficult person when it comes to business, often has problems with different internet entrepreneurs. Durov, who likes to wear only black and travels to different parts of the world all the time, built a plane with some of his employees and threw a plane down to 1500 dollars in 2012. In 2013, he was accused of jamming a police car on the road in his white Mercedes. However, Durov denied the accusations and said he didn't even know how to drive.

Durov, who traveled the world with his close friends, had parties attended by celebrities, and was with Russian model Alena Shishkova, did not stay in a fixed place for many years. He stayed a few months in each country he went to. Because returning to Russia is dangerous for her, she continues to be recognized as a leading figure in online privacy and privacy activism.

However, Durov was able to come under the criticism of Edward Snowden. Snowden tweeted that the channels in Telegram should be decentralized, that is, they should not be controlled by Telegram. In addition, the previous British Prime Minister Theresa May stated at the Davos Forum in 2018 that small platforms such as Telegram (at that time) allowed criminals and terrorists to communicate.

Pavel Durov's Success Secrets

Pavel Durov has explained in his various statements and statements the principles that make him a successful and wealthy entrepreneur. It is possible to list these principles that brought success to Pavel Durov as follows.

1. You must reach an expert level in the things that make you happy and love.

2. Try to spend every day doing useful things. Spend time with your family, go to the movies, have a picnic, serve food to the needy. Strengthen your connection with the world.

3. It doesn't matter what you write or how you write. If you want, write diaries that no one will read. It doesn't matter… Writing helps you talk to yourself.

4. Set concrete and clear goals. Write these goals down where you can always see them. Your ideas and goals should be concrete, measurable and time-limited. You should set a date for yourself and take concrete steps towards what you want until that date.

5. Learn to type without looking at the keyboard. The most important thing you can have is time. Therefore, look at the things you write, not the letters on the keyboard. Try to make quick decisions and put them into action immediately. Look for ways to get rid of the habit of procrastination and procrastination.

6. Try to learn a foreign language. Knowing a foreign language expands the boundaries of your perception of society. In addition, you will find excellent career and personal development opportunities.

7. I like to read personal development books. I try to read all the books about my profession. Listening to audiobooks is also a good alternative if you're too lazy to read.

8. Be mindful of what you eat and drink and don't smoke. Don't try to look for a magic nutritional formula. Consume only organic vegetables and fruits; for water.

9. Being a vegetarian or not drinking alcohol does not guarantee success. Knowing your limits is what will bring you real success.

10. Watch as little television as possible. Stop surfing the internet and playing games.