Pavel Durov: biography and personal life of the creator "VKontakte"

Pavel Durov is a Russian entrepreneur, a programmer, one of the founders of the most popular social network in the CIS countries. Former CEO of VKontakte and one of the richest people in Russia.

Pavel Durov. Biography

Pavel Valerevich was born on October 10, 1984 in Leningrad. His father is Valery Semyonovich Durov - Doctor of Philology, Head of the Department of Classical Philology of the Philosophy of St. Petersburg State University. The Russian billionaire has a brother - Nikolai Valerevich. He is also the technical director of VKontakte, a candidate of physical and mathematical sciences, as well as a two-time world champion among students in programming.

School years

For the first time at the school desk Pavel Durov sat in Turin, where his father worked at that time. A few years later the family returned to Russia. After a short study at an ordinary school, Durov became a pupil of an academic gymnasium at St. Petersburg State University.

Pavel Valerievich studied in depth four foreign languages. In connection with poor eyesight, he always sat behind the first desk. Since the age of 11 Pavel has become interested in programming. The hacking of a computer network and the selection of passwords for computers in the office of computer science are the famous pranks that Pavel Durov sinned. Biography of the future Russian entrepreneur continues in the university of St. Petersburg.

Higher education

At the end of the Academic Gymnasium Durov continued his studies at the Faculty of Philology at St. Petersburg State University, specializing in English Philology and Translation. In the student years he became a laureate of the Presidential and Government scholarships, three times he was a laureate of the Potanin scholarship.

In parallel with his studies at the university, he was trained at the military faculty, specializing in "Propaganda and psychological warfare." At the university he served as platoon commander at his faculty. At the end of military training, Durov received the rank of junior lieutenant of the reserve. In 2006, he graduated with a red diploma, but never took him from the university until now.

During the student days Pavel Durov began working on several projects designed to simplify the search for information necessary for students and improve the quality of scientific and social activities of their university.

First projects

Such projects were the electronic library of abstracts of the university (durov.com) and a forum for students of SPbGU (spbgu.ru). They did not bring their creator any financial benefit, but only helped to communicate to students from different universities.

After some time he became disillusioned with the system of organizing user accounts in RuNet, where people could hide under any names and avatars. Finding another form of implementing the Internet user association is the goal that Pavel Durov set for himself at the time.

"VKontakte": creation and development of the project

After a while, Paul met his old friend, who returned from the United States, where he studied. He told Durov about the student's Facebook project. There, users posted real photos and information. Pavel liked this idea, and he decided to create such an association in the Russian-language Internet space. Embody the idea in life Durov began at the end of the university. The original name of the project is "Student.ru", but after a while it was changed to "VKontakte". Durov explained this change by the fact that in any case, students will become graduates.

Pavel Durov and his brother Nikolay on October 1, 2006 open a limited liability company, known to all of us as "VKontakte", and register the first domain of the service. Until the end of the year the project was in the testing and development stage. Register in it could only by invitation. In December, Durov opened "VKontakte" for free registration. During the first days of open access, more than 2,000 users registered on the site.

At the initial stage, the promotion of the project was very successful through viral marketing and a lot of competitions for users. By the end of 2006, servers are no longer able to cope with the ever-growing number of users, which resulted in the replacement of servers and improved network software support. In 2007, Durov receives numerous proposals for the purchase of the project, but he refuses them and continues to spur the network, attracting investors. In the same year, VKontakte becomes one of the three most visited websites of the Runet.

In 2008, the number of users exceeded the mark of 20 million. At the same time, the monetization of the project started: advertising, gaming applications, which began to bring programmers a certain percentage of project revenues.

Any popular and profitable project attracts burglars, spammers and others. "VKontakte" was no exception. The site was repeatedly infected and became a carrier of viruses. In addition, the site made attempts to deploy the porn industry, so the developers did not have to sit around.

Durova and his offspring repeatedly sued for copyright infringement (for placing movies and videos on the site in public). But they did not end successfully for the plaintiffs, since "VKontakte" is a public resource, and certain users must be responsible.

In 2011, VKontakte was seriously changed both externally and functionally. There were new items: a pop-up message window, convenient photo viewing, the ability to add video files from popular video sharing and other useful functions.

Income of the creator of "VKontakte"

By the end of 2010, the value of the company was estimated at $ 1.5 billion. According to official data, the authorized fund "VKontakte" at that time was divided thus:

• Mikhail Mirilashvili - 10%;
• Leo Leviev - 10%;
• Pavel Durov - 20%;
• Vyacheslav Mirilashvili - 60%.

According to these data, the state of Pavel Durov for 2011 was estimated at 7.9 billion rubles. But this figure may not correspond to reality. One "Happy Farmer" brings about $ 10 million a year, and after all, there are other, equally popular applications. But still, based on official data, in 2011 Durov took 350th place among the richest people in Russia, having on his accounts 7.9 billion rubles (260 million dollars).

Since December 2011, he has started financing various start-ups selected on a competitive basis, and already in December six of them received from an entrepreneur for 25 thousand dollars. In January 2012, Durov donated a million dollars for the development of Wikipedia.

In November of the same year, Nikolai Kononov presented the documentary "Code of Durov", dedicated to the development of "VKontakte". The right to its adaptation was immediately acquired by AR Films. As for Paul, he reacted to the film adaptation extremely negatively. Despite his position, the film will be released in 2014.

What is he, the founder of VKontakte, personal?

Pavel Durov, whose personal life is of considerable interest primarily for the beautiful half of humanity, does not attend social events, occasionally appears in public.
He is a workaholic, uncommunicative, polite. Paul almost completely devoted himself to doing business. Pavel Durov, whose personal life does not give rest and the press, does not tell anything about her. Therefore, various rumors are spread, not confirmed by the facts.

Business Views

Despite the status of a billionaire, Durov rented an apartment next to the office where he works. His idols are Steve Jobs, Che Guevara. To the social network Facebook he refers negatively and calls it a "sinking ship". Durov is very aggressive in doing business.

Known is his "war" with the company Mail.ru Group, which is one of the largest shareholders of VKontakte. In 2011 she wanted to absorb and unite the social network with "Classmates". There is a known conflict between Durov and the editorial office of the newspaper Vedomosti, which is connected with the innovation of the site, which allows you to watch news from various resources without having to navigate through active links.

Criticism of Durov

Criticism is subjected to both eccentric actions and harsh statements, which are often made by Pavel Durov. The photo of the founder of VKontakte at the window of his office during the "money rain" immediately caused a flurry of criticism. Bloggers and journalists dubbed this trick "the bargain of a merchant", and the words of the minister of culture of Vladimir Medinsky were even tougher: "A person related to the people, like to cattle, in the zone, should get a profession of a seamstress mechanic."

May 26, 2012 at the office of Durov were scattered airplanes with attached money bills. Eyewitnesses believe that this was organized by Pavel Durov, whose photo on the balcony during the bustle outside the building is proof of this, and he does not deny it.

On the eve of the Victory Day on May 9 of the same year, Durov brought down the wrath of many people with his statement on Twitter: "67 years ago Stalin was able to defend the right to repress the people of the USSR from Hitler." Many bloggers and various public figures immediately condemned this post and in protest they removed their accounts from VKontakte. After a while, VKontakte spokesman said that Durov's harsh statement is due to the fact that his grandfather, who passed the war from beginning to end, was later repressed, and Paul himself respects the Victory Day.

Farewell to your child

Many people are interested in the question: "Pavel Durov sold" VKontakte "?" Partly it's true. It is known that on January 4, 2014 Durov sold his shares to the general director of Megafon Ivan Tavrin. The founder of the most popular social network of the CIS countries applied for dismissal on March 21, and a month later his statement was accepted. After that Pavel Durov left VKontakte finally and does not plan to return. Before his departure, the vice-president, as well as the financial director of the social network, quit.

Ivan Streshinsky, who is the CEO of USM Advisors and owns a 52% stake in VKontakte, said: "We were surprised when Durov did not withdraw his resignation statement, and VKontakte owners satisfied his decision a month later. We always believed that the role of Pavel Durov is very important for the company. We regret that he decided to leave the post of CEO. "

Perhaps Durov will change his decision and return to the post of architect "VKontakte".

Despite all this, the fact remains that Pavel Durov sold "VKontakte" and left his offspring. His dismissal, he linked with the fact that he did not provide the FSB with personal information about the people supporting EuroMaidan.

To date, the founder of VKontakte is outside of Russia and plans to launch a mobile social network, but abroad. The telegram of Pavel Durov will appear this year.

Conclusion

Many admire the talent and diligence of the bright and eccentric personality of Paul, others - despise, hinting at plagiarism and huge profits. He was credited with the service in the FSB, the state's financing of his offspring and the fact that he is just a beautiful sign of the VKonakte project.

Durov always denied all these rumors on his personal page. Despite all this, his social network has an incredible success, which speaks volumes.

On the page of Durov there is such a saying: "Those who do, and do not talk, very little. In any case, there are far fewer of them than it might seem. Do not waste your time. Man leads to the success of his actions, not words. "