social networking
Facebook’s CTO Adam D’Angelo to Leave
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The word got out, and now it is confirmed. CTO Adam D’Angelo to Leave Facebook. D’Angelo wrote a letter to Facebook staff on Friday about the move. He said he wanted a break. But, according to sources close to the company, D’Angelo felt his responsibilities no longer fit well with his skills and interests. There were rumors of some tension with Zuckerberg too. But sources said D’Angelo simply wanted to do something different (and he is only 23!). He is a friend of founder Mark Zuckerberg since high school. I am sure there is not more to read in this news than will be made to look, but the timing is kind of uncanny. Facebook Connect announcement last week.. and then this. Hmmm.
According to Venturebeat, Zuckerberg and D’Angelo met in high school and developed a music discovery service called Synapse that garnered positive press and subsequently interest (but no purchase offers) from large companies looking to hire the young developers. Zuckerberg, as most readers know, went to on Harvard and started Facebook out of his dorm room. D’Angelo was one of the first people he tapped to join him.
In fact, according to this Harvard Crimson article, Zuckerberg moved the company from Boston to Palo Alto, Calif. in 2005 in part to be closer to D’Angelo, who was attending Caltech at the time.
Facebook will not be replacing the CTO role, sources said, but has a search underway for a VP of engineering.
Adam kept a low profile for himself all along. He was universally loved at Facebook, says a source close to him. Wish him all the best!
About Adam D’Angelo: From his LinkedIn Profile
I am interested in social networks, viral engineering, development methodology, web applications, platforms, collaborative filtering, reputation systems, data mining, machine vision, computational trust, online markets, and privacy.
Specialties:
algorithms, machine learning, distributed systems, optimization, scalability, decentralized networks, programming languages
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