Twitter co-founder and inventor Biz Stone speaks at HPU

By Ryan, January 28, 2016

By James Ensor // Editor-in-Chief 

On Jan. 20 Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter, spoke to students at High Point University about innovation and his entrepreneurial spirit.
600 people attended the event in Hayworth Fines Arts Center. The conversation between Stone and Dr. Nido Qubein, HPU president, focused on Stone’s upbringing and his rise to success.
“I always wanted to be an inventor,” Stone said. “Now I have a patent for Twitter.”
Twitter is a social media website that allows users to send “tweets” and share bursts of information. Stone and fellow co-founder Jack Dorsey created Twitter and on March 21, 2006, the first tweet was sent by Dorsey.
“We wanted the idea of fast, right now and instant,” Stone said. “Twitter is about first to the world.”
Originally unsure whether or not the idea would stick with users, Stone and Dorsey continued to develop their project.
“We had no expectations for success, but we loved it” Stone said. “We were just really excited.”
During the conversation Stone explained that not every idea he had worked, but he never stopped pursuing them.
“We built [Twitter] every which way you could do it wrong,” Stone said. “I was always trying to find the positive.”
According to Twitter, the company now has 320 million active users.
“Ten years of trying and a lot of work will make you look like an overnight success,” Stone said.
Stone, a 41 year-old entrepreneur and innovator, has been named Nerd of the Year by GQ magazine and one of Time magazine’s Most Influential People.
Since co-founding Twitter, Stone has moved on to additional projects. He is currently working on a new search engine named Jelly. Originally thought to have failed, Stone has revived the project.
After his conversation with Qubein ended, I had the opportunity to ride in a car with Stone during a break between speaking engagements to talk about Jelly.
“We started Jelly and we made a rookie mistake in that it wasn’t taking off right away, so we decided to change and do something else,” Stone said.
That plan didn’t last for long.
“We got in a room to figure out how to shut it down,” Stone said. “We left that room more convinced than ever that that’s what we should be working on.”
Regardless of the fact that Stone announced that Jelly was a failure, he came back and re-launched the project.
“It failed, we pivoted, and now we’re un-pivoting,” Stone said.
Stone described how the new app is fundamentally different than the original version.
“This time around you just ask any question you want,” Stone said. “We’ll find the right person or people who know about that stuff and want to actually help and we’ll send your question to them.”
To use Jelly, you won’t have to create an account to ask a question, but you will have to create an account to answer a question. Jelly is set to launch in late February to early March.
After speaking with me, Stone went to Cottrell Hall to speak to communication and entrepreneurship students.
When asked about HPU, Stone was pleased with his visit.
“I am very impressed,” Stone said. “I had no expectations coming in and now I want to be a student here.”