Biz Stone

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Biz Stone
Stone in 2007
Born
Christopher Isaac Stone

(1974-03-10) March 10, 1974 (age 50)
NationalityAmerican
CitizenshipUnited States
Occupation(s)Creative director, software engineer, businessperson
Known forco-founder of Twitter, Jelly
SpouseLivia Stone
Websitethingsalittlebirdtoldme.com

Christopher Isaac "Biz" Stone[1][2] (born March 10, 1974)[3] is an American entrepreneur who is a co-founder of Twitter, among other technology companies. Stone was the creative director at Xanga from 1999 to 2001.[4] Stone co-founded Jelly, with Ben Finkel. Jelly was launched in 2014 and was a search engine driven by visual imagery and discovery. Stone was Jelly's CEO until its acquisition by Pinterest in 2017.[5] On May 16, 2017, Biz Stone announced he was returning to Twitter Inc.

Education[edit]

Stone graduated from Wellesley High School in Wellesley, Massachusetts.[6] He attended Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts Boston, but did not graduate from either.[7]

Career[edit]

Stone addressing a conference in 2010

Aside from Twitter, Stone is an angel investor and advisor in the startup community having backed companies in diverse industries such as Square, Slack, Medium, Nest, Beyond Meat, Pinterest, Intercom, and Faraday. Stone is a board director at Beyond Meat, Medium, Polaroid Swing, Workpop,[8] and Jelly Industries. Stone is the Chairman of Polaroid Swing.[9]

Stone made his directorial debut working alongside Ron Howard and Canon USA to direct a short film, Evermore, as a part of Project Imaginat10n. Stone described the opportunity as a chance to scratch a long-time creative itch.[10] Stone is also an advisor to Zoic Studios, and an Executive Producer of the documentary Eating Animals along with Natalie Portman.[11]

From 2003 to 2005, Stone held a senior leadership role at Google.[12]

In May 2017, Stone announced his intention to return to Twitter.[13]

Awards and honors[edit]

Along with Jack Dorsey, Stone holds the patent for inventing Twitter.[14]

Stone has been honored with the International Center for Journalists Innovation Award, Inc. magazine named him Entrepreneur of the Decade, Time listed him as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World,[15] and GQ named him Nerd of the Year, along with Evan Williams.[16] In 2014, The Economist recognized Stone with an Innovation Award.

In 2015, Stone's Twitter won an Emmy and Stone received CIPR's most prestigious accolade for leadership at the forefront of developing new forms of media.[17]

Stone is a visiting fellow at Oxford University and a member of the Senior Common Room at Exeter College, Oxford. Upon delivering the 2011 commencement, Babson College awarded Stone their highest honorary degree, a Doctor of Laws.[18] and is a Fellow[19] at Oxford University.[20] Stone is an Executive Fellow at University of California, Berkeley.[21]

Published works[edit]

Stone has published three books, Blogging: Genius Strategies for Instant Web Content (New Riders, 2002), Who Let The Blogs Out? (St Martins, 2004),[19] and Things A Little Bird Told Me (Grand Central, 2014).[22][23] In addition to his long running personal blog and Medium articles, Stone has published op-eds for The Atlantic[24] and The Times.

Personal life[edit]

Stone is Jewish.[25] He is involved in animal rights, veganism,[26] environmentalism, poverty, health and education.[27] Stone is an advisor and contributor to DonorsChoose, a nonprofit organization helping classrooms in need.[28]

Stone lives in Marin County, California, with his wife Livia and his son Jacob.[29] He and his wife founded and operate the Biz and Livia Stone Foundation, which supports education and conservation in California.[30]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "How I Got My Name". Archived from the original on 2012-01-22. Retrieved 6 February 2012.
  2. ^ Biz Stone (2000-04-12). "Biz Stone:No Emails Today". Archived from the original on 2010-02-13. Retrieved 2009-02-15.
  3. ^ Biz Stone [@biz] (November 4, 2010). "Today is my birthday—I'm in my 30's!" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  4. ^ Biz, Stone. "Biz Stone (LinkedIn)". LinkedIn.
  5. ^ Stone, Biz (2017-03-08). "Big News—Pinterest Acquires Jelly!". AskJelly.com News. Retrieved 2019-01-23.
  6. ^ "Who should be the 2009 Bostonian of the Year?". The Boston Globe. December 14, 2009.
  7. ^ "Twitter's Biz Stone To Be Executive Fellow At UC Berkeley's Haas School". The Huffington Post. September 21, 2011.
  8. ^ "Twitter Co-Founder Biz Stone Joins Workpop Board As The Company Expands To New Markets". www.prnewswire.com.
  9. ^ "Biz Stone throws his weight behind the Polaroid Swing motion photo app". TechCrunch. 12 July 2016. Retrieved 22 November 2023.
  10. ^ Temple, James. August 29, 2012. Twitter's Biz Stone to direct short film
  11. ^ "Eating Animals (2017) - IMDb" – via www.imdb.com.
  12. ^ Jay Yarow (November 2, 2013). "Biz Stone Walked Away From $2 Million In Google Stock When He Decided To Join The Struggling Startup That Eventually Became Twitter". Business Insider.
  13. ^ "What's Happening with Me". Biz Stone. 2017-05-16. Retrieved 2017-05-16.
  14. ^ "Device independent message distribution platform".
  15. ^ Kutcher, Ashton (April 30, 2009). "The Twitter Guys". Time. Archived from the original on May 2, 2009.
  16. ^ "GQ Men of the Year>". Archived from <2009 the original on September 6, 2011.
  17. ^ BIZ STONE AWARDED CIPR PRESIDENT’S MEDAL
  18. ^ <Biz "Stone Ugrad Commencement Speaker>".[permanent dead link]
  19. ^ <Biz "Stone>".[permanent dead link]
  20. ^ Malone, Michael (April 19, 2009). "The Twitter Revolution". WSJ.
  21. ^ Efrati, Melissa Korn And Amir (2011-09-01). "Master of 'Biz' Returns to School". Wall Street Journal. ISSN 0099-9660. Retrieved 2020-06-10.
  22. ^ Stone, Biz. "About bizstone". Flickr. Yahoo!. Retrieved 2008-11-07.
  23. ^ Heilpern, John (April 2014)"Out to Lunch with Biz Stone", Vanity Fair. Retrieved May 19, 2014.
  24. ^ Stone, Biz (October 19, 2012). "Exclusive: Biz Stone on Twitter and Activism". The Atlantic.
  25. ^ @Biz (May 10, 2017). "The Google version of Goldman is back. By the way, I'm Jewish. 23andMe! Feel better now?" (Tweet). Archived from the original on 2 Jan 2024 – via Twitter.
  26. ^ Mishler, Jennifer (November 15, 2011). "Watch: Biz Stone on His Love for Turkeys and Farm Sanctuary". Ecorazzi.
  27. ^ Evangelista, Benny (May 2, 2010). "Twitter's Ben Stone supports social causes". SFGate.
  28. ^ "Meet the Team | DonorsChoose". www.donorschoose.org.
  29. ^ Towle, Mimi (August 2010). "Biz Stone". Marin Magazine. Archived from the original on 2012-01-24. Retrieved 2011-09-24.
  30. ^ Schawbel, Dan. June 14, 2012. Biz Stone on His Biggest Challenges, Influences and the Future of Social Media forbes.com

External links[edit]