Mark Zuckerberg is an American technology entrepreneur, investor, and philanthropist. He is renowned as the co-founder and CEO of Facebook, one of the world’s most extensive social media platforms. With his success in this field, many question if Zuckerberg has coding experience and whether he is a web developer.
Zuckerberg began coding when he was in high school, designing a messaging program named “Zucknet.” He also created computer games and other programs. After graduating from Phillips Exeter Academy in 2002, he attended Harvard University where he continued to sharpen his programming abilities. It was during this time that he created CourseMatch, a program that enabled students to pick classes based on the choices of other students.
In 2004, Zuckerberg launched “Thefacebook” with fellow Harvard students Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Moskovitz and Chris Hughes. In just 24 hours of its launch, more than 1,000 college networks had signed up for the new social media platform. By 2005, Thefacebook had extended to include high schools and international universities, eventually becoming known simply as “Facebook” in 2006.
As CEO of Facebook, many assume that Zuckerberg spends all of his time managing the company and its operations. However, he still codes occasionally–both on projects associated with the company as well as on personal projects that have no connection to his business life. In 2011, he made a version of Scrabble for Facebook which became one of the most popular applications on the platform at that time.
When asked about his programming skills in an interview with ABC News’ Diane Sawyer in 2010, Zuckerberg stated: “I think I’m pretty good at it [programming]. But there are some things I’m not so adept at…I’m not very competent at writing code for graphics or for animation or something like that.”
Mark Zuckerberg may not be thought of as a professional web developer by traditional standards since he does not have formal education or years of experience under his belt. Nevertheless, considering his impressive achievements while coding early on in life and ongoing involvement with programming activities throughout his career at Facebook, there is no doubt that Mark Zuckerberg has comprehensive knowledge when it comes to developing software and websites.