Brad Fitzpatrick American programmer, Creator of LiveJournal Date of Birth: 05.02.1980 Country: USA

1. Biography of Brad Fitzpatrick
2. Creation of LiveJournal
3. Development and Sale of LiveJournal
4. Transition to Google

Biography of Brad Fitzpatrick

Brad Fitzpatrick, an American programmer, was born on February 5, 1980, in the state of Iowa, USA, but grew up in Oregon. In his high school years, he created his first internet company, FreeVote.com. In 1998, he enrolled at the University of Washington in Seattle, where he studied computer science.

Creation of LiveJournal

Fitzpatrick was dissatisfied with the existing online diary systems and developed a program for quickly and conveniently updating his own website. As more of his friends wanted to use the program, he eventually launched it on his own server and allowed registration for anyone interested. In 1999, the resulting online diary service was registered under the name LiveJournal, and Fitzpatrick established the company Danga Interactive in Portland, Oregon to manage it.

With LiveJournal's increasing popularity, funding was needed for its expansion. Fitzpatrick turned to the users for donations, and later introduced paid accounts with additional services.

Development and Sale of LiveJournal

In 2002, Fitzpatrick completed his studies at the university and dedicated himself fully to working on his own service. LiveJournal continued to evolve, providing users with new features. As blogs gained popularity and the blogosphere developed, Fitzpatrick received offers to buy his creation. He chose the San Francisco-based company Six Apart. The terms offered allowed Fitzpatrick to continue working on LiveJournal, and the buyer and the seller shared the same vision for the future of the project. In January 2005, LiveJournal and Danga were sold to Six Apart. Fitzpatrick assumed the role of Chief Information Architect at Six Apart, focusing on the technical development of LiveJournal while leaving the financial and marketing aspects to the specialists at Six Apart. The Russian segment of LiveJournal was serviced by the Russian company "SUP" starting from 2006.

Transition to Google

In August 2007, it was announced that Fitzpatrick would be leaving Six Apart to join Google as a software development specialist. Fitzpatrick explained his decision by stating that he was tired of working on LiveJournal and denied any dissatisfaction with Six Apart. However, his departure came amidst reports of growing difficulties within the company. On December 3, 2007, it was officially announced that the LiveJournal service was completely acquired by the company "SUP," which created LiveJournal Inc., a registered company in the USA, to globally manage the service. The new company established an advisory board, which included Fitzpatrick among others.