Jack Dorsey helps people talk online.
He helped start Twitter. He also made a way to pay for things with a phone. These tools help us stay close. Do you like to talk to friends online?
Jack Dorsey helps people talk online.
He helped start Twitter. He also made a way to pay for things with a phone. This tool is called Square.
It lets people swipe cards on a small device. Jack grew up in Missouri. He worked as a fashion model when he was young. He also likes to do yoga. Jack has many big ideas for new tools. He wants to help people connect in new ways.
Jack Dorsey is an American businessman. He helped start Twitter.
He also helped lead the company as its CEO, or chief executive officer. A CEO is a person who runs a company.
Dorsey grew up in Missouri. He worked as a fashion model when he was young. In college, he had a big idea. He wanted a way to share short messages online. He worked with Biz Stone to build a prototype. This became Twitter.
Dorsey also helped start a company called Square.
Square is a tool for small businesses. It uses a small device to read credit cards. This device can plug into a phone. Later, the company changed its name to Block, Inc.
Dorsey has many other interests. He likes yoga and fashion design. He also cares about Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a type of digital money. He has worked on many new ways for people to talk online. He even helped start a group called Bluesky.
Jack Dorsey is a famous American businessman. He is well known for helping start Twitter, Inc.
He also served as the company's CEO, or chief executive officer, during two different times. A CEO is the person who leads a company. Dorsey is also a founder of Block, Inc. and a group called Bluesky. As of February 2026, Forbes said his net worth was $5.9 billion. He has spent much of his life building tools for people to talk to each other online.
Dorsey's big ideas often started with simple questions. While studying at New York University, he wondered about sharing status updates. He wanted a way for friends to see what others were doing in real time. He worked with Biz Stone to build a prototype in about two weeks. They decided that SMS, which is a text message, was the best way to do this. This project eventually became the famous service known as Twitter.
Dorsey's path to success had many different steps. He was born in St. Louis, Missouri, on November 19, 1976. His father, Timothy, worked with scientific machines called mass spectrometers. His mother, Marcia, was a homemaker. Before he was a tech leader, Dorsey worked as a fashion model. He also studied at the University of Missouri–Rolla and New York University. He even started a company in Oakland in the year 2000 to help dispatch taxis and couriers.
He also helped create a very useful tool for small businesses. Along with Jim McKelvey, he developed Square in May 2010.
Square uses a small device that plugs into a phone to read credit cards. This lets people pay for things easily using a mobile device. The company grew very fast from 10 employees to over 100 people. Later, the company changed its name to Block, Inc. to include his interest in blockchain technology.
Today, Dorsey's work connects to many parts of our modern world. He has met with leaders like President Barack Obama and President Donald Trump.
He has also testified before the U.S. Senate about how social media works. Dorsey is a big supporter of Bitcoin, which is a type of digital currency. He even launched a new messaging app called Bitchat in 2025. This app uses Bluetooth to let people talk without needing the internet.
Jack Patrick Dorsey is a prominent American businessman and technology entrepreneur. He is most widely recognized as the co-founder of Twitter, Inc. Dorsey served as the company's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) during two distinct periods: from 2007 to 2008 and again from 2015 to 2021. Beyond social media, he is the co-founder and chairman of Block, Inc., the parent company of the Square financial services platform. He also founded the decentralized social networking project known as Bluesky. As of February 2026, Forbes estimated his personal net worth to be approximately $5.9 billion.
Dorsey's interest in communication technology began with dispatch routing. After attending the University of Missouri–Rolla, he transferred to New York University in 1997. While studying there, he developed the core concept for what would become Twitter. In 2000, he moved to California and started a company in Oakland to dispatch taxis, couriers, and emergency services via the web. During this time, he also explored ideas for medical device networks and frictionless service markets. He was inspired by platforms like LiveJournal and AOL Instant Messenger to create a real-time status update service.
The development of Twitter involved a specific sequence of collaboration and technical choices. Dorsey approached the company Odeo, which was interested in text messaging, with his idea for a status service. Alongside Biz Stone, Dorsey decided that Short Message Service (SMS), or text messaging, was the ideal medium for these short updates. They successfully built a functional prototype of the service in only about two weeks. The project gained significant momentum and investment from Evan Williams, a co-founder of Odeo who had previously worked at Google. Eventually, Odeo was renamed Obvious Corporation and spun off Twitter, Inc. as its own entity.
Dorsey's leadership at Twitter was marked by both growth and significant challenges. As the first CEO in 2007, he prioritized system uptime over immediate revenue generation. However, he lost his leadership position in 2008, reportedly due to his interest in pursuits like yoga and fashion design. He later returned to the company as executive chairman in 2011 and as permanent CEO in 2015. During his tenure, he managed various platform shifts, such as the 2016 decision to exclude photos and links from the 140-character limit. This change aimed to encourage more text-based interaction after daily tweet volumes fluctuated between 661 million in 2014 and 300 million in 2016.
Throughout his career, Dorsey has navigated complex political and social environments. In 2009, while serving as chairman, he delayed site maintenance during the Green Revolution in Iran to ensure citizens could communicate. He also testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2018 regarding foreign interference in elections. Dorsey met with President Donald Trump at the White House in 2019 to discuss platform civility. He has also faced criticism regarding the spread of misinformation on social media. In 2021, he resigned as CEO following a period of intense scrutiny from the US Senate Commerce Committee regarding legal immunity under Section 230.
In addition to social media, Dorsey has made major impacts on financial technology through Block, Inc. In May 2010, he and Jim McKelvey released Square, a small hardware device that connects to mobile devices via a headphone jack. This device allows small businesses to accept credit and debit card payments by swiping a card and capturing a digital signature. The company experienced rapid growth, expanding from 10 employees in 2009 to over 100 by June 2011. In 2015, the company filed for an Initial Public Offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange. Dorsey later renamed the parent company Block, Inc. in 2021 to reflect his interest in blockchain technology.
Dorsey's interests extend deeply into the world of digital currencies and decentralized systems. He is a vocal advocate for Bitcoin and has provided seed funding for OCEAN, a Bitcoin mining pool designed to decentralize the mining process. He also supports the Nostr social networking protocol. In 2025, he launched Bitchat, a peer-to-peer messaging app that utilizes Bluetooth mesh networking. This technology allows users to connect and communicate without requiring an active internet connection. His work continues to focus on how technology can empower individuals through decentralized tools and direct connections.
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