Steve Martocci

Right.

So started, went to Carnegie Mellon, started really, you know, building my own software.

I only really like to work on projects that I want to exist in the world.

And, uh, you know, eventually that led me to creating GroupMe.

We made it in 24 hours at a hackathon, you know, just to go to concerts with our friends.

Wow.

Uh, it was just pretty awesome.

And, uh, we sold it really fast.

Like it only went for 13 months before we sold it to Skype.

Yeah.

And we had really pioneered, you know, what so many of the features you see today and like iMessage.

I once interviewed someone who worked at Apple and said my job for three years was to copy everything you built in GroupMe into iMessage.

Wow.

So like when you send an emoji and it goes big on its own, like we did that first.

So that was a great journey, except for while I was doing it, I was, you know, I'd hit 300 pounds in college.

And by the time Group Me sold, I was almost 270 pounds.

And I was drinking a ton.

I was eating a ton.

And there was zero focus on my health.

And so had some success was like, man, I want to stay alive.