The Creator Of One Of The World's Biggest And Most Powerful Web Sites Is Not Rich
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Chris Poole created a site called 4chan.org back when he was 15 years old.
4chan is now a huge website.
According to SimilarWeb, it is the 154th largest in the US and the 360th largest in the world. It's just a little smaller than NYT.com.
4chan is also incredibly influential.
"Memes" like Lolcats and Rick Rolling started there. The hacking group Anonymous, and the group behind protests like Occupy Wall Street, first organized themselves there.
You'd think, having created such a big and powerful Website in his teens, Poole would be very wealthy.
He's not.
It's weird.
Since 4chan, Poole launched a company called Canvas, which he pivoted into a drawing-based art community called DrawQuest. That startup folded earlier this year.
Watch Poole talk about why he missed on fame and fortune with his first company.
Edited by Justin Gmoser. Originally published in July 2013.