About Me

I was born in a small city in Romania, called Ramnicu-Valcea. Years later, the city became famous as “Hackerville”. A bunch of kids decided to start doing a bit of cyber-crime and in a few years they became quite skilled at it, penetrating a few servers and doing a lot of black hat hacking. Add to this the usual sensationalism of mainstrem media, and that’s how the surname of the city was created. Truth is, Ramnicu-Valcea had one of the highest (if not the highest) concentration of informatics engineers and educators per square meter in Romania. In 1987 I got admitted to an informatics class at my high-school, from which I also graduated as analyst-programmer.

In 1987, I repeat.

In case you didn’t understand, I repeat once more: in 1987 we were playing with Z80 processors and we were writing software. So, it wasn’t necessarily that in Ramnicu-Valcea were more hackers than in any other Romanian city, but the overall informatics-savvy people were way, way more than in other cities. So it was probably the same proportion.

Fortunately, as a kid I knew nothing about this and I had a great time spending my summer holidays at my grand-parents, in the countryside.

Unfortunately, I soon realized I was living in a very disempowering time, namely a totalitarian communist regime led by a dictator called Ceausescu.

Fortunately, it turned out I could use my mind in a constructive way, so I decided to attend a college in the main city, Bucharest.

Unfortunately, I picked the Faculty of Letters, which didn’t have a lot of perspective.

Fortunately, I got in the second, after an exam in which 600 people were competing for 100 places.

Unfortunately, after getting in, I had to pay my duty for the country, in the form of military service, which, at the time, was compulsory.

Fortunately, because I was alredy enrolled in college, my service time was only 9 months, instead of 27.

Unfortunately, during my service, the Romanian Revolution happened, which turned to be quite a chaotic and bloody event. Basically, a war.

Fortunately, I got out of it alive.

Unfortunately, the country was left in chaos and it took a lot of time until it reached a decent level of living.

Fortunately, I was a student, so living light and being flexible allowed me to enjoy these chaotic years a lot.

Unfortunately, these years got to an end when I finsihed my college and I had to start doing something with my life.

Fortunately, finding a job was easy if you were willing to put in the work.

Unfortunately, I picked a job in mainstream media, as a radio anchor.

Fortunately, it paid well.

Unfortunately, it was eating me alive. I didn’t feel good at all doing it.

Fortunately, after 7 long years, I got the power to leave mainstream media and found a job in a digital company.

Unfortunately, my skills were insufficent for a senior position.

Fortunately, my position gave me the time to learn. So I learned a lot. I learned C from scratch and bought a desktop computer.

Unfortunately, even with a new level of skills, my perspectives in that company were quite limited. So I quit.

Fortunately, I knew what I was doing, because that’s how my first company started.

Unfortunately, I soon found out that being an entrepreneur is way more difficult than being an employee.

Fortunately, it paid off.

Unfortunately, after 9 years, I felt quite tired and bored, so I decided to sell it. In 9 years I created 21 different portals, with 2 of them becoming number one in their niches.

Fortunately, I was able to sell just weeks before Lehman-Borthers happened.

Unfortunately, I put (almost) all the money in real-state. Which translates in pretty much losing (almost) everything.

Fortunately, I started this blog.

And that’s how the whole thing you’re reading now started. Feel free to start from the first article if you want to know more about me.

Warning: there are more than 1.000.000 words in here. So take your time.

Meanwhile, here are few facts: