João Romão

I've been a gamer and a geek for as long as I can remember. It started around 2007, on the hand-me-down PC my older brother passed down to me, where I replayed The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time on an emulator more times than I can count — it was the only game I had.

I was coding before I knew what code was: tweaking my Tumblr's CSS, editing Minecraft files in Notepad so I could spin up a server over Hamachi and play with my friends. I grew up googling whatever I needed to learn — the sworn enemy of "I don't know how to do that."

That curiosity set the direction for my whole life. Apple's Think Different — the one arguing that the people crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do — landed on me at exactly the right age. I knew I wanted to be one of them, using technology to actually change something.

As a kid I built games; as a teenager I moved into design and started one venture after another (and went bust on plenty of them). That same drive still shows up everywhere: a lutherie project I'm just starting, a new venture whenever I spot an opportunity, and gaming with friends.

My long-term goal: to build a life with my wife — somewhere with real quality of life, and the financial and physical freedom to enjoy it.